The Daily Agenda for Valentine’s Day

Jim Burroway

February 14th, 2015

TODAY’S AGENDA:

Dinner

So, what are your plans for Valentine’s Day?

Events This Weekend: Belgium Leatherpride, Antwerp, Belgium; Cologne Street Carnival, Cologne, Germany; Gay Mardi Gras, New Orleans, LA; Arizona Gay Rodeo, Phoenix, AZ; Sitges Carnival, Sitges, Spain.

TODAY’S AGENDA is brought to you by:

From GPU News (Milwaukee, WI), February 1972, page 14.

From GPU News (Milwaukee, WI), February 1972, page 14.

EMPHASIS MINE:
I’m not much of a poetry guy, but I’ve always found this Valentine’s Day poem rather haunting. It comes to us from the February, 1962 issue of ONE magazine.

John, Passing

Steve, you say your name is, from Columbus, somewhere,
Going through New York on your way to somewhere else.
Oh New York is my home, I offer, smiling secretly
At the handsome aspirant who is really no longer
An aspirant but — John, passing — in one of his legion disguises.

Only last week you were Tim from Maine’s lumbering woods
Ending your vacation days here — Steve, you say.
Oh, yes. You’ve chosen that temporary name, John, passing.

But before we start, and you leave, admiring the neatness of my petite bedroom,
Let me make another plea as I did when you, John, passing, were here as Milo,
A hundred Bobs, Franks, Georges, Bills and one Sylvester ago.

Stay.
John, passing.
Stay.
So I may stop days and weeks searching you,
Finding the many different names you answer to and faces you wear.
So we can weld an iron home from this swirling world
And fend from reality’s cruel sunlight
So loneliness’ deep ulcers can have end and justification in you
And what’s left of this savagely confused pattern can bring a happier existence.

Pause.
You needn’t answer.
I’m sorry.
I’ve embarrassed you.
Steve you say your name is.
We’d better get on before you’re late for your train.

— Vincent Synge

TODAY IN HISTORY:
San Francisco Establishes Domestic Partnership Registry: 1991. The idea had been tossed around since 1979, when gay rights activist Tom Brougham proposed a new category of relationship called “domestic partnership.” His cause was taken up in 1982 by San Francisco Supervisor Harry Britt, who had taken the seat of slain Supervisor Harvey Milk. Britt’s bill authorizing domestic partnerships was vetoed that year by Mayor Dianne Feinstein, It would be passed again in 1989, but that law was repealed by a voter initiative in 1990. Fortunately, that same year city voters approved Proposition K which established a modified version of domestic partnerships which allowed same-sex and opposite-sex couples to register. Fittingly, on February 14, 1991, the brand new registry was established in San Francisco allowing partners to register. San Francisco however wasn’t the first city to provide domestic partnerships. That honor went to West Hollywood in 1985.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAY:
Jim Kepner: 1923-1997. There’s no telling exactly when Kepner was born. His mother found him wrapped in newspapers under an oleander bush in an empty lot in Galveston, Texas in late September of 1923. They guessed he was about eight months old, give or take. He never knew exactly how old he really was. I asked around trying to get more clues, but Paul Cain, author of Leading the Parade: Conversations with America’s Most Influential Lesbians and Gay Men checked his notes and didn’t have anthing either. He then suggested, “If you just want to pick a day in February, maybe you could pick Feb 14 — Jim really was a sweetheart!”

And so I shall.

Kepner may have been abandoned because of his deformed leg and club foot, which despite corrective surgery and physical therapy, gave him a limp for the rest of his life. That limp, more than his attempt to classify himself as a Conscientious Objector, probably kept him out of the draft during World War II. That he was open about his homosexuality may have played a part also. In 1942, he moved with his father to San Francisco, where he discovered the underground gay scene. He also began searching for books and other material on homosexuality. Over the years, that search would lead him to compile one of the largest archives of LGBT literature in the U.S.

Between 1943 and 1951, he moved to Los Angeles, New York, Miami, back to San Francisco, then back to Los Angeles. Like a lot of young idealists of his day, he became involved with the Communist party while the U.S. was still allied with the Soviet Union, but was kicked out when his homosexuality became known. Upon returning to L.A., Kepner became involved with the Mattachine Society. Soon after, he met up with other former Mattachine members who had just launched ONE, the first nationally-distributed gay magazine (see Oct 15).

