Sheila Kuehl
Kuehl was elected to the California State Assembly in 1994, becoming the first openly gay person elected to the California legislature. While running for office Kuehl found she was able to offset some negative stereotypes people had about lesbians thanks to their familiarity with her role as Zelda. She told an interviewer "When people know gay people personally, they tend to feel differently about the whole community. And all of a sudden, here's a person that they knew very well that they found out was lesbian."
Johanna Tesch
Following the birth of her youngest son, Carl, in 1902, Johanna began to engage in political activities, initially at a local level. Her political focus lay with the Social Democratic Party (SPD) which according to some sources she joined in 1902, although others contend that women were not permitted to join political parties in Germany till 1908, and she actually joined the SPD only in 1909. She campaigned for better educational opportunities for working class women and girls: she was co-founder in 1902, together with Lina Heiden and Henriette Fürth, of the "Education Association for Working Class Women and Girls" ("Bildungsvereins für Frauen und Mädchen der Arbeiterklasse”") From 1904 she also worked as a cashier at the Trades Union Office that had recently opened in Frankfurt's "All Saints Street" (""Allerheiligenstraße"") to provide organisational support for union activities and to operate as a labour exchange.