The Richmond Tea Rooms is an “Alice in Wonderland” themed restaurant in the heart of Manchester’s Gay Village.
It’s a unique and wonderful experience and members of Out In The City dined in the enchanted forest area. The food and service were of the highest quality, but in my view, it was a little pricy.
Carolyn Weathers, photographed on 12 January 2024, stands next to the Heritage Award she received from the City of Los Angeles in 2015 for her work to improve the lives of the LGBTQ community. Photo: Q Voice News
Carolyn Weathers was born 19 February 1940, in Eastland Texas, daughter of a Baptist minister, but not the type that comes to mind today. He wrote papers on the importance of the separation of church and state. He and her mother accepted their two lesbian daughters, and their home was always open to their daughters’s LGBT+ friends. Carolyn had the fortune to always feel right about herself and to know she was not the only one.
As a librarian with the Los Angeles Public Library, she organised the first reading by LGBT+ writers at the Los Angeles Public Library’s Central Library. In 2015, she received a Heritage Award from the City of Los Angeles for her work to improve the lives of the LGBT+ community. That same year, Carolyn, who was retired, was named the “Grand Lesbrarian” of the LA Pride Parade.
In her own words:
“I’m proud of the people who paved the way. I’m proud of my big sister Brenda, who was expelled from college for “moral turpitude” homosexuality in 1957 when she was 20.
Brenda was handcuffed in a Denton, Texas jail and told she could return to college if she renounced her homosexuality. She refused to do that. After being expelled, Brenda moved to Los Angeles and became a leading LGBTQ activist in the 1970s. Her story is representative of the stories of countless others.
Coming out in 1961
When I came out in 1961, there was no Pride. We in the community had camaraderie, but only in each other’s homes or in the gay bars, which were subject to police raids.
We had no public display of Pride except during San Antonio’s annual Fiesta San Antonio, a twin to New Orleans’s Mardi Gras, and to Rio de Janeiro’s Carnavale, where people are allowed, even expected, to act outside the norms.
One of the celebrations is in La Villita, a historic Mexican village in the heart of downtown San Antonio. We had a place we called the “Gay Curb” where we met and acted just gay enough for people to assume we were gay. The light kiss on the cheek, the holding of hands. That was OK. It was Carnavale after all.
Moving to LA in 1968
Things were different in Los Angeles, where I moved in 1968, drawn there by the burgeoning counterculture and hippies.
Gay, feminists, lesbian-feminists, cross-dressing friends, and I performed impromptu guerrilla theatre on Hollywood Boulevard, usually in front of the tour buses, and we got away with it, but not without angry shouts from some of the passers-by. Things might have been better in Los Angeles, but they had a long way to go.
I’m proud to have been part of the early movement that brought about change.
Protesting in LA in the 1970s
In 1970, the Los Angeles Gay Liberation Front, of which I was a member, held the first Pride Parade in Los Angeles, in Hollywood. It was called the Christopher Street West Parade, named after the location of the Stonewall Inn in New York City.
I can’t describe the thrill of stepping out into the middle of Hollywood Boulevard and marching.
In 1971, the Los Angeles Gay Liberation Front had a “Gay-In” at the merry-go-round in Griffith Park. Over 100 members of the community showed up. We sang, we danced, revelling in ourselves and who we were. “Free to Be, You and Me,” we shouted.”
Disrupting the American Psychiatric Association
On 17 October 1970, the Biltmore Hotel in Los Angeles hosted the Second Annual Behavioural Modification Conference. The audience was watching a film by Dr M Phillip Feldman, which was making the case for electroshock therapy as the “cure” for homosexuality. Carolyn Weathers, centre, stands at the podium inside the Biltmore. Weathers and approximately 35 men and women from the Los Angeles Gay Liberation Front stormed the stage and cancelled the screening in what became known as the Biltmore Invasion. That demonstration effectively forced one of the first dialogues between mental health professionals and the gay community. Within two years of that incident, “homosexuality” was removed as a mental disorder after decades of stigma and official misclassification.
