# Phyllis Lyon Born November 10, 1924 in Tulsa, Oklahoma; died April 9, 2020 in San Francisco. Lesbian feminist organizer, journalist, and lifelong partner of **[[Del Martin]]**. Together Lyon and Martin co-founded the **[[Daughters of Bilitis]]** in San Francisco on September 21, 1955, and pioneered the post-war American lesbian civil rights movement. ## Career Highlights - **Founding editor of *The Ladder*** (1956–1960) — the first nationally distributed American lesbian magazine, which Lyon ran under the pseudonym "Ann Ferguson" for the first issues to protect her position as a journalism graduate - **Co-author of *Lesbian/Woman*** (1972) with Martin — the foundational popular-press book on American lesbian life - **Co-founder of the Council on Religion and the Homosexual** (1964), an early bridge between progressive Protestant clergy and the homophile movement — a relationship that produced critical institutional cover for early gay-rights organizing in San Francisco - **Sex educator** — Lyon held a doctorate in education from the Institute for the Advanced Study of Human Sexuality and worked as a sex-education instructor for decades ## The Long Marriage Lyon and Martin met in Seattle in 1950 and became partners in 1953. Their relationship lasted 55 years until Martin's death in 2008. They were the **first same-sex couple legally married in California** — twice: in San Francisco on February 12, 2004 (a marriage subsequently voided), and again on June 16, 2008 after *In re Marriage Cases*. The 2008 wedding remains one of the most-photographed images in the American marriage-equality movement. Lyon survived Martin by nearly twelve years, dying April 9, 2020 in San Francisco at age 95. --- ## See Also - [[Queer Liberation Ecosystem]] - [[Queer Liberation Timeline]] - [[Daughters of Bilitis]] - [[Del Martin]]