Barbara Gittings
Encyclopedia
Barbara Gittings was a prominent American
activist for gay equality. She organized the New York
chapter of the Daughters of Bilitis
(DOB) from 1958 to 1963, edited the national DOB magazine The Ladder
from 1963 to 1966, and worked closely with Frank Kameny in the 1960s on the first picket lines that brought attention to the ban on employment of gay people by the largest employer in the US at that time: the United States government
. Her early experiences with trying to learn more about lesbianism fueled her lifetime work with libraries. In the 1970s, Gittings was most involved in the American Library Association
, forming the first gay caucus in a professional organization, in order to promote positive literature about homosexuality
in libraries. She was a part of the movement to get the American Psychiatric Association
to drop homosexuality as a mental illness
in 1972. Her self-described life mission was to tear away the "shroud of invisibility" related to homosexuality that associated it with crime and mental illness.
She was awarded a lifetime membership in the American Library Association
, and the ALA named an annual award for the best gay or lesbian novel the The Barbara Gittings Award
. The Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) also named an activist award for her. At her memorial service, Matt Foreman, the executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force
said, "What do we owe Barbara? Everything."
, Austria
, where her father was serving as a U.S. diplomat
. Barbara and her siblings attended Catholic school in Montreal
, and was so immersed in Catholicism that at one point in her childhood she considered becoming a nun
. Her family returned to the United States at the outbreak of World War II
and settled in Wilmington, Delaware
. Although aware of her attraction to other girls, Gittings said she first heard the word "homosexual" when she was rejected for membership in the National Honor Society
in high school. Despite being an excellent student, a teacher who had reservations about her character took her aside and told her that the rejection was based on what the teacher believed were "homosexual inclinations".
While majoring in drama at Northwestern University
, Gittings developed a close but non-sexual friendship with another female student, prompting rumors that they were lesbian
s, which led Gittings to examine her own sexual orientation. In her attempts to understand it, she had her suspicions confirmed by a psychiatrist who offered to cure her. Not having enough money to make regular visits, she was unable to get the money from her father, who reasoned there were no problems a psychiatrist could solve that a priest could not. Barbara's close friend suggested they see less of each other so as not to further encourage the rumors about them.
Having no one to talk to about the issues that were consuming her, she decided to read as much as she could on the topic. She found very little, and much of what she found described homosexuals as "deviants", "perverts", and "abnormal" in medical books and texts on abnormal psychology, or odd generalizations that stated homosexuals were unable to whistle, or that their favorite color was green. She also found all the information focused on homosexual men. She recalled in a 2001 interview, "I thought, this is not about me. There is nothing here about love or happiness. There has to be something better". Her research took up so much of her time at Northwestern that she ended up failing out of the school. Gittings found a purpose during this time, saying, "My mission was not to get a general education but to find out about myself and what my life would be like. So I stopped going to classes and started going to the library. There were no organizations to turn to in those days only libraries were safe, although the information contained was dismal."
, The Well of Loneliness
, The Unlit Lamp, and Extraordinary Women. Soon thereafter, her father discovered The Well of Loneliness in a pile of other things in her bedroom. He was so appalled at what he found that he instructed her to burn the book, but did so in a letter because he was unable to speak to her about it. Still eager to learn more about homosexuality, Gittings took a night course in abnormal psychology where she met the first woman with whom she had a brief affair. At 18 years old she left home to be on her own and moved to Philadelphia.
Gittings began to hitchhike on weekends to New York City, dressed as a man, to visit gay bars since she knew of none in Philadelphia, and knew of no other places to go to get "plugged into the gay community." In a 1975 interview, she recalled, "I wore drag
because I thought that was a way to show I was gay. It's changed now, but in the early 50s there were basically two types of women in the gay bars: the so-called butch
ones in short hair and plan masculine attire and the so-called femme ones in dresses and high heels and makeup. I knew high heels and makeup weren't my personal style, so I thought...I must be the other kind!" However, Gittings found very little in common with the women she met in the bars, and after witnessing a gay male acquaintance get beaten up after leaving a bar, began to focus her energies on collecting books.
on the advice of Donald Webster Cory, to visit the office of the new ONE, Inc.
