may21.1599
PIONEERING QUEERS
Continued from Page 19
.S '
$17,000 to support pro-gay candidates via the
first Lucille Hart Dinner, attended by 342 peo­
ple.
Better
© Portland’s gay pride celebration adds the
word lesbian to its official title.
14 churches place a half-page ad in The O re­
gonian criticizing the mayor and stating they
dispute the notion that homosexuality should
be a source of community pride.
© Roughly 400 people march in Portland’s
gay pride parade and rally at Terry Schrunk
Plaza across from City Hall. Meanwhile, 200
people gather at Laurelhurst Park to protest the
mayor’s proclamation.
© Metropolitan Community Church of
Portland moves to its current location at
2400 N.E. Broadway.
© The Eugene City Council amends the
city’s human rights ordinance to prohibit dis­
crimination against gay men and lesbians in
employment, housing and public accommoda­
tions.
© A group of lesbians decked out in politi­
cally incorrect butch-femme attire sing ’50s-
type music at the New Year’s Eve party hosted
by Every Woman’s Company. W hat starts as a
joke becomes a hit, and the Dyketones take
their show on the road.
1978
© Eugene voters repeal the city ordinance
that protects gay men and lesbians
from discrimination.
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© The Bisexuality Exploration Group
begins as an apolitical social and support group.
In 1985 the group changes its name to Bisexual
Community Forum.
W 0L
■
1979
© Portland Community Bowling Associa­
tion begins with 50 bowlers and 10 teams. By
1985 the association grows to 285 bowlers on
50 teams in three leagues.
© The Town Council Foundation gains
tax-exempt status. For years, the Internal Rev­
enue Service denied such status to gay and les­
bian groups, maintaining that all such groups
were political.
The foundation offers counseling and
assumes the apolitical activities of the Portland
Town Council. Later, the foundation’s name
changes to Phoenix Rising.
1980
1983
\
have taken place because there’s no box to
check on police reports to indicate a victim’s
sexual orientation.
© The Portland Gay Men’s Chorus opens
its first season with a concert at the Metropoli­
tan Community Church. During its fourth sea­
son, the chorus performs at Secretary of State
Barbara Roberts’ inauguration.
1981
© Portland Women’s Counseling Collective
organizes a lesbian support and therapy group
that meets on Thursday nights.
© Portland real-estate agent Don Clarkson
and a few associates hold a meeting to form a
gay business alliance called Cascade Guild.
Clarkson expects 50 people to attend the first
meeting. He is pleasantly surprised when atten­
dance climbs to more than 200. The alliance
provides gay men and lesbians with a chance to
network in the business world.
® Ten incidents of gay bashing in Laurel­
hurst Park are reported during July
and August. By Octo­
ber, more
gay men
are being
attacked in
downtown
Portland near
the bars. The
5 No. It
police com­
ment that it’s
impossible to
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NOTABLE QDOTABLES
• “It’s certainly safe to say that homosexuals are Oregon’s
biggest minority,” remarks Dr. Joseph B. Trainer in an Aug. 31,
1972, article for The Oregon Journal about the number of gay
people in Oregon.
• “Gay liberation is happening everywhere, not just in the
big cities,” says Ken Allison about the formation of the Kla­
math Gay Union in Klamath Falls, reports The Fountain in
February 1973.
• In June 1977, the Portland Scribe does an issue on gay
pride week. In the “Black Forum” column, Niobe Erebor
writes: “Gay Pride Week is joyfully here again. There are
homosexual Black people, women and men. That may be
quite evident to some of you, but the fact is that society can,
for its own perverse reasons, make gay people and Black peo­
ple invisible. So a Black gay person is doubly invisible/visi-
ble— a Black gay woman triply so."
• In January 1978, 7 he Oregonian runs a four-part series on
gay men and lesbians. T he first article shows that gay people
are divided on whether to come out.
\ would sav that about 90 percent of the gay people in Ore-
gon
homottxuab. a £ w e * not going to recon,-
© Black Lesbians and Gays United forms in
Portland. The group holds social events and
serves as a political catalyst in the African
American lesbian and gay community.
© The headline of Willamette Week's Aug. 2
cover story reads: “AIDS and Portland:
Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome— the
most perplexing and fatal disease to surface in
recent memory— has come to Portland.”
© The first issue of Just Out hits the streets
on Oct. 28 with a cover story on the Dyke-
tones.
© Travel agencies in Portland recognize the
power of the gay and lesbian dollar as Van
Nuys Travel joins the International Gay Tour
Association.
The association encourages airlines to grant
gay travel agencies the same services they pro­
vide to other travel agencies.
1984
© The Multnomah County Commission
approves an ordinance prohibiting discrimina­
tion based on sexual orientation. Opponents
immediately threaten to force a public vote. To
avoid an election, the commission repeals the
ordinance in March 1985 and replaces it with a
resolution affirming the same concept. Resolu­
tions are not subject to referendum petition.
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1 • * * |21
1985
Lucille Hart
1982
© Jerry Weller, John Baker, Terry Bean,
Keeston Lowery and Dana Weinstein form
Right to Privacy Political Action Committee.
During its first year, the organization raises
© Northwest Gender Alliance reaches out
for new members with an ad in Just Out
encouraging transvestites and transsexuals to
join the alliance for social activities and mutual
support.
C on tin u ed on P age 23
mmmi
mend that they come out. It’s too hanJ,” Jerry Weller, director
of the Portland Town Council, is quoted as saying.
• “It is our responsibility as a church to affirm our people in
their wholeness and to work against anything that tells them
they are less than God created them to be,” comments the
Rev. Gary L. Wilson in a July 1988 article for The Oregonian
about Metropolitan Community Church of Portland.
• In response to the pas­
sage of Measure 8 in 1988,
Keeston Lowery tells The
Oregonian: “1 feel this terrible
sense of sadness and sense of
shame by what this state has
done. I think there’s a lot of
people who feel that the state
has said we’re not part of the
family.”
• “When I came to Portland
in 1981, it seemed to me that
Keeston Lowery
black men in this community
were very disconnected from each other and that the weight of
the racism had divided us so that we didn’t communicate with
each other," comments Cliff Jones during an interview with
Thomas Lauderdale for Right to Privacy’s 10th anniversary
booltle, in 1992.
Jones adds: “So a friend and I
decided to have a potluck of black
gay men. We got about seven or
eight men at my house and had a
great time and so we decided to
do it on a regular basis. And then,
I thought, ‘Well, I want to meet
some black lesbians too,’ because I
hadn’t met any black lesbians in
Portland at that point
“Someone introduced me to a
black lesbian and she knew a lot
of people, so she said, ‘You bring
your men and I’ll bring my
n s f f innM
women and we’ll have a potluck
together.’ And we had a great
time,” Jones continues. “We started a group called Black Les­
bians and Gays United. We had huge potlucks for about two
years. We were getting to where we had 50 to 60 people.”
• “This decision today created a better employment nondis­
crimination act than we’ve been trying to pass in the Legisla­
ture for 23 years,” says a jubilant Jean Harris, executive director
o f Basic Rights Oregon, in response to the landmark Tanner vs.
Oregon Health Sciences University decision, as reported in the
Dec. 10,1998, issue of The Oregonian.
■ Com piled by P at Y ouno