Today, Pride enables LGBT people who are out in the world to thrive in their authentic selves. Pride offers stepping stones to those who want to come out, but are hesitant for whatever reason. Just knowing that there is such a thing as Pride can offer some comfort to those who, for whatever reason, never come out.
Gay Holocaust Survivor on TikTok
Grandma Elli
A gay Holocaust survivor has taken to TikTok with the help of her grandchildren to slam “wannabe dictator” Donald Trump.
88-year-old Grandma Elli began posting on TikTok (@grandmaelli) this month, urging her followers not to vote for Republican hopeful Donald Trump in November’s presidential election, while sharing her artwork and collages.
Her TikTok has already had more than 10,000 followers!
This year the theme of Hate Crime Awareness Week is “in solidarity with those affected by homophobic hate crime targeted towards the LGBT+ community”.
Manchester Pride have organised a Community Session on Hate Crime Awareness on 22 October from 6.00pm to 8.00pm at The Proud Place.
Join a panel of expert speakers to understand topics such as: What is a hate crime? What do I do if I experience a hate crime? How do I support someone who has experienced a hate crime?
The number of reported hate crimes against LGBT+ people in England and Wales has dropped slightly in the past year but campaigners say the figures are still “deeply worrying”.
New research published by the government on 10 October, showed that hate crimes based on a person’s sexual orientation dropped by eight per cent in the year 2023-2024, compared with 2022-2023, while transphobic hate crime fell by two per cent.
In the year ending March 2024, there were 22,839 reported hate crimes involving a person’s sexual orientation, and 4,780 transphobic crimes.
These are still record-high numbers in comparison to previous years, and only account for the tip of the iceberg, particularly when underreporting is taken into account. How many times have you been called a fag, a dyke, or a nonce in the street and dismissed it as part of daily life? These are hate crimes – and even if you didn’t report them, it puts into context just how bad the situation still is in the UK.
Meanwhile, we should be vigilant that the fight back out of this is long from over.
The Home Office defines a hate crime as “any criminal offence which is perceived, by the victim or any other person, to be motivated by hostility or prejudice towards someone based on a personal characteristic.”
Those characteristics include race, ethnicity, religious beliefs, sexual orientation, disability, and gender identity.
Anyone who has witnessed or experienced a hate crime is urged to call the police on 101, Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111 or visit the True Vision website. In an emergency, always dial 999.
The Age of Consent
“The Age of Consent” album cover
The Age of Consent is the debut album by British band Bronski Beat (Steve Bronski, Larry Steinbachek and Jimmy Somerville), released on London Records on 15 October 1984.
By 1984, many European countries had reduced the age of consent for homosexual acts to 16, but it remained at 21 in the United Kingdom, having only been partially decriminalised in 1967. Homosexuality was not ‘legalised’ in Scotland, where Somerville was born, until 1981. The wording of the legislation to decriminalise also included wording that placed restrictions such as making illegal the use of a hotel room for sex. Homosexuality was further stigmatised beyond the restrictions placed on homosexual individuals, and homophobia was a danger to gay individuals.
“The Age of Consent” inner sleeve
Against this background, Bronski, Steinbachek, and Somerville met in Brixton in 1983, and soon formed Bronski Beat. They signed a recording contract with London Records in 1984 after doing only nine live gigs.
The album was produced by Mike Thorne; the recording sessions took place in London and New York City.
The inner sleeve of the album has a table listing the minimum age for lawful homosexual relationships between men in each country in Europe, accompanied by the telephone number of a service giving gay legal advice. It was removed from the United States release of the album on the basis of “past sensitivities of several record store chains”.
The band’s debut single – “Smalltown Boy” – was released on 25 May 1984, peaking at number 3 in the UK Singles Chart in June, and reaching number one in Belgium, Italy, and the Netherlands. It is a poetically poignant, soul searching composition addressing homophobia, loneliness and family misunderstanding. It perfectly encapsulates the experience of being young and gay in the ’80s.