, an early homophile
organization that dedicated itself to providing support to homosexuals in the US. While in California, she met Phyllis Lyon and Del Martin, who had co-founded the Daughters of Bilitis
(DOB) in San Francisco. "She was a cute, curly-haired young woman wearing a shift and sandals. I remember she had this satchel, a backpack — I'd never seen anything like it. Or her," Lyon remembered. At her first meeting of the Daughters of Bilitis in someone's living room, Gittings brought up the obscurity of the name, which she thought was impractical, difficult to pronounce and spell, and referenced a fictional bisexual character, not even homosexual. "Even then I was pretty assertive...What were they doing with a name like that? It wasn't very nice of me, but they seemed to take it with reasonably good spirits." In 1958, Martin and Lyon asked Gittings to start a chapter in New York City
, which she did when less than a dozen women responded to her notice in the Mattachine Society
newsletter asking for "all women in the New York area who are interested in forming a chapter of the DOB" on September 20, 1958. Gittings served as the chapter's first president for three years commuting to New York from Philadelphia twice a month.
In 1982, Gittings remembered, "I joined the movement in 1958, when the subject of homosexuality was still shrouded in complete silence. There were no radio talk shows or TV documentaries. In all the United States, there were maybe a half dozen groups, two hundred people active in all." The Daughters of Bilitis served as a social alternative to bars for lesbians, but took great care to deny that they were "arranging for 'immoral contacts'." While president of the DOB in New York, attending members numbered between ten and forty per meeting. They met twice a month and often invited doctors, psychiatrists, ministers and attorneys to address their meetings, even if the message was clearly disparaging to lesbians. Gittings recalled, "At first we were so grateful just to have people — anybody — pay attention to us that we listened to and accepted everything they said, no matter how bad it was...anything that helped to break the silence, no matter how silly or foolish it may look to us today, was important." Gittings admitted that early meetings and writings in the Daughters of Bilitis urged their members not to upset mainstream heterosexual society; that integration and acceptance would be won if heterosexuals could see that gays and lesbians were not dramatically different from themselves.
Gittings worked in clerical positions during this time, spending ten years as a mimeograph operator for an architectural firm. The New York chapter of the DOB distributed a newsletter to about 150 people, and Gittings worked on it while being required to stay overtime at her job. In 1959, after using company envelopes to mail the newsletter out and covering the firm's name with a sticker, someone wrote to the firm to notify them that a newsletter addressing lesbianism was being distributed. Gittings was sure that she would be fired, but her boss, a woman, stated cryptically that she was familiar with the topic, having served in the armed forces. Gittings was not fired but cautioned to be more careful instead.
, following both Lyon and Martin as editors. Although the Daughters of Bilitis did take a political stand in the 1959 San Francisco mayoral race, Martin and Lyon preferred The Ladder to remain apolitical., Gittings was impressed with how her influence as editor impacted the magazine and the opinions of its readers. "I discovered the power of the press, the power to put in what you want in order to influence readers," she said.
At the 1963 convention of the newly formed East Coast Homophile Organizations, the audience heard a speaker named Dr. Albert Ellis tell them that "the exclusive homosexual" was a psychopath. Articles and essays in The Ladder sometimes carried these viewpoints, since it was difficult to get psychiatrists and doctors to address homosexuality in any form. Gittings said, "People like Ellis talked about homosexuality being a sickness. And they talked about a cure ... We'd sit there and listen and politely applaud and then go for the social hour afterward." However, after Dr. Ellis spoke, so did gay activist Frank Kameny, making an impression upon Gittings with his point that it is useless to try to find cures and causes for homosexuality since there is no valid evidence that it is an illness. Said Gittings, "My thinking didn’t change until Frank Kameny came along and he said plainly and firmly and unequivocally that homosexuality is no kind of sickness or disease or disorder or malfunction, it is fully on par with heterosexuality ... Suddenly I found that I was looking at things that had happened in the past in a very different light and I was taking a position that was increasingly diverging from DOB’s positions."
