The Daily Agenda for Thursday, July 31

Jim Burroway

July 31st, 2014

TODAY’S AGENDA:
Pride Celebrations This Weekend: Amsterdam, Netherlands; Belfast, UK; Bismark, ND; Brighton, UK; Dover, DE; Edgewater, MD; Essen, Germany; Freemont, CO; Hamburg, Germany; Hanoi, Vietnam; Lafayette, IN; Leeds, UK; Liverpool, UK; Marietta, GA; Stockholm, Sweden; Vancouver, BC.

Other Events This Weekend: Montana Two Spirit Gathering, Blacktail Ranch, Montana; Summer Diversity Weekend, Eureka Springs, AR; Divers/Cité, Montréal, QC; Family Week, Provincetown, MA.

TODAY’S AGENDA is brought to you by:

From Arizona Gay News, July 28, 1978, page 3.

From Arizona Gay News, July 28, 1978, page 3.

Miss Matty’s Attic was a multi-level bar/restaurant/cabaret/dance club in the Paradise Valley area of far northeast Phoenix, in an area which is massively suburbanized today but which I’m guessing was way out in the middle of nowhere in 1978. The old place stood more or less where the Piestewa Freeway runs today.

TODAY IN HISTORY:
 First Gay Rights Protest at the Pentagon: 1965. That year marked several important milestones in the history of organized gay protest. The year of gay protests actually got a head start in 1964 when Randophe Wicker (see Feb 3) led a small band of activists protesting in front of a New York City army induction center (see Sep 19).  In April of 1965, gay rights advocates held the first White House protests demanding equal treatment in federal employment and other areas of discrimination (see Apr 17),  A string of other protests followed, at the United Nations (see Apr 18), another one at the White House (see May 29), the Civil Service Commission (see Jun 26), and Philadelphia’s Independence Hall (see Jul 4), and, on this date in history, the Pentagon.

Participants at the Pentagon picket included gay rights pioneers Frank Kameny (see May 21), Barbara Gittings (whose birthday is also today; see below), Jack Nichols (see Mar 16) and eight others. CBS cameras were on the scene to capture it, and a report on the protest was featured on the local affiliate’s evening news. But another 46 years would pass before the military ban on gays serving openly would finally be out the door. The New York Public Library has a small online digital gallery of that first Pentagon protest.

Henry Willson (left) with Rock Hudson.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS:
 Henry Willson: 1911-1978. The future Hollywood agent was born for show business; his father was vice president of the Columbia Phonograph Company and president of Columbia Gramophone Manufacturing Co. Alarmed at his son’s interest in tap dance, he sent Henry to a boarding school in Asheville, North Carolina where he thought rough sports, rock climbing and backpacking would straighten his son out. Needless to day, it didn’t. In 1933, Henry moved to Hollywood and became a talent scout for Hollywood mogul David O. Selznick, discovering Lana Turner (although not at a drug store counter, as legend had it), Joan Fontaine and Natalie Wood.

But his real claim to fame was his uncanny knack for finding (and often, allegedly, bedding) the hottest beefcake stars of the 1950s. His “Adonis factory” transformed Robert Moseley into Guy Madison, Francis Cuthbert into Rory Calhoun, Merle Johnson into Troy Donahue, Arthur Kelm into Tab Hunter, Robert Wagner into, well, Robert Wagner, and most famously, Roy Fitzgerald into Rock Hudson. That minor detail about some of them lacking discernable talent proved to be of little hinderance to breaking into show business. Willson pesonally coached his charges in how to act, how to behave, and how to butch it up if they were lacking in that particular area. He staged “dates” for his gay stars when needed, and he even talked Hudson into a three year marriage to his secretary when rumors began to become a little too active.

While most of his male clients were heterosexual, the disproportionate number of gay male leads in his stable led many to assume that all of his clients were gay. And as Willson’s own homosexualit was public knowledge, many of his clients, gay and straight, began distancing themselves from him as he became addicted to drugs and alcohol, and also as he became increasingly paranoid and fat. His influenced waned through the 1960s, and by 1974 he became a ward of the Motion Picture and Television Country House and Hospital, where he died of cirrhosis of the liver. With nothing left of his estate, he was buried in an unmarked grave in North Hollywood. In 2005, Willson became the subject of Robert Hofler’s endlessly entertaining biography, The Man Who Invented Rock Hudson: The Pretty Boys and Dirty Deals of Henry Willson.

