Old Lesbians. Directed by Meghan McDonough. GOOD DOCS, 2023. 29 minutes.

A Secret Love. Directed by Chris Bolan. Netflix, 2020. 83 minutes.

Old Lesbians is a highly engaging film that draws on the massive oral history archive spearheaded by Texan Arden Eversmeyer.1 After founding the social and support group Lesbians Over Age Fifty (LOAF), Eversmeyer was struck by the fact that when LOAF members died, they took a piece of lesbian history with them. She then launched the Old Lesbian Oral Herstory Project (OLOHP), which aimed to conduct life-course interviews with as many lesbians as possible. Eversmeyer recruited additional interviewers, and together they gathered at least six hundred stories, most from everyday women (some exceptions are Ann Bannon and Jewelle Gomez, who make brief appearances in the film). The care and labor that went into OLOHP is extraordinary; that Eversmeyer was able to convince women to make their stories available via Smith College speaks to the trust and confidence she and her team earned.

Just 29 minutes long, Old Lesbians provides an excellent introduction to the experiences of American lesbians, some of whom came of age before World War Two. Filmmaker Meghan McDonough crafts a playful, revealing narrative that attends to both the pleasures and dangers of lesbian life. The delightful work of art director and animator Marcie LaCerte brings audio clips alive. This film would be particularly useful to start a conversation about lesbians’ experiences, especially as it pertains to white women, as well as the purpose and value of oral history. Old Lesbians could be paired with “Oral History and the Study of Sexuality in the Lesbian Community” (Davis and Kennedy 1986).

A Secret Love appears at first to be similar to Old Lesbians: a documentary aimed at capturing pre-liberation lesbian life. While we do learn about the experience of one couple—two Canadian women living in the United States—building and sustaining a relationship in the context of intense homophobia and the ever-present threat of deportation (at this time homosexuality was grounds for removal), the story centers on their loss of independence as they age and the complex family relationships they must navigate as a result.

Both athletes, Terry Donahue and Pat Henschel met in Saskatchewan in 1947. Donohue played for the Peoria Redwings in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League. Smitten, Henschel packed her bags and followed Donahue across the border where they set up house together. Donahue suggests that pretty much all the League’s players were lesbians.

As the film begins, Donahue and Henschel are in their eighties. Director Chris Bolan, who is Donahue’s great-nephew, draws on a rich archive of moving images and photographs to reveal their decades-long relationship. He also does an excellent job highlighting the dangers for queer women at that time. Donahue and Henschel not only avoided the lesbian bar scene of the 1950s and 1960s for fear of being picked up by police, but they also remained closeted until 2009. That Henschel existed merely as Donahue’s “friend” impacts what’s to come.

Donahue is loved and cared for by her niece Diana. Diana, however, lives in Canada and becomes increasingly distressed about her aunt’s well-being, especially since the distance between them makes it hard to provide consistent care. Her frustration with Henschel, who is resistant to giving up their home and moving into care, is palpable. Bolan captures not just the conflict but also the gestures toward repair, providing an intimate and sensitive look at complex family dynamics. No one is the “bad guy” here, and the painful legacy of repression is laid bare.

Bolan exposes the racism and homophobia in his family that helps us understand why Donahue remained silent about the true nature of her relationship into the twenty-first century. Now out and supported by Diana and others, the couple marries before finally transitioning into a care facility.

The conflicts and tensions Bolan captures will resonate for almost every family dealing with aging, either their own or their relatives’, regardless of sexual orientation. This Netflix film is excellent viewing for students of gerontology, health care, sociology, and history. Besides the film A League of Their Own (1992), one might link A Secret Love with research on lesbians and aging, such as “What Is Successful Aging in Lesbian and Bisexual Women?” (Jabson et al. 2021). “Love Is Love: How Do You Go on Without Your ‘Little Darling’?” (Kaufman 2020) gives further insight into how the film came about and Bolan’s decision to focus on the relationship between his mother and great-aunt as Donohue’s health declined.

1For additional films on these themes see Films for the Feminist Classroom’s interview with the filmmakers of Old Lesbians in issue 12.2.

El Chenier is a professor of history at Simon Fraser University where they teach courses in oral history and the history of sexuality. Founder of the Archives of Lesbian Oral Testimony, they have published widely in queer oral history, including “Love-Politics: Lesbian Wedding Practices in Canada and the United States from the 1920s to the 1970s” in the Journal of the History of Sexuality (2018).