Gilman moved to Southern California with her daughter Katherine and lived with friend Grace Ellery Channing. In 1888, Charlotte separated from her husband – a rare occurrence in the late nineteenth century. They officially divorced in 1894. After their divorce, Stetson married Channing. During the year she left her husband, Charlotte met Adeline Knapp, called "Delle". Cynthia J. Davis describes how the two women had a serious relationship. She writes that Gilman "believed that in Delle she had found a way to combine loving and living, and that with a woman as life mate she might more easily uphold that combination than she would in a conventional heterosexual marriage." The relationship ultimately came to an end. Following the separation from her husband, Charlotte moved with her daughter to Pasadena, California, where she became active in several feminist and reformist organizations such as the Pacific Coast Women's Press Association, the Woman's Alliance, the Economic Club, the Ebell Society (named after Adrian John Ebell), the Parents Association, and the State Council of Women, in addition to writing and editing the "Bulletin", a journal put out by one of the earlier-mentioned organizations.