Gittings began to implement changes in The Ladder that included adding "A Lesbian Review" underneath the title on the cover and replacing the line drawings on the cover with photographs of actual lesbians, often taken by her partner, Kay Lahusen
. Gittings distributed The Ladder in six bookstores in New York and Philadelphia, and one Greenwich Village
store displayed the magazine prominently, selling 100 copies a month. The focus of the magazine shifted as well to tackling more controversial issues to spark debate, printing such articles titled "I Hate Women" remarking on women who are politically apathetic, and "To Act or to Teach?" that was a back-and-forth debate on whether it was more effective to educate the public or take political action.
s at the White House
, the US State Department, and at Independence Hall in Philadelphia to protest the federal government's policy on discrimination of homosexuals, holding a sign that read "Sexual preference is irrelevant to federal employment." The men who agreed to picket had to wear suits and ties, and the women who participated were to wear dresses, heels, and pantyhose so as to look employable by the federal government. Reactions from passersby were varied. A tourist witnessing the demonstration remarked, "I still don't believe it. Somebody's kidding." A stunned high school student pointed out, "They all look so normal." Gittings recalled, "I remember a man said to his kids, 'Hold your noses — it's dirty here.' And there was a woman dragging a string of kids who said, very angrily, 'You should all be married and have children like me.'" Leaflets were distributed to passersby that described their reasons for picketing, surprising some recipients who were unaware gays and lesbians could be fired so easily, and disgusting others. Gittings remembered, "It was risky and we were scared. Picketing was not a popular tactic at the time. And our cause seemed outlandish even to most gay people." The evening prior to the group's picketing the State Department, Secretary of State Dean Rusk
announced the pickets at a press conference. Gittings connected the high-profile visibility with a "breakthrough into mainstream publicity." From 1965 to 1969 Gittings participated in picketing at Independence Hall in Philadelphia on July 4, until the Stonewall Riots
in June 1969. After the riots, the annual Gay Pride Parade
commemorating the riots took its place.
Differences in Gittings' political stance and the leadership of the DOB began to show, and came to a culmination in 1966 when she was ousted as the editor of The Ladder for, as one source claims, creating the issue that reported on the DOB convention late, but according to another source because she removed "For Adults Only" on the cover of the magazine without consulting the DOB.
In November 1967, Gittings and Kameny worked together as co-counsel in hearings held by the Department of Defense
to discredit an expert witness named Dr. Charles Socarides
, who testified that homosexuals could be converted to heterosexuality
, and to call in question the policy held by the Department of Defense that homosexual employees could be fired for being named as homosexuals. "Publicity was the objective," Gittings recalled many years later. Kameny and Gittings dressed conservatively, but wore buttons that said "Gay is Good" and "Pray for Sodomy." "We held press conferences for the benefit of sharp-eyed reporters. When we first went into a hearing room, we made certain to shake hands with all...participants so (they) could not avoid reading our buttons. Although neither were attorneys, at the end of their cross-examination, the Department of Defense removed Socarides from their lists of expert witnesses.
Gittings made hundreds of appearances as a speaker in the late 1960s. She carried on her mission to convince heterosexuals and homosexuals alike that homosexuality is not an illness, stating in a letter in 1967:
, the first gay caucus
in a professional association, and became its coordinator in 1971.
She pushed the American Library Association for more visibility for gays and lesbians in the profession. She staffed a kissing booth
at the Dallas convention of the ALA, underneath the banner "Hug a Homosexual," with a "women only" side and a "men only" side. When no one took advantage of it, she and Patience and Sarah
author Alma Routsong
(better known by her pen name, Isabel Miller) kissed in front of rolling television cameras. In describing its success, despite most of the reaction being negative, Gittings said, "We needed to get an audience. So we decided, let's show gay love live. We were offering free—mind you, free—same-sex kisses and hugs. Let me tell you, the aisles were mobbed, but no one came into the booth to get a free hug. So we hugged and kissed each other. It was shown twice on the evening news, once again in the morning. It put us on the map."
Gittings made an appearance on the Phil Donahue Show in 1970 and on PBS' David Susskind
Show in 1971, along with six other lesbians, including Lilli Vincenz and Barbara Love. They were among the first open lesbians to appear on television in the US, and debated long-held stereotype
s about gays with Susskind. A week after her appearance on the David Susskind Show, a middle-aged couple approached Gittings in the supermarket
to claim, "You made me realize that you gay people love each other just the way Arnold and I do."
