Gay Vampire Summer

But! Congress actually allowed a workaround--this law included a provision that actually allowed a single woman to "Credit-Marry" a bank, so that the bank (or its general manager, or other suitable representative appointed by the bank) could act as her male guardian in financial matters. And this is, in fact, the origin of the term "credit union," because the original Credit-Union Associations were created by groups of women (Congress had not passed a law prohibiting women from creating their own businesses and organizations, etc., in part because the freemasons in the government wanted their female associates to be able to form women's auxiliaries and so on) so that single women could freely enter into Credit-Unions (or Credit-Marriages) with a local financial institution in order to have a safe place to keep money or get a line of credit.

This was also, incidentally, a not uncommon way for sapphists to hold a kind of semi-public wedding for themselves; one woman who was already a member of the Credit-Union Association would stand in as the Credit-Groom representative of the Association during the Credit-Wedding to her lover (mostly just getting paperwork done, but many very early Credit-Union Associations did celebrate each new member with a party because it was an occasion worth celebrating!).

Nowadays credit unions just often have better rates than banks, but they're really such an important part of women's history and queer history.

Also, a necessary note for everyone about the above history lesson: