This annual fellowship will be awarded to a student completing a thesis, dissertation, or other substantive project on a WGSS topic. Administered through the WGSS program, the fellowship will be first awarded in Fall 2025. It is funded through an endowment from Houston community activist Arden Eversmeyer.  Applications will be due in January, for award in the following academic year.

Arden Eversmeyer, a local citizen herstorian, devoted much of her later life to documenting the stories of the lesbian community in Houston, lest these essential parts of the American narrative remain untold. The records of her Old Lesbian Oral Herstory Project now reside in the Sophia Smith Collection at Smith College, and Arden and OLOHP are the subject of a new documentary called Old Lesbians (trailer).

Arden also founded LOAF, Lesbians over the Age of Fifty, an organization focused on building community among older lesbians (papers collected in the UH Carey Shuart Women’s Archive).

The WGSS Program deeply appreciates Arden’s foresight in funding the next generation of scholars to follow in her footsteps, through her generous bequest.