In 1972, Gittings and Kameny organized a discussion with the American Psychiatric Association entitled "Psychiatry: Friend or Foe to Homosexuals: A Dialogue," where a panel of psychiatrists were to discuss homosexuality. When Gittings' partner Lahusen noticed all the psychiatrists were heterosexual, she protested. Gittings remembered, "My partner, Kay, said, `This isn't right—here you have two psychiatrists pitted against two gays, and what you really need is someone who is both.' The panel moderator, Dr. Kent Robinson, agreed to add a gay psychiatrist if we could find one. In 1972 who would come forward?... Kay and I wrote letters and made phone calls around the country." A gay psychiatrist in Philadelphia finally agreed to appear on the panel in heavy disguise, and with a voice distorting microphone, calling himself "Dr. H. Anonymous". He was John E. Fryer
, and he discussed how he was forced to be closeted while practicing psychiatry. Gittings read aloud letters from psychiatrists she had solicited who declined to appear for fear of professional ostracism. She described the event as "transformative". In 1973, homosexuality was removed from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual as a mental disorder, and Gittings celebrated by being photographed with the Philadelphia newspaper headlines, "Twenty Million Homosexuals Gain Instant Cure."
Gittings spent 16 years working with libraries and campaigning to get positive gay and lesbian-themed materials into libraries and to eliminate censorship
and job discrimination
. She wrote Gays in Library Land: The Gay and Lesbian Task Force of the American Library Association: The First Sixteen Years., a brief history of the group.
Gittings helped start what was then called the National Gay Task Force, later to be named the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force
(NGLTF) in 1973. Gittings served on the board of the NGLTF throughout the 1980s. She inspired nurses to form the Gay Nurses Alliance in 1973. She held exhibits at APA conventions in 1972, 1976, and 1978, her last one being "Gay Love: Good Medicine" that portrayed gays as happy and healthy.
, After Stonewall
, Out of the Past, and Pride Divide
. In 1991 she remembered her decisions to be as open as she was throughout her life when she said, "Every time I had to make a decision to put myself forward or to stay back, to use my real name or not, to go on television or decline, to get out on some of the earliest picket lines or remain behind. I usually took the public position because there weren't many of us yet that could afford the risk."
Gittings was renowned for her "ferocious dedication to the cause with a cock-eyed optimism, kindness, and gentle sense of humor." As recognition for Gittings' contributions to the promotion of gay and lesbian literature, in 2002 the Round Table of the ALA renamed their book award the Stonewall Book Award
: Barbara Gittings Literature Award for Fiction. In 2001, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation
honored her by bestowing her the first Barbara Gittings Award, highlighting dedication to activism. The same year, the Free Library of Philadelphia
announced its Barbara Gittings Collection of books dedicated to gay and lesbian issues. There are over 2,000 items in the collection, the second largest gay and lesbian collection of books in the US outside the San Francisco Public Library
's. In 2003, the American Library Association
rewarded her with its highest tribute, lifetime honorary membership. She also earned the first John E. Fryer Award from the American Psychiatric Association in 2006 with Frank Kameny. The award goes to people who have made a significant impact on the mental health of gays and lesbians. In October 2006, The Smithsonian Institution
acquired a sign she carried in her picketing in 1965, donated by Frank Kameny. In 2007, readers of The Advocate
included Gittings on a list of their 40 favorite gay and lesbian heroes.
and Renaissance music
. She sang in choral groups for most of her life, spending over 50 years in the Philadelphia Chamber Chorus. She was also a hiking and canoe
ing enthusiast.
Gittings met her partner, Kay Tobin Lahusen (b.1930) in 1961 at a picnic in Rhode Island
, and described how they began: "We hit it off, we started courting. I flew to Boston
[to see her] and got off the plane with a big bunch of flowers in my hand. I couldn't resist. I did not care what the world thought. I dropped the flowers, grabbed her and kissed her. That was not being done in 1961."
