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*YAHOO`s Ugens pluk - Weekly choice: 16.9.1999           Microsoft MSN WebGuide: det bedste på WWW * Queer Living Award * Rainbow Award * Pride Award * Gaypage Award´s Season Page* GLBT Award A very charming, inspiring and motivating homepage about gay marriage and partnership across the world,lots of pictures, lots of links, a breathtaking presentation of the life and struggle of Danish gay couple Axel and Eigil Axgil, the first same sex couple in the world ever to get married. Cph.Gayinfo

THE PIONEERS OF GAY MARRIAGE

click below photo

THE FIRST legal married gay couple was Axel & Eigil Axgil, who married together with 10 other couples in Copenhagen the 1st October 1989. It was a worldwide media event. But at this time Axgils had been together for nearly 40 years, 32 of which under a common name. Axel and Eigil had in 1957 combined their first names into the family-name Axgil when they were in prison for gay right activism. So many gay couples also changed their names that the government soon stopped this early precursor to civil union. In 1989 the Partnership Law again made such name changes possible.

THE 1ST MAN OUT...AND THE 1ST COUPLE

When Axel started his gay society, he was promptly fired from an auto-firm, thrown out of his living quarters and expelled from his party. Old friends avoided him and soon he fled to Copenhagen, where he met Eigil. To demonstrate their union Axgils clad like twins. Just as Axel was the first man out the Axgils were the 1st couple out, decades before others followed. As they bought identical suits to mark their union in 1950 there was an uproar in their society as this was unheard of, but at the wedding it was the dress code.

 

    THE FIRST GAY SOCIETIES

The 23rd of June 1948 the first Danish gay society F-48 was founded by Axel Axgil. Soon after a Norwegian and Swedish section under F-48 followed. F-48 was very successful and had 1.339 members in 1951 and when Axgil stepped down as chairman in 1952 it had reached the world record of 2600. The Nordic sections developed into the national societies DNF-48 in Norway and RFSL in Sweden in 1950. The 23rd of June 1998 F48/LBL marked its 50th year jubilee as the oldest still existing gay society. Axgil also made a new society IHWO "International Homosexual World Organization" (1954-1970) which held huge congresses with upto 150 international participants and changed several laws

F-48 = Forbundet af 1948, from 1982 Landforeningen af Boesser og Lesbiske/Forbundet af 1948 has now 1300 members.

DNF-48 = Det Norske Forbund af 1948, now LLH. Official start May 1950. The first decade in Norway and Sweden only 1-200 members.

RFSL = Riksforbundet for seksuel Ligeberettigelse Official start of national society Oct. 1950. Axgils were present on both occasions.

The IHWO had a German Section. In 1952 "COC" and "Der Kreis" had 1-2000 members. Axel Axgil is honorary member of RFSL.

 

GAY MEDIA PIONEERS

The society´s magazine "VENNEN" followed ½ a year after the founding of the gay society F-48, with sharp-witted Helmer Fogedgaard (1907-2002) as editor. His effort was indispensable and his support of Axgils`and F-48 was often crucial. His noble magazine was without pictures and a year later a photo service inspired by the Swiss "Der Kreis" was introduced to fill the void. The first nude photo sold thousands of copies and a small gay media empire employing a dozen started with Eigil Axgil as the main photographer. The photoseries sold as art pictures all over the world,. Later the pictures were published in the "Male Models".

 

  click photos for full size

THE WITCH HUNT

As the police wanted to stop the VENNEN attacks on policemethods against gays, Axgils were arrested and put in prison for more than 1 year after a horrific McCarthy´ite witchhunt in 1955 where 1000 gays were arrested. The police tried in vain to confiscate VENNEN. The trial was a show-trial as the judge recommended rat poison for gay sex offenders anyway. As they had not made porn they were convicted using an obscure lesser law-paragraph against "speculation in lust". The hysteria gave rise to the anti- gay "Ugly Law" 1961-1965. The police forgot to confiscate the vital negatives and the photo service quickly started up again. At their release the DA told them to stay apart. They then told him that they formally had gotten a common name Axgil upon which he promised them a lifelong persecution. It lasted until 1968 when the last pornography raid in Denmark was launched against Axgils: the local police mutineered and would not load their vans and the top brass had to crawl home in a VW Beetle aching under a ton of porn. As the ban of pornography was lifted in 1969 their soft erotica trailed off as they would not invest in color printing of pornography and they embarked on a new pioneering adventure.