Kepner’s first article in ONE appeared in March, 1954, titled “The Importance of Being Different” under the pseudonym of Lyn Pedersen. His debut article went to the very heart of a critical debate taking place in the gay community. Mattachine founder Harry Hay, for example (see Apr 7), argued that gay people were a distinct cultural minority, while others like Dale Jennings (see Oct 21) argued that the only difference between gay people and straight people was who they went to bed with. Kepner threw his support with Hay, announcing “Vive la Différence!” But he also urged readers not to let the controversy split the nascent movement. “What can a Society accomplish if half of it feels its object is to convince the world we’re just like everyone else and the other half feels homosexuals are variants in the full sense of the term and have every right to be? … Only by allowing the free action of individual groups within the structure of an elastic society can such diverse philosophies work together.”

By the fall of 1954, Kepner was working more or less full time at ONE, although he didn’t draw a salary until 1957. Kepner continued writing under his own name as well as several pseudonyms, mainly as a marketing ploy to mask the fact that ONE had such a tiny staff. Meanwhile, ONE had also established an educational branch, the ONE Institute, in addition to the publication arm of ONE magazine. The competing goals, education versus publication, put a strain on the organization’s meager resources and energies. Kepner finally resigned from ONE in 1960, frustrated by the infighting and what he saw as lax management in the organization.

Kepner stayed out of gay advocacy until the mid sixties. In 1966, he became the secretary of the Southern California Council on Religion and the Homophile, and edited ten issues of their newsletter. He also began publishing his own magazine, Pursuit & Symposium, which focused on gay history. He mortgaged his house to fund it. After two years, the magazine failed and he lost his house. In 1967, he helped to organize a rally in response to the LAPD raid on the Black Cat bar (see Jan 1), where he declared that “the nameless love would never again shut up.” Out of that rally came a new gay rights group, PRIDE (Personal Rights in Defense and Education), and Kepner served as the editor for the group’s newsletter. In October, that newsletter would become The Los Angeles Advocate, then later simply The Advocate. Kepner remained a regular with The Advocate through 1976, and contributed sporadically afterwards. Kepner also helped to form the Society of Pat Rocco Enlightened Enthusiasts (SPREE), a group of film enthusiasts and fans of Pat Rocco (see Feb 9), and Kepner is credited with convincing the Park Theatre’s (straight) owners to program for gay audiences. In 1969, he became an active member of the Los Angeles Gay Liberation Front, and he served on the Christopher Street West committee from 1970 to 1977. He was a founder of the Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Community Services Center, and would come to work as a member of their paid staff for their education program from 1978 to 1980.

Jim Kepner with his archives

Beginning in 1971, Kepner made his vast collection of gay documents and memorabilia available to the public. In 1975, he dubbed his collection the Western Gay Archives, then renamed them again in 1984 as the International Gay and Lesbian Archives. By then, the collection consisted of 25,000 books and thousands of other items. In 1994, Kepner’s collection was merged with ONE’s archives at the University of Southern California. That archive today is known as the ONE National Gay and Lesbian Archives. If you ever have a chance to stop in, I heartily recommend it. Kepner died in 1997, at about the age of 74. A month later, his anthology, Rough News, Daring Views: 1950s’ Pioneer Gay Press Journalism, was published by Haworth Press.

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?

Nathaniel

February 14th, 2015

Today, I’m getting married! Because we can do that now in North Carolina.

Eric Payne

February 14th, 2015

Congratulations, Nathaniel.

May the rest of your lives be a culmination of joy and happiness.

I remember the day Bill and I married… how be both gave a somewhat casual concept to the idea; we took the train from NY to Boston, got out license and got married. No big deal.

Except… it was. In the few hours between waking and the ceremony, things started intensifying. The ceremony itself was outside, in Boston Common, in 30-degree weather. It was just us and the county clerk, in casual clothes. Bill (who isn’t big on PDAs) and I, standing in front of the common’s swan pond, holding each other’s hand and sharing a public kiss and…

Something happened. My feelings for Bill deepened and strengthened. I can’t really explain it; I hadn’t thought my love for Bill could ever change, but there was, suddenly, an intesity… it wasn’t just “me and him” anymore. It was “Us.”