Gittings and Lahusen were together for 46 years. They donated copies of some materials and photographs covering their activism to the Cornell University
Rare and Manuscript Collections. In 2007, Lahusen donated all of their original papers and photographs to the New York City Public Library. NYPL President Paul LeClerc said, "The collection donated by Barbara Gittings and Kay Tobin Lahusen is a remarkable first-hand chronicle detailing the battles of gays and lesbians to overcome the prejudice and restrictions that were prevalent prior to the activism and protest movements that started in the 1960s." The University of Massachusetts Amherst
main library also received a donation of over 1,000 of Gittings' and Lahusen's books in 2007.
In 1997, Gittings and Lahusen pushed the American Association of Retired Persons (AARP) to grant couple's membership to them, for a reduced price on health insurance
. One of her last acts as an activist was to come out
in the newsletter published by the assisted living facility they reside in. On February 18, 2007 Gittings died in Kennett Square, Pennsylvania
after a long battle with breast cancer
. She is survived by her life partner, Kay Tobin Lahusen, and her sister, Eleanor Gittings Taylor.
In 1999, Gittings summed up her inspiration for her activism: "As a teenager, I had to struggle alone to learn about myself and what it meant to be gay. Now for 48 years I've had the satisfaction of working with other gay people all across the country to get the bigots off our backs, to oil the closet door hinges, to change prejudiced hearts and minds, and to show that gay love is good for us and for the rest of the world too. It's hard work — but it's vital, and it's gratifying, and it's often fun!"
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
activist for gay equality. She organized the New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
chapter of the Daughters of Bilitis
Daughters of Bilitis
The Daughters of Bilitis , was the first lesbian rights organization in the United States. It was formed in San Francisco in 1955, conceived as a social alternative to lesbian bars, which were considered illegal and thus subject to raids and police harassment...
(DOB) from 1958 to 1963, edited the national DOB magazine The Ladder
The Ladder (magazine)
The Ladder was the first nationally distributed lesbian publication in the United States. It was published monthly from 1956 to 1970, and once every other month in 1971 and 1972. It was the primary publication and method of communication for the Daughters of Bilitis, the first lesbian organization...
from 1963 to 1966, and worked closely with Frank Kameny in the 1960s on the first picket lines that brought attention to the ban on employment of gay people by the largest employer in the US at that time: the United States government
Federal government of the United States
The federal government of the United States is the national government of the constitutional republic of fifty states that is the United States of America. The federal government comprises three distinct branches of government: a legislative, an executive and a judiciary. These branches and...
. Her early experiences with trying to learn more about lesbianism fueled her lifetime work with libraries. In the 1970s, Gittings was most involved in the American Library Association
American Library Association
The American Library Association is a non-profit organization based in the United States that promotes libraries and library education internationally. It is the oldest and largest library association in the world, with more than 62,000 members....
, forming the first gay caucus in a professional organization, in order to promote positive literature about homosexuality
Homosexuality
Homosexuality is romantic or sexual attraction or behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality refers to "an enduring pattern of or disposition to experience sexual, affectional, or romantic attractions" primarily or exclusively to people of the same...
in libraries. She was a part of the movement to get the American Psychiatric Association
American Psychiatric Association
The American Psychiatric Association is the main professional organization of psychiatrists and trainee psychiatrists in the United States, and the most influential worldwide. Its some 38,000 members are mainly American but some are international...
to drop homosexuality as a mental illness
Mental illness
A mental disorder or mental illness is a psychological or behavioral pattern generally associated with subjective distress or disability that occurs in an individual, and which is not a part of normal development or culture. Such a disorder may consist of a combination of affective, behavioural,...
in 1972. Her self-described life mission was to tear away the "shroud of invisibility" related to homosexuality that associated it with crime and mental illness.
She was awarded a lifetime membership in the American Library Association
American Library Association
The American Library Association is a non-profit organization based in the United States that promotes libraries and library education internationally. It is the oldest and largest library association in the world, with more than 62,000 members....
, and the ALA named an annual award for the best gay or lesbian novel the The Barbara Gittings Award
Stonewall Book Award
Sponsored by the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Round Table of the American Library Association , the Stonewall Book Award is for LGBT books...
