Legally married at last after 55 years
Two pioneers marry for the second time and become California's first legal same-sex marriage.
On 16 June 2008 at 5.01 pm, Del Martin, 87, and Phyllis Lyon, 84, married at San Francisco City Hall. It was the first legal same-sex marriage in California, and for the two women it was already their second wedding.
Four years earlier, in February 2004, San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom had begun issuing marriage licences to same-sex couples. Martin and Lyon were the first couple to marry at the time. But the California Supreme Court annulled these marriages shortly afterwards. Now, in 2008, the same court declared the ban on same-sex marriage unconstitutional. Mayor Newsom married Martin and Lyon personally, in the same blue and lavender trouser suits as the first time.
The two women had known each other since 1950, had lived together in San Francisco since 1953 and had helped shape the queer civil rights movement for decades: in 1955 they founded the Daughters of Bilitis, the first nationwide lesbian organisation in the United States, and a year later the first nationally distributed lesbian magazine, "The Ladder". In 1971, Martin became the first openly lesbian woman elected to the board of the National Organization for Women.
Six weeks after the wedding, on 27 August 2008, Del Martin died. That same year, California voters approved Proposition 8 to abolish marriage rights for same-sex couples again. The 18,000 marriages concluded between June and November 2008, however, remained valid.