It was accompanied by a video of Jimmy Somerville with fellow band member friends Larry Steinbachek and Steve Bronski, who, while cruising at a public swimming pool and changing room, are attacked and beaten up by a gang of homophobes. Somerville is returned to his family by the police; he leaves home alone and has a reunion with friends Steinbachek and Bronski, travelling to a new life on a train.
The band had the telephone number of the London Gay Switchboard (telephone support and information for gays and lesbians in central London) etched into the inner groove of the 12″ vinyl version.
Coming Out Stories will take you to one the most important moments in many people’s lives. It will perch you on sofas in suburban sitting rooms, stand you in front of officials’ desks, put you at the centre of a crowd in a noisy classroom, everywhere where these conversations have happened.
Podcast: The Most Important Conversations Happen in Bed
Across 50 years of bedsheets, the love story of two extraordinary women unfolds against the backdrop of evolving LGBTQ+ rights in Britain. The romance between wild-hearted Margo and shrinking violet Lucille twists and turns as the political debate around queer love transforms from aversion to acceptance over the decades.
Queer female stories and longstanding lesbian relationships are rarely seen or heard in the media. This drama is quietly radical in its intimate depiction of two women’s personal lives revolutionised by the outside world’s changing relationship to queer love. The play asks – is love enough to weather the storm of conflicting political debate?
Lie your head on the same pillow as Margo and Lucille as they have the most important conversations of their lives in the privacy of their bed, laying bare the dreams, frustrations and secrets they dare not speak in public.
Cast: Margo (17 years) …….. Tamara Brabon Lucille (17 years) ……… Laura Marcus Margo (29/40 years) …….. Lucy Ellinson Lucille (29/40 years) ……… Kelly Hotten Margo (66 years) …….. Cara Chase Lucille (66 years) ……… Alexandra Mathie
In a rare piece of drama that not only looks at a black, gay relationship, Mr Loverman also follows the life of elder gays in a relationship in a TV adaptation of Bernardine Evaristo’s 2013 best-selling novel.
The eight-part drama starts on Monday (14 October) on BBC One at 9.00pm. Mr Loverman follows Barrington Jedidiah Walker, who is known around town as a suave and charismatic elder. Barrington known as Barry to his mates, is a 74-year-old, Antiguan-born, exuberant Hackney personality, renowned for his dapper taste and fondness for retro suits.
His wife has fears that he has been cheating on her with other women. But what she doesn’t know is that Barrington is having an affair with his best friend and soulmate Morris. In what has been described as “a life-affirming story about family, love, and being true to yourself”, viewers will be in for a treat with this series.
The ’80s are synonymous with the music of Holly Johnson and Frankie Goes to Hollywood. As the band were storming the charts, Britain was going through a cultural revolution. On the 40th anniversary of the album Welcome to the Pleasuredome, released in 1984, this exhibition charts the life and career of Liverpool lad Holly Johnson and his meteoric ascension to fame, where he became one of the first openly gay and openly HIV+ high profile artists in history.
Delivered in partnership with Homotopia and Duovision, this exhibition tells the story of Holly’s very public experience with homophobia and HIV+ stigma. It reflects the polarising emotions of glamour, fun and sexual liberation, as well as fear and loss, encapsulating the experiences of the LGBT+ community at the time, an important moment in our history, and its legacy today.
Holly Johnson (William Johnson) was born on 9 February 1960 in Wavertree, Liverpool. He attended St Mary’s Church of England Primary School from 1965, where he starred in plays, wrote poetry and created his first song on a glockenspiel.
In 1972, he enrolled at Liverpool Collegiate Grammar School for Boys. The music of David Bowie and Marc Bolan inspired Holly, he started dyeing his hair and acquired the nickname “Joyful Johnson”.
