MIDDLEBURY — There are more than 744,000 same-sex married couples in the United States, and each one owes a debt of gratitude to two endearing, persistent and empathetic women now living their best lives at the Eastview at Middlebury retirement community.

Holly Puterbaugh, 78, and Lois Farnham, 80, were among three-same sex couples who in 2000 became the face of Vermont’s groundbreaking civil unions law. It was the first domino to fall in a national movement — both in the courts and legislatures — that led to same-sex marriage in Massachusetts in 2004, Vermont in 2009, and culminating in federal recognition through the Obergefell v. Hodges U.S. Supreme Court ruling in 2015.

Catalyzed by the Freedom to Marry Task Force and the Vermont Supreme Court’s 1999 Baker v. State decision, the civil unions law mandated that same-sex couples be conferred the same rights — such as hospital visitation, medical decision making, inheritance and joint insurance policies — as heterosexual married couples.

True, couples don’t get “civil-unioned” anymore. From both a practical and legal standpoint, it’s now an anachronistic, separate-but-equal protection rendered superfluous by full marriage rights. But it’s still regarded by many same-sex couples as the critical forerunner to the full equality they enjoy today.

Lois and Holly are helping mark this year’s 25th anniversary of the law they helped push over the finish line. They’ll appear, with other major players in the civil unions effort, on a panel discussion at Middlebury College on Friday, April 25, from 3–5 p.m., at Davis Family Library.

“The world did not end,” Holly, a diminutive spitfire, said while recalling civil-union opponents’ predictions that the law would somehow cheapen heterosexual marriage and result in a major influx of gay and lesbian couples.

For Holly and Lois, the journey began during the early 1970s.

Holly had graduated from Ohio’s Wright State University and transplanted to Vermont to take a job teaching math at the University of Vermont, from which she would retire in 2007.

Lois, an aspiring nurse born in Jay, Vt., learned in 1971 she’d need to complete a statistics course to get into graduate school at Albany Medical Center.

“Guess who my teacher was?” Lois asked playfully, smiling at her partner.

The pair struck up a friendship after the course had ended.

“Lois started to show me Vermont; that’s her favorite activity,” Holly said. “On Oct. 20, 1972, we decided that this was something that should last forever. We’re still working on it; it’s only been 52 years.”

While Holly taught at UVM, Lois spent a big portion of her career as an RN at Fannie Allen Hospital in Colchester, and as a nurse at three elementary schools in the Essex area. She and Holly lived primarily in Chittenden County before retiring and moving into Eastview in 2014.

‘ROOMMATES’

Both women gave back to their community wherever they lived, from Scout leader to non-profit board member, to Habitat for Humanity home builder.

Early on, they referred to themselves as “roommates” or “partners.” It was a time during which many lesbian and gay couples lived their lives in the shadows, rather than be subjected to myopic scorn.

But as they rubbed shoulders with heterosexual married couples, they became increasingly aware of what they were missing out on. And they weren’t happy about it.

Fifty years ago, major employers like UVM weren’t extending benefits to the domestic partners of employees; that was confined to heterosexual married couples. The institution would later greenlight what it called “same-spousal equivalent” benefits, which Holly and Lois were grateful to receive.

They began attending meetings where same-sex couples commiserated and talked about the benefits they weren’t getting. Their collective hopes for change got a boost in 1995 with creation of the Freedom to Marry Task Force (FMTF), led by attorneys Susan Murray and Beth Robinson. Both at the time were working for Middlebury’s Langrock, Sperry & Wool.

GETTING STARTED

Holly and Lois decided to get involved.

“On the way home (from a meeting), Lois said to me, ‘I don’t know about you, but I think I’d like to be involved in this FMTF (effort),’” Holly recalled. “I replied, ‘That’s good, because I was going to say the same thing.’”

Like all good lawyers, Murray and Robinson (now U.S. Circuit Court Judge) looked beyond the legal arguments. And they noted the court-focused, same-sex marriage effort that had failed a few years prior in Hawaii.

“We knew that in order to win marriage equality, we needed to win people’s hearts and minds — and not just make great legal arguments… And in order to do that, we needed people to tell their stories,” Murray told the Independent.

Lois and Holly emerged as perfect parties in the Vermont court case in part because, among other things, they’d already been together for 25 years, had been dedicated community volunteers and devoted members of their church.

“They were doing all the things we do to help Vermont work,” Murray said. “On top of that, they were — and still are — salt-of-the-earth Vermonters.”

Asked how important the couple was to the success of Baker v. State, Murray was succinct:

“They were critical.”

Joining Lois and Holly as plaintiffs were two other same-sex couples: former Addison County Counseling Service Director Stan Baker and Peter Harrigan, and Nina Beck and Stacy Jolles.

“They were looking for a lesbian couple, a gay male couple, and a couple with kids,” Lois recalled.

She acknowledged she and Holly initially had to think over the attorneys’ request.

“They told us about all the stuff that could happen,” Lois said, noting in part tragic fate of Matthew Shepard, a gay man who had been beaten, tortured and left to die in Wyoming on Oct. 6, 1998.

“They told us that people’s cars had been vandalized, and they could burn down your house,” Lois continued. “They painted a very bleak picture. But we decided somebody had gotten us the same-sex spousal-equivalent (benefits), and now it was our turn to do something.”

