Anna Sher Simon ’91 likes to joke that her living room
is a shrine to marriage, and a visit to her family home in
Denver’s tree-lined West Washington Park neighborhood
bears that out. The walls are covered with photos and
framed news stories commemorating the four times she and
her wife, Fran Simon, have publicly committed their lives to
one another in front of friends, family and supporters.
Together, the images and clippings document the
Simon’s own wedding journey as pioneers, and public faces,
of same-sex marriage as it has evolved over the past two
decades. But in a broader sense, they narrate a tale shared by
gay couples across the country who have strived to win, and
keep, legal recognition for their relationships.
The Simon’s bond has been enduring, and their efforts to
ensure the civil rights associated with it are relentless.
“We have been the poster couple for marriage,” Simon
said, as she gave a tour of the residence she shares with Fran
and their son, Jeremy, counting off the number of times the
couple has been interviewed by various media in Colorado
on the occasion of their historic nuptials. “What has it been?
One, two, three, four front-page Denver Post photos —
above the fold, as they say.”
Most recently, their activism brought them to the forefront of a state-wide effort to pass Amendment J, a ballot
question designed to rewrite the language of the Colorado
constitution to allow gay marriage. The Simons starred in a
video-driven campaign that succeeded wildly, winning more
than 64 percent of the vote on Nov. 5.
The Simons are celebrating the victory while girding
themselves for the public battle over same-sex marriage
to continue on a national level. There are, no doubt, more
chapters to come in their pioneering love story.
For Simon, now a professor of biological sciences at the
University of Denver — and known to her students as
Dr. Sher — the first chapter started when she was an
undergraduate at Earlham College.
On her way to earning a B.A. in both biology and art, she recalled in a recent interview, her activist side began to emerge.
Along with a group of friends, she helped start the first communal residence for gay and lesbian students in one of Earlham’s college-owned, off-campus houses. The co-ed roommates supported each other socially and academically and did volunteer work, though Simon said, back in the 1980s, before LGBT students felt comfortable being out on campus, a lot went unsaid. It was unofficially gay.
“We just called it Community House. That was our code,” Simon said. “Everybody just knew that we were the gay house because we were all gay.”
Making the house a reality, Simon said, influenced her life as much as her formal education. “That was good for me because I really struggled with self-esteem problems and other things in high school. So it was wonderful to feel like I belonged and I could make a difference.”
Mark Rebstock ’91, a fellow student — and now a life-long friend of Simon’s — lived in the Community House during his senior year. He saw the roots of her activism as they took shape. They participated together in a student group that worked to increase tolerance of LGBT students and staff at a time, he said, when neither students nor facility felt particularly secure at the school.
“I always admired how engaged she was,” said Rebstock, who lives in Washington, D.C. and works for a nonprofit that brings emerging leaders form across the globe to the country’s capital for immersion programs. “She was open and out as a student leader. She was always super present.”
Simon was so comfortable in Earlham’s academic and social world, that she stayed in Richmond after earning her degree in 1991, “helping out in the biology program for a couple of years,” as she put it. Part of those duties included leading research trips to Kenya, where Simon did her own study abroad program while still an undergraduate.
From there, she went to the University of New Mexico where she eventually earned her Ph.D. in biology. Her thesis advisor was Diane L. Marshall, who Simon notes, she first met at Earlham when Marshall was working as a sabbatical replacement professor. There, the two formed a life-long academic bond.
There was more education for Simon, who focused her research in Albuquerque on the impact of invasive plants on the local ecosystem. She did post-doc as a Fulbright scholar in Israel, and a second post-doc at the University of California Davis. She floated through temporary appointments for five years before landing her tenure track position at the University of Denver.
And during that same time, she also met Fran Simon.
A marriage story
Anna and Fran connected through an online dating site and the relationship felt right from the very start. “I liked that she had put her Myers Briggs in her personality description, and that she was volunteering with her therapy dog, a Rottweiler, on the side, and also coaching high school basketball,” said Anna. “She was a catch.”
By the second date — at a synagogue; both Anna and Fran are Jewish — each decided they had found their bashert, the Yiddish word for soulmate.
There was long-distance romance for a few years, before Fran, who lived in the Bay Area and worked in marketing research, decided she would move to Denver. Then came a decision to have a child, though the couple, who seemed to do everything in the most progressive way possible, had one conventional belief: they should be married before a kid arrived.
With gay marriage still unsanctioned at the time, they did the next best thing. They booked a spot at the Denver Botanic Gardens, hired a rabbi and held a commitment ceremony with friends and family in attendance. “I have to say, in 2004, that was pretty radical,” said Anna.
Both wore white wedding gowns. “So, for as radical as it was, it was also pretty traditional in a way,” Fran added.