By 1973, Holly had started writing songs, composed on an acoustic guitar, purchased with cigarette coupons. He attended school less frequently, due to the hostility he and his friend, “Honey Heath” experienced, in response to their increasingly outrageous appearance.
During his later school years, Holly discovered the work of Andy Warhol, The Velvet Underground, Derek Jarman, William Burroughs and Jean Genet. He adopted the name “Holly Johnson” and never looked back.
Relax, Two Tribes and The Power of Love all reached number 1. They became the second act, in the history of the UK charts, to reach number 1 with their first three singles, after fellow scousers, Gerry and the Pacemakers in the 1960s.
National Coming Out Day was first celebrated in 1988 based on the idea that the most basic form of LGBT+ activism was coming out to family, friends, and colleagues.
Be proud of who you are and your support for LGBT+ equality this National Coming Out Day!
Sharing our authentic selves with others is not always safe or easy, and it is not a one-day event — but when possible, it can be an extraordinarily powerful key to breaking down the barriers we face as LGBT+ people. We are still coming together, celebrating ourselves, and advocating for our rights. It is more important than ever that we show up to send a clear message against the threats to equality: We are not going anywhere.
Matthew Shepard
Matthew Shepard
Matthew Wayne Shepard (1 December 1976 – 12 October 1998) was an American student at the University of Wyoming who was beaten, tortured, and left to die near Laramie on the night of 6 October 1998. He was taken by rescuers to Poudre Valley Hospital in Fort Collins, Colorado, where he died six days later from severe head injuries received during the attack.
Suspects Aaron McKinney and Russell Henderson were arrested shortly after the attack and charged with first-degree murder following Shepard’s death. Significant media coverage was given to the murder and what role Shepard’s sexual orientation played as a motive for the crime, as he was gay.
The prosecutor argued that the murder of Shepard was premeditated and driven by greed. McKinney’s defence counsel countered by arguing that he had intended only to rob Shepard but killed him in a rage when Shepard made a sexual advance toward him. McKinney’s girlfriend told police that he had been motivated by anti-gay sentiment, but later recanted her statement, saying that she had lied because she thought it would help him. Henderson pleaded guilty to murder, and McKinney was tried and found guilty of murder; each of them received two consecutive life sentences.
Shepard’s murder brought national and international attention to hate crime legislation at both the state and federal level. In October 2009, the United States Congress passed the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr Hate Crimes Prevention Act (commonly the “Matthew Shepard Act” or “Shepard / Byrd Act” for short), and on 28 October 2009, President Barack Obama signed the legislation into law. Following their son’s murder, Dennis and Judy Shepard became LGBT rights activists and established the Matthew Shepard Foundation.
Matthew Shepard’s mother gets ‘unexpected honour’ of Presidential Medal of Freedom
Judy Shepard and Dennis Shepard, the parents of Matthew Shepard (Image: Markus Bidaux)
The mother of Matthew Shepard has expressed her gratitude at the “unexpected honour” of being recognised for her campaigning in the years since her son’s death.
Matthew Shepard’s murder in 1998 sent shock waves around the world. He was found dead and tied to a fence in Laramie, Wyoming after being beaten and tortured.
On 3 May 2024, Judy Shepard, Matthew’s mother, was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom. The honour is the highest civilian award in the United States. In an opening address at the event at the White House, President Biden mentioned Judy’s work. “The brutal murder of your son galvanised the movement into a law in his name [to] protect LGBTQ Americans. Your relentless advocacy is a reminder that we must give hate no safe harbour and that we can turn into purpose that pain.”
The note that accompanied Judy’s medal said: “Judy Shepard took a mother’s most profound pain and turned her son’s memory into a movement. Matthew Shepard’s brutal death 25 years ago shocked the conscience of our nation and galvanised millions of Americans to stand against anti-LGBTQI+ hate.
Together with her husband, Dennis, their courageous advocacy has since driven tremendous progress in our laws and culture, giving young people and their families strength and hope for the future. The Shepard family’s compassion reflects the best of America, where everyone is equally deserving of dignity and respect.”
