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Memorial Day for the GLBT Community
4/15/11
Dear Thom, Here is the history...
In the late 1990's we were having Memorial Days for my peers who died of AIDS. It was becoming synonymous gay=AIDS=death.
I wanted to have a different understanding of our history. LGBT people (even before we were classified as LGBT) were being persecuted and killed due to our sexual orientations, gender identity or sexual differences.
I wanted to have one Memorial Day each year to honor and remember all of those people who were killed (or died- suicide) throughout history. I thought of choosing one theme each year so that it would include everyone after a few years of the cycle.
The first group that I chose were the people who died in the Nazi era due to their sexual orientation. Then maybe the next year the major theme could be for transgender people, or witch hunts, etc.
As you can see by the webpage at http://infotrue.com/memday.html we had a successful program that year. I think I chose a date that year that reflected Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld. June was already booked up with events for Pride Month. But the idea of one unified day didn't take hold. Instead we have December 1st as AIDS Remembrance Day and the transgender community have a day etc.
I also fought the City of New York and finally got a permit to have a Memorial Stone inscribed in the Holocaust Memorial Park as a follow up to the program in 1999. I got the permit last year and I am now waiting for the weather to be better and then do the inscribing. http://infotrue.com/sheep.html Our community doesn't seem to honor our past or our dead. I made a webpage for the first statewide march in our country for Gay Rights in 1971. (I was there.) I couldn't get any LGBT media to remember the date or even print a letter to the editor. http://infotrue.com/albany.html If we don't remember and honor our history or our dead, who will?
Rick Landman
Mens Social Network
10/22/11
Dear Rick,
I am sorry it has taken this long to respond to your much appreciated history of LGBT Memorial Day.
Has it continued since the first one in 1999? I really feel that your leadership in this area would really be accepted as a standard for our community since, as best I can tell, there has not been any other efforts or organized programs that approaches the one you have organized. May 6th makes sense, it would be honoring all of our deceased LGBT family and friends just before the PRIDE events in June.
I for one would be very much interested in trying to get Arizona, particularly Tucson, on board with this -- if it were recognized and promoted as "International LGBT Memorial Day", I think it would not take very long that it would become "the standard" -- annual proclamations could be generated at every local, state and including national level by the heads of those entities. Every level can set it's own program as far as how "deep" they get involved -- even if it is just a day of recognition -- without any formal service.
Did you ever meet Dr. Frank Kameny (Washington, DC)? If so, you are aware he passed away October 11th (National Coming OUT Day.) I put together a snippet of his life from some of the e-news sources in kind of a Memorial Page to our members. I had never heard of him until his death (or if I had, it did not really stick in the gray matter!!!) I am sending you a "copy" of that email just FYI. I usually try to put a memorial page together for any of members or friends that pass.
Well, I've kinda rambled here, but I would appreciate your thoughts and hopefully you are still promoting the idea??
Hope to hear from you when you have time.
Thom Goodrich
10/22/2011
Dear Thom,
I am glad to say that numerous groups around the world also had the same idea and it continues to spread. But different days are used and sometimes it is just for the transgender community etc. but there wasn't a consensus for the day I chose.
Yes, I met Frank when he was alive. He was a real pioneering man for our rights, even if I had some differences at the time.
I was in the Gay Liberation Front and we were younger than he was and like all younger people; more impatient. I just came back from the Occupy Wall Street in NYC... I live 5 blocks away.
So do what your area feels is right. There doesn't need to be one day that everyone follows.. just remember and respect our past.
Rick Landman
www.infotrue.com
10/22/2011
Rick,
Thanks much for the prompt reply. Maybe someday ONE DAY will be recognized (probably not in my lifetime - getting closer to the magic number 69 - on the 27th - LOL). I think I will just start with our group. We hold a Monthly Pot Luck and Social with a monthly theme. This year I think I will promote a Memorial Day where all that have lost a loved one or friend can bring pictures or other memorabilia for display and for just a MOMENT OF SILENCE. I lost my partner of almost 32 years back in 2001, miss him all the time but he is better off than suffering (he had cancer related problems and ate aspirin like M&Ms (which I didn't know until it was too late) they ate his stomach up and Dr.s could not stop the bleeding.
My heart is with all the OWS ers and other "Occupy" groups around the country. This blasted right wing news media we seem to have more of is pathetic in their reporting of the purpose of 99/1. Tea Party crap can get away with anything but those on the other end of the spectrum are blasted as nuts and law breakers -- SO UNREAL!!!
Thanks again, take care - -
BIG HUGS FROM ARIZONA TO NY
Thom
PS - I was born in central NJ, my Dad's family (my siblings) live in the Albany/Troy area.
10/22/2011
Thom,
I turn 60 next year and my lover is dead since 1989. I hope these kids will be able to focus on the gross economic inequities and social injustices and environmental needs as well as dumb wars...
Rick
10/22/2011
Rick,
The majority, unfortunately, have the "can't happen to me" syndrome -- learning from history is not in their make up -- I hope for the best for our future but I am expecting conditions worse than this country has ever seen or experienced all in the name of greed.
Thom
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So much for the emails leading up to our upcoming M.S.N. Memorial Day - - again, I will be sending out more details in separate emails. If anyone has a partner (spouse) or family member that is gay/bi and you would like to have a place setting at the MSN Memorial Dinner Table, please contact me ASAP -- below is a list of those that I have been able to obtain some information on (from May, 20002 on MSN Members) and they will be recognized at the table with information that I have BUT if anyone has additional information, please bring it EARLY on Saturday the 5th.
Allen Dankworth (Thom Goodrich's Spouse) - March, 2001
Stephen Hall (MSN member) - September, 2001
Don Gilroy (MSN member, Gi Taylor partner) - March, 2002
Steve Schonberg (MSN member) - May, 2002
Fred Hagen (MSN member) - December 2002
John Potter (MSN member) - January 2003
Richard Holmes (MSN member) - July 2003
Jerry Curl (MSN Founding member, Les Elliot partner) - March, 2004
Robert Moore (Presbyterian Minister) - April 2004
Bill Zach (Past Pres. TPTimers) - May, 2004
David Eyde (Wingspan) - June, 2004
Triton Elliot (MSN Pizza Night mascot) - April 2005
Bo Linus Orsjo (MSN member, Vaughan Thompson partner) - March, 2006
Robert Chapman (Lloyd Chapman's nephew) - June, 2006
Jerry Burley (MSN member) - June, 2006
Gi Taylor (MSN member, Don Gilroy partner) - September, 2006
Will van Asdell (MSN member) - June, 2007
John Thomas Doney (Thom Goodrich's nephew) - December, 2007
Jim Valiton (MSN member) - March, 2008
George Howser, Jr. (MSN member) - January, 2009
Maurice Grossman, (MSN member) - January, 2010
Richard C. Jensen, (MSN member, AmriTam partner) - August, 2010
Harris Flanigan "Willey" Wilson, (MSN member) - January, 2011
Bear Palmer, (Companion to Davis Palmer) - December, 2011
Lloyd Chapman, (MSN member) - December, 2011
I know that David Hensley has info on his partner to be added to the list.
I am sure there are other deceased past or former members or their family members that you may have an obituary about that might not be on the above list, please let me know -- email Thom at msn.communicator@gmail.com or phone: 305-6976.
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