Twenty-one years ago today @TheEllenShow came out publicly on national TV. The backlash was fierce and her future cast in doubt. In this 2001 interview hear a beloved icon at a crossroads. Listen to the full episode here: http://bit.ly/mgh-degeneres
The plans were innocent enough. A “Mardi Gras” fundraising costume ball on New Year’s Day 1965 for a new organization called the Council on Religion and the Homosexual. The problem? San Francisco’s police only allowed people to cross-dress on Halloween. So Evander Smith and Herb Donaldson, both attorneys and both gay, met with the police and got them to make an exception. But at the last minute the police reneged and showed up at San Francisco’s California Hall ready for battle. Smith and Donaldson stood their ground and changed the course of history.
Listen to the full episode here: http://bit.ly/mgh-donaldson-smith
Photos: (left) Partygoers on their way to the Council on Religion and the Homosexual Mardi Gras Ball at San Francisco’s California Hall under the watchful eyes of the San Francisco police, January 1, 1965. Credit: San Francisco Examiner. (right): Evander Smith photographed by the police outside California Hall (the police photographed everyone entering the building using sequentially numbered cards), January 1, 1965. Credit: Evander Smith California Hall Papers, Collection number: GLC 46. Courtesy San Francisco History Center, San Francisco Public Library.
Listen: When gay-bashing homophobes put Joyce Hunter in the hospital, they could never have imagined their brutal act would propel Joyce into a leading role helping LGBTQ youth avoid the kind of traumatic childhood she had experienced.
Listen to the full episode at http://bit.ly/mgh-hunter
Photo: Joyce Hunter in her office at the Hetrick-Martin Institute talking with two students from the Harvey Milk High School, 1986. Credit: © JEB—Joan E. Biren.
What do you do when you’ve been slapped around by a policeman simply because the way you look and the way you’re dressed leads him to believe you’re a lesbian? Or when your friend—your gay brother—is left to die in a hospital because he’s a “flaming queen”? Shirley Willer got angry. She was also radicalized and decided that she had to “do something” because, as she says in the 1990 interview featured in this episode, “it had to stop.” Hear what Shirley did next in her episode of Making Gay History: http://bit.ly/mgh-willer
Today is PFLAG’s 45th anniversary! To honor this milestone, listen/re-listen to our episode with Morty and Jeanne Manford and how their path that led to the founding of the first organization for parents of gay people that ultimately became PFLAG. Listen via your podcatcher or at this link: http://bit.ly/mgh-manford
It’s the 88th birthday of Kay Lahusen, pioneering photojournalist and gay rights advocate! Listen (or re-listen) to our episodes with her and Barbara Gittings:
http://bit.ly/mgh-gittings-lahusen1
http://bit.ly/mgh-gittings-lahusen
Guess who’s birthday it is today? Here’s a photo of producer Sara Burningham with the birthday girl.
Check out this article in Salon about the origins of our podcast: “The urgent mission of #MakingGayHistory” http://bit.ly/mgh-salon
Many thanks to our listeners for a great 2017! Please let us know what you thought by rating & commenting on your podcatcher app (It helps more people find the show): http://bit.ly/mgh-subscribe
More to come in 2018. Happy New Year!
Sometimes it’s hard to ask the next question. That’s what happened when I brought up the subject of AIDS with Morty Manford. You can’t see it because this is audio, but what I saw in that moment, was that Morty’s eyes quickly filled with tears. And that’s why I asked him if AIDS was something I shouldn’t ask about.
Listen at this link: http://bit.ly/mgh-manford2
Or subscribe at http://bit.ly/mgh-subscribe