In a statement, Judy said the medal was an “unexpected honour” and was “very humbling for me, Dennis, and our family.” She continued: “What makes us proud is knowing our President and our nation share our lifelong commitment to making this world a safer, more loving, more respectful and more peaceful place for all. I am grateful to everyone for the love and support through the years. It has allowed our work to continue.
If I had the power to change one thing, I can only dream of the example that Matt’s life and purpose would have shown, had he lived. This honour reminds the world that his life, and every life, is precious.”
Marking the 20-year anniversary of Matthew’s death in 2018 Judy and Dennis attended the Attitude Awards where they accepted the Attitude Inspiration Award.
The meetings that began the modern movement for LGBT equality were held in offices of the Diocese of Manchester, beginning 7 October 1964.
Sixty years later, on 7 October 2024, members of Out In The City will be commemorating this meeting outside Church House, 90 Deansgate, Manchester M3 2ER.
From 1954 to 1957, the Wolfenden Committee considered the laws on homosexuality and prostitution. Its 1957 report recommended partially decriminalising male homosexual acts. But it would take ten more years of lobbying and activism before the Sexual Offences Act (1967) achieved this.
The Homosexual Law Reform Society
In 1958 the Homosexual Law Reform Society (HLRS) was formed in response to inactivity from the government on the Wolfenden proposals.
The HLRS’s first public event at Caxton Hall, Westminster drew over 1,000 people. Bernard Dobson recalled the experience:
“I went with a friend of mine … and we went early, feeling very self conscious. It was packed out. By going to a place like that, you were proclaiming in a blaze of lights that you were one of these hundreds of homosexual men … they were mostly men – meeting, not in the usual situation, cruising the place, but going there to talk about law reform … On the platform was a man called Antony Grey… I was very excited by the meeting, so I went up to him and told him that he had given a marvellous speech and I was very interested … He gave me his address and I joined the society …”
Antony Grey in the 1960s – Campaign for Homosexual Equality
From its offices at 32 Shaftesbury Avenue (now demolished), London, Secretary Antony Grey and many others lobbied Parliament for decriminalisation over the next decade.
Partial decriminalisation in 1967 did not bring freedom for gay men. Prosecutions for ‘gross indecency’ actually went up after 1967 and many more men continued to be convicted until the offence was removed in 2003.
The Campaign for Homosexual Equality
The Campaign for Homosexual Equality (CHE) originally started as the North-Western Committee for Homosexual Law Reform (NWCHLR). The group was founded in Atherton, near Manchester, in Allan Horsfall’s miner’s cottage at 3 Robert Street.
3, Robert Street in Atherton, near Manchester – Photo: Campaign for Homosexual Equality
It was organised as a political body aligned with the London-based HLRS, but also sought to offer social opportunities to gay men and lesbians in the northwest of England. It soon expanded, and at its peak in the mid-1970s included 130 branches across England and Wales and more than 5,000 gay and lesbian members.
North-Western Homosexual Law Reform Committee advert in the Manchester Independent 24 October 1967 – Campaign for Homosexual Equality
At a 1971 public meeting in Burnley, CHE members confronted opponents to the opening of a local club. At the packed Burnley Public Library meeting, Horsfall invited the homosexuals in the room to stand. Over a hundred did so.
The event has been described as ‘one of the first mass coming-out demonstrations in the UK, certainly the first outside London.’ CHE members recall it as a coming-of-age moment for the gay movement in England.
Arena Three: A Lesbian Community
Well before the women’s and the gay liberation movements, lesbians were organising as a network and community. The cautiously-named Minorities Research Group (MRG) was set up in 1963. Its aims were to put lesbians in touch with one another through its magazine Arena Three, to affirm community and to challenge the negative social stereotypes of lesbianism.
In response to a demand for social meetings, the group held talks and social gatherings at the Shakespeare’s Head pub in Carnaby Street, London from 1964. Other local groups around England followed suit.
