Shortly after the establishment of the Republic of Turkey in 1923, women's suffrage became a subject of debate,as the new regime was founded on the idea of popular sovereignty and promised women equal rights. Intellectual and professional women openly expressed their interest in political matters and demanded becoming active participants in the political process. When the state granted women the right to vote and to be elected in the municipal and then national elections in 1930s, hundreds of thousands of women cast their ballots for the first time and seventeen women entered the parliament. This event marked a watershed in terms of gender equality and has been celebrated since as one of the biggest achievements of the republican regime. Consequently, it has also become an irrevocable part of the narratives of this period. Yet, the female voters and candidates who participated in these "groundbreaking" elections have attracted almost no attention in historiography. This paper will focus on these women, exploring the following questions: Who were the women who went to the polls and were nominated for public offices in the elections of 1930 and 1935? Under which circumstances did they vote or become candidates? And how did they interpret their roles as the first female voters and popularly elected public officers in the transformation of Turkey and particularly in the establishment of gender equality? The purpose of this study, which is based on a variety of primary sources, such as national and foreign newspapers, parliamentary archives, reports of government officials, memoirs, and biographies is threefold. It aims, first, to find out these women's educational, economic, ethnic, and religious backgrounds; second, to understand their views on and expectations about women's suffrage; and third, to determine the impact of women's acquisition of political rights on gender equality.