William

February 14th, 2015

1, Congratulations Nathaniel! All my best to you and your spouse!

2. It is bad enough that Burroway et al have allowed what was arguably the best gay blog on the web to die a slow death by starving it of content, but they can’t even get the endlessly repeated historical items right. The San Francisco domestic partnership law was repealed in 1989, not 1990. The error is significant for two reasons. First, because turnout in off year elections is key, and it is more difficult to turn out voters in an off-off year like 1989 than an off-year like 1990. Also, 1989 was the year of of the Loma Prieta earthquake. The campaign to defend the domestic partnership law was run by the same type of people who today run groups like the “LGBTQ Task Force”, i.e., largely incompetent people who prioritize radical posturing over results. These folks decided that the progressive, “queer” intersectional thing to do is to suspended their campaign 2 weeks before Election Day and then to give away $30,000 of their donors’ contributions to earthquake relief. The result: we managed to turn an expected win into a narrow loss. In San Francisco. Which sent a message to the entire nation that we were so weak, we couldn’t even win the right to hospital visitation in the “gay capital.”

Stephen

February 15th, 2015

Congrats, Nathaniel.

Today, the 15th., we celebrate the 45th anniversary of making our lives together. Who’d’ve thought?

Eric, I understand your emotion. We eloped to Ontario in 2003 and had a farcical marriage in the garden of a B&B. To make us feel welcome the owners, our witnesses, had a piano-playing friend record show-tunes because gay. We exchanged vows with Don’t Cry for Me, Argentina in the background, clouds of wrong notes coming from the boom box. And so on. But I felt very much as you did. Things did change.

Eric Payne

February 15th, 2015

Stephen,

Happy Anniversary. 45 years? Damn, man, you’re old! :-)

June 26th will be our 20th anniversary.

Isn’t being in a “gay marriage” fun? We get two anniversaries a year, so get lots and lots of cake!

Soren456

February 15th, 2015

Best wishes to you and your partner, Nathaniel.

Richard Rush

February 15th, 2015

Congratulations, Nathaniel, and Stephen, too.

My husband and I will be celebrating our 34th anniversary together this year. But we haven’t formalized our marriage yet. The last several years have been overwhelmingly dominated by gutting and renovating our small house, which involved living elsewhere for one-and-a-half of those years. And it’s still not completed.

Ben in oakland

February 15th, 2015

William, I have to agree with you about the incompetence of our politically active betters. They lost prop8 for us when we should have won.

I no longer donate money to EQCA, HRC, NGLTF, and a few others. There was simply no excuse.

Spunky

February 15th, 2015

Congrats to you and your husband, Nathaniel!

And happy Valentine’s Day (weekend) to everyone else.

eddie

February 16th, 2015

Yes Yes, I too must say to Nathaniel: a big fat congratulations – as well as to all those who will be celebrating any number of anniversaries. 45 years for Stephan – holy moly! Our up coming 25th silver anniversary can’t touch that. However I just may be the first American to be legally recognize in a gay marriage. Not recognized in America of course but recognized in Denmark. A government legally recognized gay marriage nonetheless. Just over 25 years ago Denmark was the first nation legally performing marriages in the city hall and over 25 years later, Americans and other nationalities are still claiming that the world will come to an end if we let this happen. 25 years later, Denmark has one of the highest standards of living over most other countries in the world and my marriage to my Danish husband is better than I could ever dream possible.

Stephen

February 16th, 2015

Dear Eric, yes I am old. I am very, very old. I am also in fabulous shape.

eddie. I loved my time in Copenhagen. I adored it. If I wasn’t so extremely old (cf Eric) and my husband wasn’t impossible – he really is. I don’t know why I even bother with him any more – I’d think of retiring there. Except we have a big old farm house surrounded by thousands of acres of wilderness. And four dogs. Our lives get settled by accident but once defined the limits become harder to break as we get older.

Nathaniel

February 18th, 2015

I guess I should take a moment to thank everybody for the well-wishes, and to congratulate many of you on the lengths of your relationships. It was a wonderful day, and we couldn’t have made it happen without a lot of help and support from many of our friends.

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