In 1966 a breakaway group was formed, primarily to act as a social club. Kenric was named after its founder members’ neighbourhoods, Kensington and Richmond in west London.
From 1971, the MRG and Arena Three morphed into a new organisation and publication, Sappho. The group and magazine were organised by Jackie Forster and her partner Babs Todd, from their home in Connaught Square, near Marble Arch. Sappho social meetings were held at the Euston Tavern, 73-75 Euston Road and later at the Chepstow pub in Notting Hill.
Paul Fairweather will be attending the Out In The City meeting at Cross Street Chapel on Thursday, 10 October at 2.00pm to speak about LGBT history in Manchester.
Royal Northern College of Music
The Royal Northern College of Music (RNCM) is a conservatoire located in Manchester, and is one of the UK’s busiest and most diverse public performance venues.
Out In The City members attended a Thursday lunch time concert where six pianos were played simultaneously by teachers and students.
The three pieces of music were “Totti” by Graham Fitkin, “Six as 1” by Nikki Yeoh and “Six Pianos” by Steve Reich.
The skills of the pianists had to be admired, but views ranged from “excellent” to “the worst concert ever”.
A lesson learnt – you can’t please all of the people all of the time!
Rainbow Lottery Super Draw!
Please support Out In The City by buying a Rainbow Lottery ticket or two (or more!)
With each Rainbow Lottery ticket, you are not just entering to win exciting prizes, you are also supporting our mission to support older LGBT+ people.
It’s a vital part of our fundraising as we receive 50p for every £1 spent and you have the chance to win cash prizes each week from £25 for three numbers up to a jackpot of £25,000 for six numbers – while helping us to achieve more for the LGBT+ communities over 50 years.
This month we have a terrific tech prize for you. On Saturday 26 October, one lucky person will win the just-released iPhone 16 Pro!
This top-of-the-line phone is built for Apple Intelligence, for a whole new smartphone experience. It comes in Grade 5 Titanium with a Super Retina XDR display with a state-of-the-art GPU for gaming, and the most advanced iPhone camera system yet, for professional photos and the highest quality video in a smartphone!
Your regular weekly tickets already enter you into the draw to win this fantastic prize – but did you know you can now top-up your tickets, just for the Super Draw weeks!? And just imagine what you could do with this huge prize …
If you’re a fan of street art, then you probably love this amazing masterpiece …
It’s ten years since Manchester’s famous Gay Village became home to the largest LGBT piece of street art in the UK – 40 metres high and nine metres wide. The multi-coloured makeover took a little more than a week of hard work on the side of The Molly House on Richmond Street to be finished.
Organised by gay community group Queerchester, which lobbies and fundraises for arts and culture initiatives in the gay village, the project saw the entries of the street art competition winners Glenn Jones (the overall winner), Lauren Jo Kelly, Adam Pryce and Mark Wallis become bigger than they could ever have imagined with the help of renowned graffiti artists Aylo (Hayley Garner) and Cbloxx (Joy Gilleard). Over 950 online votes and 7 judges chose between 29 brilliantly creative entries to pick the winner.
The mural depicts five famous faces who are considered to be LGBT icons, two of which are very well known around Manchester’s gay scene; legendary drag queens Anna Phylactic (top) and Foo Foo Lammar (top right). The others are feminist Emmeline Pankhurst (top left), writer Quentin Crisp (bottom left) and scientist Alan Turing (bottom right). Lauren Jo Kelly designed Anna while Glenn Jones created the other four. Adam Pryce’s cute critters in the top left above the rainbow and Mark Wallis’ naked man below it complete the work of art.
Work in progress in 2014
The Belles of St Trinian’s
Commemorating the film that was many people’s first experience of (very good) drag.
The Belles of St Trinian’s is a 1954 British comedy film, directed by Frank Launder, co-written by Launder and Sidney Gilliat, and starring Alastair Sim, Joyce Grenfell, George Cole and Hermione Baddeley.