Barbara Gittings

 Barbara Gittings: 1932-2007. Her friend and fellow gay rights activist Jack Nichols (see Mar 16) called her “the Grand Mother of Lesbian and Gay Liberation.” That’s not much of exaggeration considering all she had accomplished for the LGBT community. Her quest for equality and dignity began when she flunked out of her freshman year at Northwestern University because she spent too much time in the library trying to understand what it meant to be a lesbian. Her mission since then was to tear down what she called “the shroud of invisibility” that facilitated the ongoing criminal persecution of homosexuality as well as its being regarded as a mental illness. She organized the New York chapter of the Daughters of Billitis in 1958, and she gained a national platform within the gay and lesbian community as the editor of the pioneering lesbian journal The Ladder in the mid-1960s.

No Limits: Barbara Gittings picketing the White House, 1965.

In 1963, she met Frank Kameny, the pioneering gay rights activist based in Washington, D.C. (see May 21). He was, as she described him, “the first gay person I met who took firm, uncompromising positions about homosexuality and homosexuals’ right to be considered fully on a par with heterosexuals.” Together, they formed a collaboration that would transform the gay rights movement from one of timidity and defensiveness to bold action and determined demands for equality. Those actions included the first ever gay rights protests in front of the White House, Philadelphia’s Independence Hall, and the Pentagon, all beginning in 1965. The move was audacious — the Daughters of Bilitis officially opposed picketing at the time, and they would force her removal as editor of The Ladder in 1966 over the issue — but Gittings pressed forward, convinced that invisibility would fall only when gays and lesbians themselves took the steps to boldly step out of the shadows.

Barbara Gittings, Frank Kameny, and John E. Fryer as “Dr. H. Anonymous” at the 1972 APA panel on homosexuality.

The pair’s greatest accomplishment came in the campaign to remove homosexuality from the American Psychiatric Association’s list of mental disorders. In 1971 Kameny and Gittings organized an exhibit at the APA convention in Washington, D.C.. While there, they attended a panel discussion on homosexuality, and were outraged to discover that there were no gay psychiatrists on the panel. Kameny grabbed the microphone and demanded that the APA hear from gays themselves. The following year they were invited to participate in a panel discussion entitled “Psychiatry, Friend or Foe to Homosexuals? A Dialogue.” Gittings convinced Dr. John E. Fryer, a gay psychiatrist to take part. But he would do so only on the condition that his participation remain anonymous, and that he could wear a disguise and use microphone to alter his voice. “Dr. H. Anonymous’s” participation created a sensation at the convention as he described how he was forced to be closeted while practicing psychiatry (see May 2). Gittings, in turn, read aloud letters from other gay psychiatrists who refused to participate out of fear of professional ostracism. The following year, homosexuality was removed from the APA’s list of mental disorders, and Gittings celebrated by being photographed with newspaper headlines, “Twenty Million Homosexuals Gain Instant Cure.”

In the 1970s, Gittings’ passion returned to where she first tried to find information about what it means to be a lesbian, the library. She helped to found the American Library Association’s Gay Task Force. That’s where she got the idea for a gay kissing booth at the ALA’s 1971 convention in Dallas. “We needed to get an audience,” she remembered. “So we decided… let’s show gay love live. We were offering free—mind you, free—same-sex kisses and hugs. Let me tell you, the aisles were mobbed, but no one came into the booth to get a free hug. So we hugged and kissed each other. It was shown twice on the evening news, once again in the morning. It put us on the map.” She continued, “You know that kissing booth wasn’t only a public stunt. It gave the message that gay people should not be held to double standards of privacy. We should be able to show our affections.”

She died in 2007 after a long battle with breast cancer. She is survived by Kay Tobin Lahusen (see Jan 5), a fellow gay rights advocate and her partner of 46 years. You can see a personal remembrance of Barbara Gittings by Jack Nichols here.

Ian Roberts

Ian Roberts: 1965. The hunky Australian made headlines in 1995 when, as a playor for the Manly-Warringah Sea Eagles rugby club, he came out as gay. He came out in a big way: by posing nude for the first issue of Blue magazine. Public reaction was mostly positive, and his teammates were supportive. He sat out the 1996 season due to injuries, and signed with the North Queensland Cowboys in 1997. He retired from regular play in 1998 after his injuries kept piling up. That same year, he began studying acting at the National Institute of Dramatic Art in Sydney. He had a brief cameo in the 2005 Australian film Little Fish, and he took the role of Riley, a Henchman of Lex Luthor in 2006’s Superman Returns. He’s also appeared in the 2009 Australian mini-series Underbelly: A Tale of Two Cities, and in the ABC1 drama The Cut. In 2012, he appeared in his first starring role, as a gay characer, in the indy film Saltwater.

If you know of something that belongs on the agenda, please send it here. Don’t forget to include the basics: who, what, when, where, and URL (if available).

