Seattle gay rights pioneer: 'It's a great day for America'

More than four decades before Friday's historic U.S. Supreme Court's decision to legalize same-sex unions, two men went into the King County Administration Building to apply for a marriage license.
 
They were denied in front of cameras that sent the story from Seattle around the world. The lawsuit that followed was cited for decades by attorneys on both sides of the gay marriage debate, either saying the courts made the correct decision or an outdated one.
 
Friday morning, Paul Barwick, one-half of the couple that day in 1971, waited to see what the decision would be – and was overjoyed when he first saw the news on Twitter.
 
"It's just amazing in 46 years we went form the idea of being a joke in most of America to being the reality that it is today," Barwick said from his home in San Francisco.
 
On Sept. 20, 1971, Barwick, an early gay-rights pioneer in Seattle, and Fagele benMiriamn held hands as they went to get a marriage license in King County. Barwick wore a shirt that read, "GAY."
 
In the weeks after their story made headlines, the couple received mail from people across the country saying they were the first openly gay couple they'd seen.
 
"We realized we were touching a lot of people who were living kind of quiet lives of desperation all alone," Barwick said in 2012. "And being all alone in the closet is a terrible, terrible experience."
 
Barwick, 67, served in the Army and was a Washington State Patrol cadet before realizing he'd have to remain closeted for a career in police work.
 
"Growing up back in those days, people didn't talk about homosexuality at all," he said in 2012. "You would hear jokes and that was about the only time the subject was brought up."
 
Barwick's father didn't talk to him for two decades after he came out. Barwick later learned that his father wanted to say all was forgiven – but didn't get the message until four months after his father's death.
 
A nurse at Olympic College, where he attended, brought Barwick to weekly meetings of the Gay Liberation Front at the University of Washington, where he met John Singer, who in 1973 changed his name to benMiriamn. In the early 70s, they and other gay activists lived together in a Capitol Hill commune and helped organize Seattle's first Gay Community Center.
 
BenMiriamn talked openly about being gay to newspaper and television reporters, once painted "Gay Power" on his car windows and debated local conservatives while wearing a dress.
 
BenMiriamn died in 2000 at age 55, the victim of lung cancer. But he lived long enough to see attitudes about same-sex couples progress, and "Fagele would just be proud as punch today," Barwick said.
 
Barwick credited many people who worked to make the acceptance of same-sex couples happen. He also said there needs to be better acceptance of transsexuals and that it's unfair that some gay couples can lose their jobs for being married.
 
Barwick said he's concerned about the hate speech that still divides communities, not only about sexual orientation but also race. He mentioned President Obama's eulogy for nine black churchgoers killed by a racist gunman in South Carolina and the Seattle arsonist who tried to burn a popular gay nightclub on New Year's Day 2014.
 
But there were also signs that gave him hope after the decision on Friday. He received kind messages from friends, and teared up when a tech blog he normally reads – one with no affiliation to same-sex causes – had rainbow colors supporting the Supreme Court's decision.
 
"That's amazing in itself," Barwick said of the cultural change. "Forty-six years in the spectrum of social change is really quick.

"It shows people can do the right thing if given the chance."

• LIKE KIRO 7 Eyewitness News on Facebook

Want to talk about the news of the day? Watch free streaming video on the KIRO 7 mobile app and iPad app, and join us here on Facebook.

KIRO