Thirty-two years ago today – Monday, October 3, 1994 – the first-ever public event (as far as I know) for the nascent and then-named Lesbian and Gay History Month took place at Lucas Hall 100 at the University of Missouri at St. Louis (UMSL), where I was a nighttime graduate student in history while serving…
New Biography: An LGBTQ Pioneer Who Lived Most of His Life in the Closet
In October 1965, the Rev. Robert Watson Wood, along with three other protestors, appeared on the cover of The Ladder, the monthly publication of the Daughters of Bilitis, the first national organization for lesbian women in the United States. The cover photo was taken the previous June, when Rev. Wood and two dozen others —…
A Dozen Ways to Make America (More) Wonderful Again
I started paying attention to national politics fifty years ago, in Mrs. Griggs’ sixth-grade social studies class at Potosi (Missouri) Middle School during the bicentennial year when Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter battled it out for the presidency. International events came into focus with the capture of American hostages in Iran in 1979. A decade…
America 250: Queer Revolutionaries
Much has been written this year about the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence and much has been written during the past few decades, including full biographies, about the queer (at least, queer-adjacent) lives of three who served in George Washington’s Continental Army: Deborah Sampson, Casimir Pulaski, and Baron von Steuben. This piece provides…
A Heartfelt Farewell to Margaret Katherine Flowing Johnson
Margaret Katherine Flowing Johnson November 14, 1940 – January 20, 2026 On her birth certificate, she was Margaret Katherine. To her origin family, she was Midge. To her partner Marcia’s family, she was Margaret. For a brief moment, she was almost Honey. To most who knew her in the St. Louis region for the last…
Whitney Wisker-Brooks, Out Progressive Lesbian, Running For House Seat in Rural Missouri
Whitney Wisker-Brooks, 38, an out progressive lesbian, is running for the House District 116 (HD 116) seat in the Missouri General Assembly. She is a Democrat. District 116 covers approximately the southern half of St. Francois County and the northern half of Madison County. (The St. Francois County Courthouse in Farmington, where 400 gathered at…
Precious Names and Places: The Central West End and LGBTQ+ St. Louis
For as long as I can remember, grounding myself in history has provided steady footing. Even an evening at a new restaurant requires a quick Google search to learn the who, what, when, where, and why of the establishment’s history. In the period between 1990 and 1997 when I lived in St. Louis (South County,…
Flowing: “A Kick-Ass Activist”
I met Flowing Johnson in 1994 through the St. Louis chapter of the (then-called) Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Teachers Network (GLSTN), which I started that summer. She and I were teachers – community college math for her and high school social studies for me. In her mid-50s at the time, Flowing had long ago developed…
Thirty Years Ago: AMC’s Michael Delaney Pointed to a Pink Triangle
When my mother worked at the hometown Walmart when I was a boy in the 1970s, one rule was chiseled in granite: “Do not call me at work, ever — unless the house is on fire or somebody’s dying!” Mom practiced what she preached, so it was a shock thirty years ago this month when…
Coming to Left Bank Books: Poet and Activist Steven Reigns
Former St. Louisan Steven Reigns (he graduated from Parkway South in 1994), now an LA-based poet and activist, is not afraid of spending time with life’s unavoidable finale – death. He founded the Gay Rub Project in 2011, a collection of rubbings of LGBTQ+ historical markers and monuments, including many gravestones. The Gay Rub Project…
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