. The Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) also named an activist award for her. At her memorial service, Matt Foreman, the executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force
National Gay and Lesbian Task Force
The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force builds the political power of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community from the ground up. The Task Force is the country’s premier social justice organization fighting to improve the lives of LGBT people, and working to create positive, lasting...
said, "What do we owe Barbara? Everything."
Education
Gittings was born to Elizabeth Brooks and John Sterett Gittings in ViennaVienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
, Austria
Austria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
, where her father was serving as a U.S. diplomat
Diplomat
A diplomat is a person appointed by a state to conduct diplomacy with another state or international organization. The main functions of diplomats revolve around the representation and protection of the interests and nationals of the sending state, as well as the promotion of information and...
. Barbara and her siblings attended Catholic school in Montreal
Montreal
Montreal is a city in Canada. It is the largest city in the province of Quebec, the second-largest city in Canada and the seventh largest in North America...
, and was so immersed in Catholicism that at one point in her childhood she considered becoming a nun
Nun
A nun is a woman who has taken vows committing her to live a spiritual life. She may be an ascetic who voluntarily chooses to leave mainstream society and live her life in prayer and contemplation in a monastery or convent...
. Her family returned to the United States at the outbreak of World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
and settled in Wilmington, Delaware
Wilmington, Delaware
Wilmington is the largest city in the state of Delaware, United States, and is located at the confluence of the Christina River and Brandywine Creek, near where the Christina flows into the Delaware River. It is the county seat of New Castle County and one of the major cities in the Delaware Valley...
. Although aware of her attraction to other girls, Gittings said she first heard the word "homosexual" when she was rejected for membership in the National Honor Society
National Honor Society
The National Honor Society is a recognition program for high school students in grades 10-12 in the United States and in several other countries...
in high school. Despite being an excellent student, a teacher who had reservations about her character took her aside and told her that the rejection was based on what the teacher believed were "homosexual inclinations".
While majoring in drama at Northwestern University
Northwestern University
Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston and Chicago, Illinois, USA. Northwestern has eleven undergraduate, graduate, and professional schools offering 124 undergraduate degrees and 145 graduate and professional degrees....
, Gittings developed a close but non-sexual friendship with another female student, prompting rumors that they were lesbian
Lesbian
Lesbian is a term most widely used in the English language to describe sexual and romantic desire between females. The word may be used as a noun, to refer to women who identify themselves or who are characterized by others as having the primary attribute of female homosexuality, or as an...
s, which led Gittings to examine her own sexual orientation. In her attempts to understand it, she had her suspicions confirmed by a psychiatrist who offered to cure her. Not having enough money to make regular visits, she was unable to get the money from her father, who reasoned there were no problems a psychiatrist could solve that a priest could not. Barbara's close friend suggested they see less of each other so as not to further encourage the rumors about them.
Having no one to talk to about the issues that were consuming her, she decided to read as much as she could on the topic. She found very little, and much of what she found described homosexuals as "deviants", "perverts", and "abnormal" in medical books and texts on abnormal psychology, or odd generalizations that stated homosexuals were unable to whistle, or that their favorite color was green. She also found all the information focused on homosexual men. She recalled in a 2001 interview, "I thought, this is not about me. There is nothing here about love or happiness. There has to be something better". Her research took up so much of her time at Northwestern that she ended up failing out of the school. Gittings found a purpose during this time, saying, "My mission was not to get a general education but to find out about myself and what my life would be like. So I stopped going to classes and started going to the library. There were no organizations to turn to in those days only libraries were safe, although the information contained was dismal."
After college
At 17 years old she returned from Northwestern "in disgrace" after failing out of school and unable to tell her family why. But she was compelled to continue her search for information. She found some in the novels available at the time: NightwoodNightwood
Nightwood is a 1936 novel by Djuna Barnes first published in London by Faber and Faber. An edition published in the United States in 1937 by Harcourt, Brace included an introduction by T. S. Eliot.....
, The Well of Loneliness
The Well of Loneliness
The Well of Loneliness is a 1928 lesbian novel by the British author Radclyffe Hall. It follows the life of Stephen Gordon, an Englishwoman from an upper-class family whose "sexual inversion" is apparent from an early age...
