Ada Bello

Cuban-American chemist and lesbian activist

Philadelphia, PA

Ada Bello was born into a middle-class family in 1933 in Havana, Cuba. Aware from early on that she was attracted to girls, she also...
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Richard Bentley

Accountant, AIDS crisis survivor

New York, NY

Legacy of Voices is an oral history project created in 2008 by Lara Spotts and Brian O’Donnell, inspired by their realization that to better understand...
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Perry Brass

Gay Liberation Front member, author

Bronx NY

Perry Brass was born in 1947 in Savannah, Georgia. His family was part of a close-knit community of mostly Polish Jews. Perry’s relationship with his...
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Kylar W. Broadus

lawyer; founder, Trans People of Color Coalition

Washington D.C., DC

Kylar William Broadus was born on August 28, 1963 in Fayette, Missouri. His parents—William, a truck driver, and Fannie, a supervisor of housekeeping—instilled in their...
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Marlow Monique Dickson

INTERNATIONAL PERFORMER & NIGHTLIFE FIGURE

Chicago, IL

Guest interviewer Zackary Drucker recorded Marlow Monique's oral history for OUTWORDS in 2021. Zackary Drucker is an independent artist, filmmaker, and cultural producer. She has performed...
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Ceyenne Doroshow

FOUNDER / EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF GLITS

Ozone Park, Queens, NY

Brooklyn-born Ceyenne Doroshow grew up in a traditional Black middle-class family, religious and conservative to a fault. Her mother was an educator and neighborhood staple,...
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Martin Duberman

author, academic, activist

New York, NY

Martin Duberman is an American historian and writer, and one of the pre-eminent scholars of the LGBTQ movement. Martin was born in 1930. His father...
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Tom Dyer

gay newspaper publisher

Winter Park, FL

Tom Dyer was born in Lancaster, Ohio in 1955. When he was 7 or 8, Tom was discovered by his brother and father playing Barbies...
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Denise Eger

Pioneering lesbian rabbi; ally to congregants with HIV

Sherman Oaks, Los Angeles, CA

Rabbi Denise Eger was born on March 14, 1960 in New Kensington, Pennsylvania. Her devout Jewish family settled in Memphis, Tennessee around 1972. Rabbi Eger...
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Arden Eversmeyer

founder, old lesbian oral history project

Houston, TX

Arden Eversmeyer was born on April 4, 1931, in Stevens Point, Wisconsin. She moved with her parents and younger sister to Dallas, Texas in 1943....
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Phyllis Randolph Frye

first openly transgender judge in U.S.

Houston, TX

At her birth in 1948, Phyllis Randolph Frye was named Phillip. Growing up in Texas, Phillip became an Eagle Scout and was the commander of...
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Manuel Garza

MATTACHINE ACTIVIST, HAIRDRESSER

New York, NY

Legacy of Voices is an oral history project created in 2008 by Lara Spotts and Brian O’Donnell, inspired by their realization that to better understand...
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James Gribben

actor, dancer, music director

Gun Barrel City, TX

Jim Gribben was born in 1943 in Indianapolis, Indiana. Though his childhood was difficult, Jim’s “small but mighty” mother taught him strength and resilience. As...
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Miss Major Griffin-Gracy

transgender women of color activist

Little Rock, AR

Miss Major Griffin-Gracy was born in the 1940s in Chicago, Illinois. Around age 13, she came out to her parents as transgender. After a psychologist,...
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Michela Griffo

Gay Liberation Front radical; artist

New York, NY

Michela Griffo was born in 1949 in Rochester, New York, into a large, unruly family of Irish, Germans, Italians—what Michela calls the United Nations of...
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Christy Henderson-Jenkins

Stonewall arrestee, early trans catalyst, entertainer, author

Palmdale, CA

Christy Henderson-Jenkins was born on November 11th, 1949. She spent her childhood years in Philadelphia before moving to Arizona with her mother and stepfather at...
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