Of the six plaintiffs in the Baker v. State complaint, only Farnham was a native Vermonter — a distinction she still wears with pride.

“She’s the native; I’m an import,” Holly joked of her own Ohio roots.

Their participation went beyond court dates. They appeared at press conferences, photo ops and gave interviews to help explain and publicize the Freedom to Marry Task Force’s goals.

Lois and Holly didn’t wilt under the spotlight. They helped make the case in the court of public opinion. They spoke at Rotary Clubs, churches, forums, town halls — any venue where people wanted to learn what the plaintiffs were seeking, and why.

“We basically told them what we were missing out on,” Holly said. “We said, ‘We love each other, just like you love your wife or husband.’”

It’s a message that gained traction as FMTF advocates attended forum after forum. Meanwhile the Vermont Supreme Court was reviewing Baker v. State.

“A lot of people had no idea we were denied all these rights. You could see people listening and shaking their heads,” Lois said.

The mostly positive public reaction was gratifying for Holly and Lois.

“We had a couple people tell us, from the next generation down, that we were their role models,” Lois said.

“That helped a lot,” Holly added.

FIRST VICTORY

Meanwhile, Murray and Robinson made headway on the legal front. And on Dec. 20, 1999, The Supreme Court ruled that denying marriage benefits to same-sex partners was a violation of the Vermont Constitution.

It was an encouraging decision for freedom-to-marry stakeholders, but they still needed to win over state lawmakers — during the second year of the legislative biennium.

“They weren’t planning on that,” Holly said. “They were told (by the court) on Dec. 20, ‘This is what you have to do.’”

Both women credited former Rep. Tom Little, a Shelburne Republican, for keeping the House Judiciary Committee on task as it crafted, and eventually passed to the House floor, a civil unions bill.

“He said afterwards they did a graduate-level course in benefits and equality,” Holly recalled.

Opponents — including some religious groups — descended upon the Statehouse to demand the civil unions bill be killed. Among the most vocal was the late Fred Phelps, then a Kansas-based minister who infamously coined the term “God hates fags.” Phelps’ hateful rhetoric ended up having the opposite effect.

“He was the one who probably helped us the most,” Lois grinned.

Holly and Lois were in the well of the Vermont House on April 25, 2000, for what was — for same-sex-union stakeholders nationwide — a cathartic 79-68 roll-call vote on civil unions that followed three hours of impassioned debate.

They said they kept tabs on each vote, ending with the final one — former Rep. (and Lt. Gov.) David Zuckerman, P-Hinesburg. Zuckerman voted “yes.”

House Speaker Mike Obuchowski had warned those assembled against loud reactions until after he’d gaveled the end of the proceedings.

Once he did, the celebrating began.

“We erupted and hugged each other; many of us broke into tears,” Lois said.

The civil union law had poked a metaphorical hole in a dam holding back marriage equality, and the floodgates had opened. That dawned on Murray while part of a contingent of Vermonters who participated in a march for marriage equality in Washington, D.C., in late April of 2000.

“The response from other people from the rest of country was overwhelming,” Murray said.

State contingents at the march had been lined up alphabetically. Organizers insisted Vermont be moved to the front of the marching line.

“That’s when I realized this was a huge deal, nationally,” Murray said.

ONLY IN VERMONT

Vermont’s civil unions law took effect on July 1, 2000. Lois and Holly were among the first in line to get “civil unionized” that same day, at the Burlington Congregational Church.

The couple was pleased with the victory, but knew their civil union was only recognized within Vermont.

“We were allowed on the bus, but we had to sit in the back,” Murray recalled. “That became a tough pill for some of us to swallow.”

Lois and Holly were game to continue the quest for marriage, a step Massachusetts had taken in 2004.

“If the (federal government) had done it first, we wouldn’t have had to do anything,” Holly said.

Even as momentum built for same-sex marriage legislation in Vermont, the two women found reminders that some folks’ minds would never be changed.

“There were the “Take back Vermont’ signs,” Lois recalled.

Both the Vermont House and Senate passed S.115, the same-sex marriage bill, during spring 2009. Gov. James Douglas of Middlebury vetoed the bill.

Both women were initially angry about the veto, which the Legislature overrode the day after it was recorded.

Ironically, Holly and Lois worship at the same place as Jim and Dorothy Douglas — the Congregational Church of Middlebury.

“We’re friends with (Jim Douglas),” Holly said. “I talk to him many Sundays; we laugh, joke, but neither of us has ever mentioned the (marriage veto). I wouldn’t do that to him; I have too much respect for him.”

“At that time, he thought (a veto) was the right thing to do,” Lois added.

On Sept. 1, 2009 — the day same-sex unions became legal in Vermont — Lois and Holly walked across Burlington’s Battery Park to the Congregational Church to tie the knot. Ben & Jerry’s Homemade was giving out free pints of ice cream that day. The women noted the containers of “Chubby Hubby” and joked with the person who was passing them out.

“We said, ‘Wait a minute… What about the lesbians getting married?’” Lois said.

And then Holly provided a second punchline: “How about a pint of ‘Skinny Wife?’”

John Flowers is at [email protected].