 

  CLICK FOR FULL-SIZE

"AXELHUS" - A DANISH FAIRY TALE

"Axelhus" a 800 m2 former school was made into a 20 room gay paradise with "restrooms" and swimmingpool. While the ´68-generation tried to change the world, Axgils actually succeeded in making their own fairy kingdom. This gay paradise with a 5000 m2 garden was fitted out with a big swimmingpool. The mostly nude guests of this gay UN were truly international, at one point originating from 16 nations. Axgil still receives letters of thanks from his guests. Weekends were open for liberated married couples. Axgils only complaint was lack of sleep. In 1980 they had to close as the finance minister denied them exemption from a ruinous inheritance tax if one of them died as they were not married. 9 years later the law was changed by their old gay society F48/LBL.

 

  THE SAME- SEX MARRIAGE LAW  

  Click for screen size

Marriage ideas were unfashionable when F-48 was in competition with revolutionary BBF (1971) and LB (1974). These movements expired and F-48 was renamed LBL/F-48 in 1982. Axel became a honorary member in 1975. A lobbying campaign for partnership could not prevent a rejection of the first law proposal in 1984. Axgils had declined to join the commission examining the possibilities of a same- sex marriage as they had no legal background. The commission came to a negative conclusion , but in 1988 an opinion poll showed that the Danish People were firmly behind a new same-sex marriage law-proposal ( 57% for and 25% against ), and the parliaments members were given a free vote by their parties. The Danish Folketing adopted the Partnership Law the 26th of May 1989 and the Justice Ministry surprisingly decided that the partnership demanded the ritual of ordinary civil unions. As Axgil´s for 40 years were the living definition of gay partnership, the F-48/LBL society chose their founder and honorary member as the first to marry day the law came into force, 1st of October 1989. Axgils´recordlong partnership had turned into a defiant demonstration when they as gay activists behind prison walls got the idea of a public gay union using a common family name. In 1989 the walls fell for all lovers to marry regardless of sex and the world will never be the same. The countries where Axgils also had laid the foundation, Norway and Sweden followed as the first in 1993 and 1995.

THE MARRIAGE

As Axgil´s didn´t want to marry as the only couple the 1st Partnership day as LBL/F-48 had planned, further 10 couples tied the knot. 1st couple: Eigil (67) & Axel Axgil (74). 2nd couple: Lutheran Minister Ivan Larsen & psychologist Ove Carlsen, both 42. 3rd couple: Teacher Jan Lyllof (45) & Student Joek Volkman (27). The first 6 couples were LBL/F-48 activists while the 5 others used the opportunity to marry the 1st day in "The Wedding Chamber".       The vicemayor Tom Ahlberg read almost the same text as to heterosexual couples. The city hall was under siege from the world press. Normally no wedding service can take place on Sundays at the Town Hall but the civil servants went to work anyway to make possible that the gay couples could marry on the first day. Tom Ahlberg together with Axgil´s and LBL/F-48´s secretary Bent Hansen, worked frantically behind the scenes to make the wedding possible on the 1st of October 1989. The Axgil`s forced the government not to delay the wedding a week because of too late printing of documents. They threatened to marry immediately in the period of the lawless limbo between the old and new law, and go to the press exposing the embarrassing fact, that if one of them died in the week, the survivor was to loose everything. The civilretsdirektoratet then agreed to use photocopies.

 

"If everyone comes out of the closet, then this will happen everywhere."

