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Clela Rorex, as Boulder County Clerk in 1975, issued the first same-sex marriage license in the United States after the Boulder City Council passed an early ordinance prohibiting discrimination against gay people in 1974. A life-long advocate for equal rights for women and LGBTQ persons, she retells the story of the actions she took in 1975, which included issuing six same-sex marriage licenses—and famously NOT issuing a marriage license to a man who, as a joke, asked her to grant a license for him to marry his horse—and places them in the context of the attitudes and reactions to the equal protection movements during that time. She also tells about the modernization of the County Clerk’s office and innovations that were implemented. She describes the continuation of her fight for marriage equality after her retirement from her position as County Clerk and details later work she did in public administration and legal administration, including work for the Native American Rights Fund in Boulder.