Shewolf dedicated her adult life to the dream of lesbian community and in service of women. She worked to achieve equal pay for equal work at the University of Louisiana, at the Lafayette campus in southwest Louisiana. She started holding feminist potlucks that continued for 15 years. Shewolf wore a pants suit to her interview for her job at the University of Louisiana, which was quite revolutionary at the time.
Theresa âTerriâ Barry came out in 1976 when she was in her early twenties and still in college. That same year, she met her then-partner Joan Mayfield, and they decided to start a feminist bookstore. From 1977 to about 1980, she and Joan ran Labrys Books in the living room of their Richmond, Virginia, home. They chose the name Labrys, after the double headed ritual axe found in ancient Minoan depictions of the Mother Goddess. The bookstore was run with the support of the Richmond Lesbian Feminists, an organization that still exists today.
In the 1970s, Lenny Lasater was a trailblazer for women, first in the Birmingham coal mines, then, in the trade union for electricians, The International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, when she was in Nashville, Tennessee, and later, in Atlanta, Georgia. She formed her own business, Lenny Lasater Electrical, in Atlanta, where she also got clean and sober. Also, she started a band that is now called âJust Roxie.â Throughout, she has been out and proud of who she is, âa very butch lesbian.â
Roberta Arnold writes about her mother, June Arnold, novelist and founder of Daughters, Inc. publishing company. Julia Penelope once said that June filled out a form stating her religion as âWomen,â and this was true. She was fierce in her devotion to the Womenâs Movement.Â