--67-year-old Eigil Axgil. - Color photo by Rex Wockner.

by Rex Wockner IN what has been hailed as a fundamental turning point in the fight for gay and lesbian equality, 11 gay-male couples were legally married Oct. 1 in the Copenhagen, Denmark, Town Hall. Denmark is the first country in the world to allow gay/lesbian marriage and this was the day the new law took effect. The grooms included a high school teacher, a Lutheran minister and a school psychologist.  As hoards of reporters from all over the world stampeded for interviews, the 11 marriages were compared with such watershed gay events as the 1969 Stonewall Revolt in New York City, the 650,000-strong 1987 March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights and the 1988 mobilization in Great Britain against homophobic Clause 28. "This is one of the five most important days ever in the lesbian and gay struggle," boasted one jubilant celebrant to Copenhagen's Pink Radio stationThe Copenhagen daily newspaper Berlingske Tidende dubbed the 11 weddings, simply, "the event of the year." At the center of the festivities was 74-year-old Axel Axgil and his 67-year-old partner of 40 years, Eigil Axgil. Axel founded the Danish gay-rights movement by coming out of the closet in 1948. He was fired from his job the very next day.  "I'm quite overwhelmed with all these people and the press," Axel said through a translator, "but it's overall very beautifully put together."  "We just never could have dreamed we would get this far," added Eigil. "Of course, we always hoped we would be fully accepted and have the same rights as others." Eigil said he was not troubled at being married amidst a "media circus" because it is "the necessary price you pay for making world history." Many other gay and lesbian couples saw it differently, however, and postponed their weddings until later. Activists with the National Association for Gays and Lesbians [LBL] had thought that 50 to 100 couples might marry Oct. 1, but as the historical significance of the day became more apparent, several couples backed out. Only three of the 11 couples later attended a press conference, including the pair that had been trailed for eight days by a British Broadcasting Corporation documentary crew.

   

pictures by Anja Tollan (click pictures for full size)

 

Asked if he had any words of encouragement for gay and lesbian couples in other countries who might someday hope to be married, Eigil Axgil said: "Be open. Come out. Keep fighting. This is the only way to move anything. If everyone comes out of the closet then this will happen everywhere."

 

IT ALL HAPPENED SO FAST

 

The weddings themselves were surprisingly brief. Copenhagen Vice-Mayor Tom Ahlberg addressed the group for two minutes, reminding the grooms of their duties of "joint love, helpfulness and tolerance" (Full text here).  Each couple then individually entered a small adjacent room to answer the single question, "Will you take ... as a partner?"

 

 

After both men said 'yes,' they signed the marriage certificate and made way for the next couple. Photographers nearly got into fist fights jockeying for position in the cramped space.     After all vows had been exchanged, the couples descended the Town Hall steps into a hundreds-strong throng of well-wishers   click below picture   flinging rice and confetti. Champagne flowed freely as the Danes exclaimed "Skal.     The three activist couples then made a dramatic exit in horse-drawn carriages, winding through the narrow streets of Copenhagen to a grand reception at the stylish LBL offices. Used with permission. Read the whole article here. Copyright 1989/1999 Rex Wockner. Rex Wockner's weekly "International News" is archived at http://www.wockner-news.com/ http://www.qrd.org/qrd/www/world/wockner.html, see also Wockner´s Wire at PlanetOut.

 

Helmer Fogedgaard - Axgils & Rolf Loevaas - Allan Hellmann - "Rolf" Karl Meier, - "Bob Angelo" - Eigil Axgil 1922-+95

PIONEERS OF EUROPEAN GAY SOCIETIES 1st PARTNERSHIP PAGE
Helmer Fogedgaard, "Homophilos" (1907-2002) Editor &  publisher of "Vennen" 1949-1955, the Danish F-48 magazine
Allan Hellman, (1904-1982) 1950-51 F-48 /RFSL "The bravest man in Sweden" was for years the only openly gay.
Rolf Loevaas (1923-1996) The 1st chair of Norwegian gay society DNF-48 1950-52, prolific gay activist writer.
"Rolf" - Karl Meier, (1897-1974) Swiss "Der Kreis" 1942-67, visited Axgils 1954 & 70. Godfather of gay movements.
"Bob Angelo" - Niek Engelshman, (1913-1988) founded Dutch COC (1946-63) met Axgils 1949 & 53, decorated 86.
Magnus Hirschfeld (1868-1935) WhK 1897-1933, gay sex researcher as  Alfred Kinsey (1894-1956) who wrote Axgil
Eric Thorsell (1899-1980) with WhK, RFSL/ F-48.  Michael Holm & Guert Staal took over "IHWO" (1954-1970) in 1968.
Harry Hay(1912-) The Mattachine Society 1948-1953, a parallel to Axgils´ F-48 1948-52, DNF-48, RFSL & IHWO 1954-70

 

 

PROGRESS OF PARTNERSHIP LIST

DENMARK Population 5.2 mill. Law in effect 1 October 1989, Folketinget adopts Registered Partnership 26 May 1989

NORWAY Pop. 4.3 mill. in effect 1 August 1993, Stortinget legalized Registered Partnership 1 April 1993.

