Del Martin (1921-2008) and Phyllis Lyon (1924-2020) were two pioneering lesbian activists who fought tirelessly for the recognition of lesbian issues as feminist issues. They dedicated their lives to creating a safe haven for lesbian women and advocating for their civil rights.
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Hello, from Wonder Media Network, I’m Jenny Kaplan and this is Encyclopedia Womannica.
Today, we celebrate two pioneering lesbian activists who fought tirelessly for the recognition of lesbian issues as feminist issues. They dedicated their lives to creating a safe haven for lesbian women and advocating for their civil rights. Let’s talk about Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon.
Del Martin was born Dorothy Taliaferro in San Francisco, California on May 5, 1921. She graduated from high school as the class salutatorian before studying journalism at the University of California-Berkeley and at San Francisco State College. When Del was 19, she married James Martin. The couple had one daughter together. After four years of marriage, Del and James divorced. Although she kept her ex-husband’s surname, it was after this marriage that she changed her first name to Del.
Phyllis Lyon was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma on November 10, 1924. At a young age, her family moved to northern California. Phyllis stayed close to home for college. She graduated with a degree in journalism from the University of California-Berkeley in 1946. After a few years of working as a general reporter, Phyllis left California and took a job on the editorial staff of two magazines in Seattle, Washington.
Del and Phyllis met for the first time when Del joined Phyllis’ magazine staff. The two immediately hit it off and became fast friends. Their friendship evolved into a romantic relationship and on Valentine’s Day of 1953, they moved into a place together in San Francisco.
Their neighborhood in San Francisco was a very Catholic, working-class, heterosexual community. Del and Phyllis struggled with solation as they found it difficult to develop a social network. To combat this lack of connection and community, they founded the Daughters of Bilitis or DOB in 1955. The name was inspired by a collection of erotic poems called “Songs of Bilitis” that celebrated lesbian sexuality.
At its inception, DOB consisted of 8 members. It was the first lesbian civil and political rights organization in the United States. It was intended to be a secret social club for lesbians who did not feel comfortable going to bar. At that time, gay and lesbian bars were being raided and harassed by police. It transformed into a community where lesbians could feel safe to come out, connect with other lesbians, and find support to cope with the challenges of being unaccepted by much of society.
Del and Phyllis served as counselors to their fellow members. They would provide rides to meetings and offered consolation when members were having problems in their personal lives. They understood and commiserated with women who feared losing their jobs, their homes, and their families due to their sexuality.
Although they originally intended for the group to be a secret, Del and Phyllis decided they wanted to give the group more visibility and recognition. With Phyllis as their fearless editor, DOB began publishing a monthly magazine, called The Ladder. It was the first nationally distributed lesbian publication in the U.S. and Del and Phyllis made it a point to capitalize the word “Lesbian” every time it appeared. Del and Phyllis were inducted into the LGBT Journalists Hall of Fame for their work on The Ladder in 2005.
In the early 1960s, there was a rise in oppression and violence against the homosexual community. Phyllis and Del worked alongside other gay and lesbian activists to urge state legislators to change California sex laws that criminalized homosexuality. The legislators told them that if they wanted to make progress with their movement they should join forces with religious leaders.
Phyllis and Del met with progressive Methodist clergyman, Ted McIlvenna. Ted was in charge of the young adult outreach program at the Glide Urban Center. Through his outreach, he realized that many of the homeless youth in the program were misunderstood gay men who were driven to the streets after being ostracized by their friends and families. Because Ted himself was heterosexual, he sought support from local homophile organizations. Ted invited Phyllis and Del to a historic consultation between religious leaders and gay and lesbian activists. In 1964, the Council on Religion and the Homosexual was born. It was the first group in the U.S. to use the word “homosexual” in its name. The organization played a pivotal role in the movement to gain religious support for gay and lesbian rights.
Phyllis went on to work as Ted’s assistant at the Glide Foundation. Together, they founded the National Sex and Drug Forum which was intended to educate clergy on drug cultures and non-heteronormative sexuality. With Phyllis as a founding faculty member, the forum evolved into The Institute for Advanced Study of Human Sexuality.
Phyllis and Del also joined the National Organization for Women. They were among the first out lesbians to get involved and Del was the first out lesbian elected to the board of directors. Their main efforts between 1971 and 1973 revolved around adopting resolutions that supported lesbian issues being recognized as feminist issues.
Phyllis and Del published their first book Lesbian/Woman in 1972 and their second Lesbian Love and Liberation in 1973. These were trailblazing pieces of literature that depicted lesbians in modern America in a realistic, supportive way. They discussed sexual liberty and what it means to be a lesbian. These books helped to lay a foundation for lesbian feminism.
While Phyllis and Del did a lot of collaborative work, they also had individual successes. Del helped lead the campaign to have the American Psychiatric Association denounce its previous declaration that homosexuality was a mental illness. And Phyllis chaired the San Franciscans Against the Briggs Initiative, a group that fought and defeated the initiative to ban gays and lesbians from working in California public schools.
On February 12, 2004, Phyllis and Del got married after then San Francisco mayor, Gavin Newsom, directed the city clerk to issue same-sex couples marriage licenses. But their marriage license was voided 6 months later when a California appellate court ruled that the mayor had exceeded his legal authority by issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples.
In May 2008, the California Supreme Court overturned the ruling. On June 16, 2008, at the ages of 87 and 83 and after over 50 years together, Phyllis and Del were the first same-sex couple married in California.
Just two months after they got married, Del passed away on August 27, 2008, at the age of 87. Phyllis died on April 9, 2020, at the age of 95.
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