And feel free to consider this your open thread for the day. What’s happening in your world?

FYoung

July 31st, 2014

I found the bio notes on Barbara Gittings especially inspiring. Thanks, Jim.

Victor

July 31st, 2014

Barbara Gittings is truly one of my heroes. We were delighted to welcome her bronze memorial onto Chicago’s Legacy Walk as part of the inaugural dedication in 2012… http://www.legacyprojectchicago.org/Barbara_Gittings_Plaque_Image.html
…sadly, her partner Kay couldn’t make it to the ceremony because she is too old and frail to travel. But, boy, she is still feisty and sharp as a tack. How I admire all these giants upon whose shoulders we stand.

Hue-Man

July 31st, 2014

k.d. lang stamp issued today July 31, 2014 (picture at link)

“k.d. lang is 1 of 5 distinguished musicians we celebrate in our Canadian Country Artists series. In a career that has spanned nearly 30 years, she has sold millions of records worldwide and won both JUNO and Grammy awards. A recipient of the Governor General’s Performing Arts Award, lang is also an Officer of the Order of Canada.” https://www.canadapost.ca/shop/buy-stamps/all-postage/p-413943111.jsf;CPO_JSESSIONID=9PTPThQLvpM8Trz02h52pX1w9cpTtzps21wVNchZcb2p0N3Dx4yL!1826196121?execution=e1s1

Michael Bedwell

July 31st, 2014

RESPECTFUL CORRECTIONS. Many thanks for celebrating the great Barbara. However:

1. The photo of Barbara picketing (followed by Randolfe “Randy” Wicker) was not take at the White House but in front of Philadelphia’s Independence Hall; July 4, 1966, I believe.

2. Their was no gay exhibit at the 1971 American Psychiatric Association Convention nor did Frank Kameny take over the podium to protest lack of gay inclusion on a panel. In fact, after the APA’s convention the year before in San Francisco had been zapped by gay protesters, Frank was asked to help organize a gay panel for the ’71 convention called “ “Lifestyles of Non-Patient Homosexuals” which he did. Participants with him were Lilli Vincenz, Jack Baker, Del Martin, and Larry Littlejohn. However, behind the scenes he was also working with members of Gay Activists Alliance/DC, Gay Liberation Front-DC, Mattachine Society of Washington, and the Gay May Day Tribe to zap the convention. One of them, Cliff Witt, was supposed to commandeer the stage, and deliver the groups’ statement, but he and most of the others zappers were fairly quickly forced out of the room and locked out by furious convention attendees. Realizing this, only then did Frank take the stage, and spontaneously say much of what Witt would have.

As he later recalled: “People milled around for a bit, and nothing was happening, and I decided we were going to lose this altogether, so I came forward up on the stage and seized the microphone. The moderator asked me what I was doing. I said I’m seizing the microphone from you, and he said ‘Well, tell me your name and I’ll introduce you’. So I did and he did. And I proceeded to denounce them until one of the elderly psychiatrists just pulled the plug out of the wall. But I never needed a microphone to be heard, so I went on anyway. And the psychiatrists were down below shaking their fists at me and calling us Nazis [as he told them] psychiatry is the enemy incarnate. Psychiatry has waged a relentless war of extermination against us. You may take this as our declaration of war against you!”

While some accounts have the gay panel occurring before this, apparently it was scheduled for later that evening, and, unsurprisingly, few showed up to hear the panel that night express similar feelings. But the day’s events, and pressure from our allies in the profession, led to Frank and Barbara being asked to participate in another panel at the 1972 convention, as well as organize a gay-positive exhibit.
Kay is credited with insisting they find a gay psychiatrist willing to speak, too. From behind his mask and pseudonym, Fryer told his colleagues: “Much like a black man with white skin who chooses to live as a white man, we can’t be seen with our real friends, our real homosexual family, lest our secret be known and our doom sealed.”

3. Barbara was not one of the founders of the American Library Association Task Force on Gay Liberation, later the Gay Task Force, but quickly joined, and became its second coordinator, serving in that position for 15 years. According to her partner Kay, the original idea for the kissing booth at the 1971 ALA convention came from the group’s founder and first coordinator, Israel Fishman. It was also at this convention that the group presented its first book award. It went to lesbian author Isabel Miller (née Alma Routsong) for “A Place for Us” (aka “Patience and Sarah”), then the two joined six others in the kissing booth—left only to kiss each other as none of the convention’s other attendees accepted their offer.

Thank you.

Jim Burroway

July 31st, 2014

Thank you for the corrections and the illuminating additions. I’ll refer to them when her birthday comes around next year.

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