, The Unlit Lamp, and Extraordinary Women. Soon thereafter, her father discovered The Well of Loneliness in a pile of other things in her bedroom. He was so appalled at what he found that he instructed her to burn the book, but did so in a letter because he was unable to speak to her about it. Still eager to learn more about homosexuality, Gittings took a night course in abnormal psychology where she met the first woman with whom she had a brief affair. At 18 years old she left home to be on her own and moved to Philadelphia.
Gittings began to hitchhike on weekends to New York City, dressed as a man, to visit gay bars since she knew of none in Philadelphia, and knew of no other places to go to get "plugged into the gay community." In a 1975 interview, she recalled, "I wore drag
Drag (clothing)
Drag is used for any clothing carrying symbolic significance but usually referring to the clothing associated with one gender role when worn by a person of another gender. The origin of the term "drag" is unknown, but it may have originated in Polari, a gay street argot in England in the early...
because I thought that was a way to show I was gay. It's changed now, but in the early 50s there were basically two types of women in the gay bars: the so-called butch
Butch and femme
Butch and femme are LGBT terms describing respectively, masculine and feminine traits, behavior, style, expression, self-perception and so on. They are often used in the lesbian, bisexual and gay subcultures...
ones in short hair and plan masculine attire and the so-called femme ones in dresses and high heels and makeup. I knew high heels and makeup weren't my personal style, so I thought...I must be the other kind!" However, Gittings found very little in common with the women she met in the bars, and after witnessing a gay male acquaintance get beaten up after leaving a bar, began to focus her energies on collecting books.
Daughters of Bilitis
In 1956, Gittings went to CaliforniaCalifornia
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
on the advice of Donald Webster Cory, to visit the office of the new ONE, Inc.
ONE, Inc.
ONE, Inc. was an early gay rights organization in the United States.The idea for a publication dedicated to homosexuals emerged from a Mattachine Society discussion meeting held on October 15, 1952....
, an early homophile
Homophile
The word homophile is an alternative to the word for homosexual or gay. The homophile movement also refers to the gay rights movement of the 1950s and '60s....
organization that dedicated itself to providing support to homosexuals in the US. While in California, she met Phyllis Lyon and Del Martin, who had co-founded the Daughters of Bilitis
Daughters of Bilitis
The Daughters of Bilitis , was the first lesbian rights organization in the United States. It was formed in San Francisco in 1955, conceived as a social alternative to lesbian bars, which were considered illegal and thus subject to raids and police harassment...
(DOB) in San Francisco. "She was a cute, curly-haired young woman wearing a shift and sandals. I remember she had this satchel, a backpack — I'd never seen anything like it. Or her," Lyon remembered. At her first meeting of the Daughters of Bilitis in someone's living room, Gittings brought up the obscurity of the name, which she thought was impractical, difficult to pronounce and spell, and referenced a fictional bisexual character, not even homosexual. "Even then I was pretty assertive...What were they doing with a name like that? It wasn't very nice of me, but they seemed to take it with reasonably good spirits." In 1958, Martin and Lyon asked Gittings to start a chapter in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, which she did when less than a dozen women responded to her notice in the Mattachine Society
Mattachine Society
The Mattachine Society, founded in 1950, was one of the earliest homophile organizations in the United States, probably second only to Chicago’s Society for Human Rights . Harry Hay and a group of Los Angeles male friends formed the group to protect and improve the rights of homosexuals...
newsletter asking for "all women in the New York area who are interested in forming a chapter of the DOB" on September 20, 1958. Gittings served as the chapter's first president for three years commuting to New York from Philadelphia twice a month.
In 1982, Gittings remembered, "I joined the movement in 1958, when the subject of homosexuality was still shrouded in complete silence. There were no radio talk shows or TV documentaries. In all the United States, there were maybe a half dozen groups, two hundred people active in all." The Daughters of Bilitis served as a social alternative to bars for lesbians, but took great care to deny that they were "arranging for 'immoral contacts'." While president of the DOB in New York, attending members numbered between ten and forty per meeting. They met twice a month and often invited doctors, psychiatrists, ministers and attorneys to address their meetings, even if the message was clearly disparaging to lesbians. Gittings recalled, "At first we were so grateful just to have people — anybody — pay attention to us that we listened to and accepted everything they said, no matter how bad it was...anything that helped to break the silence, no matter how silly or foolish it may look to us today, was important." Gittings admitted that early meetings and writings in the Daughters of Bilitis urged their members not to upset mainstream heterosexual society; that integration and acceptance would be won if heterosexuals could see that gays and lesbians were not dramatically different from themselves.