Inspired by British cartoonist Ronald Searle’s St Trinian’s School comic strips, the film focuses on the lives of the students and teachers of the fictional school, dealing with attempts to shut them down while their headmistress faces issues with financial troubles, which culminates in the students thwarting a scheme involving a racehorse.
The film was among some of the most popular British films to be released in 1954, with critics praising the comedy and several of the cast members for their performances, including Sim’s dual role as the headmistress Miss Millicent Fritton and her twin brother Clarence Fritton.
The film was the first to be produced in the St. Trinian’s film series – three sequels were later produced and released after this film: Blue Murder at St Trinian’s (1957); The Pure Hell of St Trinian’s (1960); and The Great St Trinian’s Train Robbery (1966).
The film was the third most popular movie at the British box office in 1954, after Doctor in the House and Trouble in Store. The film was banned for children under 16 in South Africa.
The 1860s lesbian who stopped at nothing in her quest to become a doctor
Sophia Jex Blake refused to take no for an answer. But her professional ambitions came with costs to her secret love life.
Sophia Jex-Blake, age 25 Photo: Portrait by Samuel Laurence, 1865, via Wikimedia
Sophia Jex Blake was everything that Victorian society hated about women: outspoken, strident and determined.
Fiercely ambitious, she dreamed of becoming a doctor, but she was not legally allowed access to medical school. Refusing to accept this, she campaigned for years to be permitted to attend school and legally practice medicine.
Jex Blake was also a lesbian. She had a series of romantic entanglements, which she took enormous pains to hide from the world. Her eventual life partner was another doctor, Margaret Todd, and together the two women worked to bring about social reform and acceptance and to help establish women as credible professionals in the medical field.
Throughout all of this, they concealed the true nature of their relationship, fearing that it would irrevocably damage their work and Jex Blake’s legacy.
And what a legacy it is.
Jex Blake was born on the south coast, the daughter of a retired lawyer. Like most girls her age, she was educated at home until age 8 when she was sent to school and fell in love with learning.
Prodigiously talented, she was offered a place at Queen’s College in London – the first educational establishment in Britain to grant women academic qualifications – where she was later asked to become a mathematics teacher. Her family was set against her taking the position. In fact, her father forbade his daughter from working for pay, so she offered her services for free.
While in London, she lived in the household of Octavia Hill, famous for her social welfare campaigning and for later founding the National Trust – as well as for living with another woman, Harriet Yorke. Jex Blake’s relationship with Hill was, in her own words, one of “passionate intimacy”, leading to speculation that it was at this point that Jex Blake first began to have romantic relationships with women.
She also spent time in Edinburgh, where she met with trailblazing future physician Elizabeth Garrett-Anderson, who inspired her interest in public health. Living in Scotland in 1869, Jex Blake enrolled alongside five others in the University of Edinburgh to study medicine. They were later joined by two more, and together, the women became known as the Edinburgh Seven.
Initially, the seven women all had their applications to Edinburgh Royal Infirmary rejected because many felt that to admit women would, in the words of Professor Robert Christison, “lower the standing of the medical profession.” A contemporary surgeon, William Walker, likewise argued that the idea of being treated by women would be “offensive in nature … violating the feelings of propriety and decorum.”
But there were no rules that forbade them from studying, so they were permitted to attend classes. On 18 November 1870, Jex Blake and the other women went to sit for their anatomy exam when she saw “a dense mob filling up the road … We walked up to the gates, which remained open until we came within a yard of them, when they were slammed in our faces by several young men.”
In order to practice medicine, the seven women needed to sit their exams, and their campaigning to be allowed to do so attracted a huge amount of publicity and the support of such distinguished men as Charles Darwin. Ultimately, in 1873 the British courts ruled that women were still not permitted to graduate with a medical degree or practice medicine. So, despite studying and passing, the University still denied the women their degrees.
