Posted by:
elderolddog
(
)
Date: October 20, 2016 01:02AM
In Connell O'Donovan's history of homosexuality and the mormons (http://www.connellodonovan.com/abom.html) the second photo (after one of BY's sons in drag) is of the two Lesbian women who ran the Primary program, published "The Children's Friend" and founded the Primary Children's Hospital.
Here's the relevant paragraph:
"In 1883, 33 year old Louie Felt met 19 year-old May Anderson, and they also fell in love. This time, however, May did not marry Joseph Felt. In 1889 May moved in with Louie, and Joseph permanently moved out of the house Louie had built and bought on her own.[12] Thus began one of the most intense, stable, and productive love relationships in turn-of-the-century Mormonism. These two women lived together for almost 40 years, and together presided over three of Mormonism's most significant institutions: the General Primary Association (for Mormon children), the Children's Friend (a magazine for young Mormons), and founding the Primary Children's Hospital.[13] Louie and May were fairly open about the romantic and passionate aspects of their relationship, as reported in their biographies published in several early issues of the LDS Children's Friend. According to their recent biographer, Felt and Anderson's relationship was a "symbiotic partnership with each compensating for the weaknesses and complementing the strengths of the other". The 1919 Children's Friend biography more bluntly declared that "the friendship which had started when Sister Felt and [May Anderson] met...ripened into love. Those who watched their devotion to each other declare that there never were more ardent lovers than these two". The same biography also calls the beginning of their relationship a "time of love feasting", and makes it clear that the two women shared the same bed.[14] Twice in the Children's Friend, Anderson and Felt were referred to as "the David and Jonathan" of the Primary, which, the magazine explained, was a common appellation for the women. For centuries, the biblical characters David and Jonathan have been classic signifiers of male-male desire and homoeroticism, because in the Hebrew scriptures, it was written in 2 Samuel 1:26 that upon Jonathan's death in battle, David lamented, "very pleasant hast thou been unto me: thy love to me was wonderful, passing the love of women."[15] That these two women were described as "David and Jonathan" simultaneoulsy masculinizes them and firmly encodes their love for each other in a homoerotic context."
I am aware that after the Relief Society got rolling in Deseret, it was completely an institution run by its members; they did everything and did not ask permission, apparently preferring to do what they thought necessary and apologizing later, if need be.
Here's how things ended for the sisters running the organization, according to Wikipedia:
"The church-wide implementation of Priesthood Correlation in the 1960s "radically transformed" the Relief Society. These changes assisted in preparing the Relief Society for an era of a worldwide church. Correlated lessons and materials were easier to translate and applicable to a broader audience. A side-effect of these changes was that the Relief Society lost some of the autonomy that it once enjoyed. The Relief Society Magazine's last edition was December 1970, after which it and several other church magazines were replaced with the Ensign."
I feel quite certain that this entry was energetically 'massaged' so as to put the best light possible on the fact that the sisters were kicked out of their control of the organization.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relief_Society