SWEDEN  Pop. 8.7 mill. in effect 1 January 1995, Riksdagen legalized Registered Partnership 7 June 1994.

GREENLAND, DK, adopted Danish Partners Act 26 April 1996, - Nordic countries recognized each others acts Aug. 1995.

HUNGARY Pop. 10.3 mill. Passed 21 May 1996 by Magyar Orszaggyules: Legal protection of Common Law Marriage

ICELAND Pop. 263.000, 27 June 1996, The Icelandic Althingi voted for "Recognized Partnership" 4 June 1996.

HAWAII - US State Pop. 1.2 mill,  "Reciprocal Beneficiary Relationship"  enacted 8th June 1997, later suspended.

THE NETHERLANDS Pop. 15.3 mill. In effect 1 January 1998. Passed "Registration of Partnership" Act 9 July 1997.

FRANCE Pop. 55 mill. Civil Solidarity-pacts "PaCS" adopted October 13 1999: PaCS in effect November 17 1999.

BELGIUM   Pop. 10 mill. Partner measure (Statutory Cohabitation Contract) in effect the 4th January 2000

VERMONT (US STATE) - Dec. 20, 1999 Vermont Supreme Court: "Civil union"- law in effect from 1st July 2000

Portuguese lawmakers Thursday 15th of March 2001 granted legal rights of common law marriages to gays.

Germany (Pop. 78 mill.) Bundestag adopted "Eingetragene Partnerschaft"  in effect 1st of August 2001.

Finland adopted a comprehensive registered-partnership law the 28th of September 2001, in effect March 2002

 

 

1ST REGISTERED COUPLES LIST

DENMARK Eigil (1922-1995) & Axel Axgil (1915-) 1st legally married gay partners, 67 & 74, Copenhagen Town Hall 1-10-1989

DENMARK 2nd. Longest lasting same-sex marriage: lutheran Minister Ivan Larsen and psychologist Ove Carlsen both 42

DENMARK 3rd couple: Teacher Jan Lyllof , 45, & Student Joek Volkman, 27. Now divorced. No lesbians married 1-10-1989

NORWAY A couple from Trondheim came before lesbian Karen-Christine Friele of DNF-48 who " had fought 20 years for this"

SWEDEN Hans Jonsson, 42, & Sven-Olov Jansson, 58, married at Ostersund City Hall by former MP Jorn Svensson 5-1-1995

ICELAND Two gay couples and a lesbian Anna Sigridur Sigurjonsdottir & Solveig Magnea Jonsdottir, Reykjavik 27-6-1996

THE NETHERLANDS 3 anonymous male couples were married 5-1-1998, an Amsterdam pensioner was first, partner now dead

THE NETHERLANDS Irma van Praag and Anna Kreuger, first lesbian couple to use the "Registration of Partnership" 14-1-98

BELGIUM Activist Alain Bossuyt, who registered with his partner Luc Legrand were among the first 4th of January 2000

VERMONT USA: Carolyn Conrad and Kathleen Peterson joined "Civil union" as the first couple in USA 1st July 2000.

GERMANY: Heinz Harre and Reinhard Leuschow, who married at the Hanover town hall the 1st of August 2001.

 

 

. VENNEN  -  INDEPENDENT FIGHTING ORGAN FOR NORDIC HOMOPHILES

Marriage Sites World: D-Jawort Australia New Zealand COC Netherlands GB PTT

Marriage Sites USA: Partners - Domestic Partnership - QRD - Partnerships 1. 2. History of gay marriage

Partnership Acts: Danish Norwegian Swedish Icelandic   Finnish  Portuguise French

Gay organizations and org.:   LBL/F48 LLH RFSL  COC SETA  HOSI HRC ILGA

News: Wockner´s Wire & Archive   Planet Out  & http://www.wockner-news.com/ OutRage!   SBU QX

GL Indices:  Rainbow  Gayscape  QRD  Norton Gay History Halsall  Queers in History Outlist

 

 

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