Jex Blake was under a huge amount of pressure. Her family disapproved of her actions and the publicity they brought her. On one occasion during the campaign, Jex Blake found herself in court charged with outspokenness and defaming the character of one of the male teachers.
While she was professionally outspoken, there was another aspect of her life that Jex Blake kept studiously hidden from public view: her love life.
Jex Blake would later write in her (now mostly destroyed diaries), “I believe I love women too much to ever love a man.” This gave her an advantage in one way, for as she would later state, it meant that she was not “afraid to step on men’s toes,” and with the prospect of marriage off the table, Jex Blake was free to be as hot-tempered and ambitious as she wished. Jex Blake was always one of the least socially acceptable of the Edinburgh Seven simply because she had no husband at home.
After the 1873 ruling, the Edinburgh Seven travelled down to London, where Jex Blake founded the London School of Medicine for Women. Three years later, the UK Medical Act allowed anyone who was qualified, regardless of gender, to practice medicine.
Still, there was a great deal of hostility in Britain against the idea of female physicians. Other countries were more liberal, and Jex Blake was able to sit for her examinations at the College of Physicians in Dublin. Going abroad was her only realistic option, and in 1877, she finally received her MD from the University of Berne before passing her exams in Dublin the same year. She was now the third woman to be registered as a doctor in Britain.
Keen to ensure her knowledge and practices were up to date, she had travelled to America in order to observe the newly set up Boston hospital where she met fellow medic Lucy Sewell. The two quickly became involved and planned to live and work together as both romantic and professional partners. Such a vision of a working same-gender relationship was utterly alien at the time and considered abhorrent by society. Her plans with Sewell fell apart when Jex Blake was forced to return to the UK following the death of her father.
In 1886, Jex Blake returned to Edinburgh where she helped establish the Edinburgh School of Medicine for Women. There, she met the woman who would become her life partner, Dr. Margaret Todd, who studied at the Edinburgh School of Medicine and would graduate with an MD from Brussels in 1894. Particulars of the two women’s relationship are hard to pin down, not least because Jex Blake ordered Todd to burn all her letters after her death. The school attracted a good deal of negative attention as it was. If one of the founders had been caught engaging in “unnatural” behaviour, the result, both women knew, would have been disastrous.
To practice medicine and further the cause of women’s education and suffrage, both women concealed the true nature of their relationship, living separately for many years. They channelled their energy into campaigning to improve public health in Edinburgh. Their papers and reports attracted a good deal of attention, and their suggestions were taken up regarding fresh water and improving access to health care for the poor.
Despite their circumspection, there is some circumstantial evidence that their personal relationship was something of an ‘open secret’ accepted by their friends. They were often referred to together in invitations and correspondence, gradually accepted amongst their friends and colleagues in much the same way that their professional capabilities were.
Together, Todd and Jex Blake went on to write a series of articles arguing for women’s rights and stating that women should have equal access to education. They also practiced medicine together, largely from Jex Blake’s house and practice at Bruntsfield Lodge.
When Jex Blake retired in 1899, the two women could finally be wholly together. They moved to Rotherfield, where Todd wrote, and the two women welcomed friends and students alike.
Jex Blake died in 1912, and Todd wrote a book detailing her lover’s life, although she carefully omitted herself and destroyed her letters and diaries. She erased the role she played in supporting her partner for fear it would damage Jex Blake’s reputation.
Even today, the Edinburgh Medical Society website does not list Todd as Jex Blake’s partner, though it does list the husbands of the other members of the Edinburgh Seven.
Todd died just three months after her book was published, possibly by suicide, although this remains open to debate. It was a sad end to a partnership that had achieved so much. The relationship between these two remarkable women and doctors reflects the personal and romantic difficulties women in the late nineteenth century faced and the sacrifices that were demanded of them. These sacrifices deserve to be remembered, as they paved the way for more widespread acceptance of women’s rights and LGBTQ+ love.
Out in the City 