Sally Miller Gearhart

In 2022 a feature documentary about Gearhart is in the making directed by documentarian Deborah Craig.

Gearhart spent her later years in Willits, California, before moving to a care home in nearby Ukiah, California. After a long illness, she died in Ukiah on July 14, 2021, at the age of 90.

Gearhart was portrayed by Carrie Preston in the 2017 miniseries When We Rise, which dealt with the evolution of the LGBT community in San Francisco and advancement of LGBT civil rights in America.

Her partner was Jane Gurko, a fellow professor at San Francisco State University, until the latter's death in 2010.

The Sally Miller Gearhart Fund for lesbian studies was established by Carla Blumberg, one of Gearhart's former students, in January 2008 at the University of Oregon. It was created to promote research and teaching in lesbian studies through an annual lecture series and an endowed professorship at the university. The first lecture was given by Arlene Stein of Rutgers University on May 27, 2009, and it was titled The Incredibly Shrinking Lesbian World and Other Queer Conundra.

Gearhart is an entry in the 2003 dictionary-like book The A to Z of the Lesbian Liberation Movement: Still the Rage, by JoAnne Myers.

In 1978, Gearhart fought alongside Harvey Milk, one of the first openly gay politicians in the U.S., to defeat California Proposition 6, known as the "Briggs Initiative". Gearhart famously debated John Briggs, attacking the initiative to ban homosexuals from academic positions in public schools. A clip of the debate appeared in the documentary film The Times of Harvey Milk, which also included Gearhart talking about working with Milk against Proposition 6, and reactions in San Francisco in the aftermath of Milk's assassination.

While living in San Francisco, Gearhart began writing feminist science-fiction novels and short stories that highlighted her utopian ideals for a wider lesbian audience. In 1978, her most famous novel, The Wanderground, was published, exploring themes of ecofeminism and lesbian separatism. She wrote two books as part of the Earthkeep trilogy, The Kanshou, published in 2002, and The Magister, published in 2003. Both stories explore a dystopian world where women outnumber men, and humans are the only beings on the planet.

Gearhart was also featured in several documentaries, including Word Is Out: Stories of Some of Our Lives, released in 1977, and "Last Call at Maud's" released in 1993. She appeared briefly in Barbara Hammer's 1975 short film "Superdyke".

In 1976, Gearhart co-wrote A Feminist Tarot with Susan Rennie. It was published by Persephone Press and used conventional Rider–Waite–Smith imagery. This book was one of several tarot divination books on the market attempting to find alternative meanings within the symbology, the most famous of which is probably Motherpeace. Unusual for a work of feminist spirituality at a time of goddess worship, this book reinterpreted and subverted the stated meanings of the Rider Waite Smith deck.

By 1973, Gearhart was employed at San Francisco State University, where she went from teaching speech to teaching women's studies. There, she was able to develop one of the first women and gender studies programs in the United States. With her help, the university was the first to develop a course dealing with sex roles and communications. She continued at San Francisco State University until her retirement in 1992.

In the mid-1970s, Gearhart was co-chair of The Council On Religion And The Homosexual. This organization offered a variety of speaking events and literature to educate followers on the Judeo-Christian tradition. It also educated legislators about the lifestyles of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people.

In 1969, Gearhart followed a lover to Kansas. The following year, she moved to San Francisco with no plan aside from her determination to live openly as a lesbian.

The Sally Miller Gearhart Papers (1956–1999) are held at the Special Collections and University Archives, University of Oregon Libraries.

Gearhart attended an all-women's institution, Sweet Briar College, near Lynchburg, Virginia. She graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in drama and English in 1952. At Bowling Green State University, she obtained a master's degree in theater and public address in 1953. She continued on at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, getting her Ph.D. in theater in 1956, with the intent of pursuing a life of academia.

Sally Miller Gearhart (April 15, 1931 – July 14, 2021) was an American teacher, feminist, science-fiction writer, and political activist. In 1973, she became the first open lesbian to obtain a tenure-track faculty position when she was hired by San Francisco State University, where she helped establish one of the first women and gender study programs in the country. She later became a nationally known gay rights activist.

Sally Miller Gearhart was born in Pearisburg, Virginia, in 1931 to Sarah Miller Gearhart and Kyle Montague Gearhart. Her mother was a secretary, and her father was a dentist. After the pair divorced early in her childhood, Gearhart moved to her maternal grandmother's boarding house. There, she experienced female camaraderie and developed an admiration for "the collective strength of women."