Still, they wanted to formalize their bond legally. They did all that they could, starting years of complicated paperwork that would give them the same rights as straight married people.
“When I went to change my last name to Simon, I had to be fingerprinted, pay for an FBI background check, petition a judge and publish my new name in a local newspaper,” said Anna.
There was additional paper work when Jeremy was born a short while later, including agreements with the sperm donor. “If you’re a straight couple and there’s donated sperm, it’s not complicated at all,” said Anna, who carried the baby.
To secure her parental rights, Fran had to battle a bureaucracy that was not used to two moms raising a child. “When we had the baby, you know, we automatically got a birth certificate, but we had to go to the special, special office and get the birth certificate that has both our names on it,” said Fran.
“And for it to say mother-mother, you have to pay an extra fee, of
course,” Anna added.
But by being so public — open
in their private and professional
lives — they served as role models
in normalizing same-sex relationships — at a time when gay people still could legally be denied housing, or fired from their jobs.
“We were constantly educating people, like our doctors, lawyers,” said Fran. “At school there was mom’s night and dad’s night, and we were like, can we just call it parent’s night?”
They were part of a growing movement to change laws so that
other couples did not go through the same hassles. Progress on that front arrived when a domestic partnership bill was introduced in the Colorado Legislature. Anna and Fran testified at hearings and appeared in media report
The bill was controversial, but it passed in early 2013. “We were given the honor of being the first couple in the state to receive a civil union,” said Anna. Colorado Senator John Hickenlooper,
then governor of the state, signed the papers and gave the pen to
the couple’s young son, as the media looked on.
But then something unexpected happened. A case was filed in
the federal court district that covers Colorado and other Western
states, asking judges to award marriage rights to same sex couples.
In 2014, the court did just that.
City officials in Denver reacted quickly. They called the
couple and asked if they wanted to get married immediately.
“Then we became the first same-sex couple in Denver to receive
a legal marriage.”
“Because of this our picture hangs in the clerk and recorder’s
office, like other historic marriages that they’ve done,” said Anna.
There was one more crucial step. A court case, now famously known as Obergefell v. Hodges had been lingering for years, and
arrived before the U.S. Supreme Court. The nation held its breath
as the judges decided on June 26, 2015, that same sex marriage was
a guaranteed right in the U.S. Constitution.
The next morning, their phone rang. It was the office of Denver
Mayor Michael Hancock asking if they wanted to come down and
make it official, once again.
“They said, can you be here at 11:30? It was already 9:30 and so
we had to go get Jeremy out of school,” Anna said. “He was, like,
you’re getting married again?”
It was another “first” for Anna and Fran and another media frenzy. But, the pair believed it was important to follow through
on their path of gaining the most protection possible for their
family ties, and to set the pace for same-sex couples now and in
generations to come.
Nadine Bridges, who is executive director of One Colorado, the advocacy group that orchestrated the campaign for November’s Amendment J, noted that Anna has been a crucial voice, not just for marriage equality but for multiple causes in the community dedicated to “uplifting and protecting all vulnerable populations.”
“She has an incredible heart and I have been lucky to have her support me and the work of One Colorado,” said Bridges.
An academic, an advocate
While Anna Sher Simon is known in Colorado for her activism on behalf of same-sex marriage, she has also taken on other causes over the years, including in the University of Denver community.
While teaching and continuing her research on invasive plants species and the restoration of damaged ecosystems, she has also advocated for the place of women in STEM education. During her time at the school, Anna said, she noticed that the careers of women in DU’s College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics were stalling. One particular year, two female
colleagues were denied tenure while male peers moved ahead.
“I realized I had to do something,” she said. “That’s what I learned at Earlham. You don’t just sit idly by.”
She brought together the most senior women in each of the departments of the sciences and math college and organized the STEM Women’s Faculty Association. The group works to build networks between female staff members, and advise the school on hiring and other matters.
The effort has won widespread support, including in 2021, a $1 million grant from the National Science Foundation to create
infrastructure for inclusivity training, mentoring and a more equitable workplace overall. Anna is the faculty director for the
program, which has the potential to be a model, statewide and nationally, for other colleges.
It keeps her busy and engaged and comes on top of the work she and her wife do civically in the name of equity in the region
where they live.
Anna and Fran expect that work to continue, particularly on the gay marriage front, and especially over the next few years as the political climate swings back and forth and recent court decisions threaten the status, and even the possibility, of marriages like theirs across the country.
Both say they are up for the challenge, just as they always have been. It is their contribution to tikkun olam, as they explained, using the Hebrew word for accepting the responsibility
to heal the world’s rifts.
“We think the ability to effect change is our obligation,” Anna said. ■