Gittings worked in clerical positions during this time, spending ten years as a mimeograph operator for an architectural firm. The New York chapter of the DOB distributed a newsletter to about 150 people, and Gittings worked on it while being required to stay overtime at her job. In 1959, after using company envelopes to mail the newsletter out and covering the firm's name with a sticker, someone wrote to the firm to notify them that a newsletter addressing lesbianism was being distributed. Gittings was sure that she would be fired, but her boss, a woman, stated cryptically that she was familiar with the topic, having served in the armed forces. Gittings was not fired but cautioned to be more careful instead.
The Ladder
From 1963 to 1966, she edited the organization's magazine, The LadderThe Ladder (magazine)
The Ladder was the first nationally distributed lesbian publication in the United States. It was published monthly from 1956 to 1970, and once every other month in 1971 and 1972. It was the primary publication and method of communication for the Daughters of Bilitis, the first lesbian organization...
, following both Lyon and Martin as editors. Although the Daughters of Bilitis did take a political stand in the 1959 San Francisco mayoral race, Martin and Lyon preferred The Ladder to remain apolitical., Gittings was impressed with how her influence as editor impacted the magazine and the opinions of its readers. "I discovered the power of the press, the power to put in what you want in order to influence readers," she said.
At the 1963 convention of the newly formed East Coast Homophile Organizations, the audience heard a speaker named Dr. Albert Ellis tell them that "the exclusive homosexual" was a psychopath. Articles and essays in The Ladder sometimes carried these viewpoints, since it was difficult to get psychiatrists and doctors to address homosexuality in any form. Gittings said, "People like Ellis talked about homosexuality being a sickness. And they talked about a cure ... We'd sit there and listen and politely applaud and then go for the social hour afterward." However, after Dr. Ellis spoke, so did gay activist Frank Kameny, making an impression upon Gittings with his point that it is useless to try to find cures and causes for homosexuality since there is no valid evidence that it is an illness. Said Gittings, "My thinking didn’t change until Frank Kameny came along and he said plainly and firmly and unequivocally that homosexuality is no kind of sickness or disease or disorder or malfunction, it is fully on par with heterosexuality ... Suddenly I found that I was looking at things that had happened in the past in a very different light and I was taking a position that was increasingly diverging from DOB’s positions."
Gittings began to implement changes in The Ladder that included adding "A Lesbian Review" underneath the title on the cover and replacing the line drawings on the cover with photographs of actual lesbians, often taken by her partner, Kay Lahusen
Kay Lahusen
Kay Lahusen is considered the first openly gay photojournalist of the gay rights movement. Lahusen's photographs of lesbians appeared on several of the covers of The Ladder from 1964 to 1966 while her partner, Barbara Gittings, was the editor...
. Gittings distributed The Ladder in six bookstores in New York and Philadelphia, and one Greenwich Village
Greenwich Village
Greenwich Village, , , , .in New York often simply called "the Village", is a largely residential neighborhood on the west side of Lower Manhattan in New York City. A large majority of the district is home to upper middle class families...
store displayed the magazine prominently, selling 100 copies a month. The focus of the magazine shifted as well to tackling more controversial issues to spark debate, printing such articles titled "I Hate Women" remarking on women who are politically apathetic, and "To Act or to Teach?" that was a back-and-forth debate on whether it was more effective to educate the public or take political action.
Protests
In 1965, Gittings marched in the first gay picket linePicket line
A picket line is a horizontal rope, along which horses are tied at intervals. The rope can be on the ground, at chest height , or overhead. The overhead form usually is called a high line....
s at the White House
White House
The White House is the official residence and principal workplace of the president of the United States. Located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., the house was designed by Irish-born James Hoban, and built between 1792 and 1800 of white-painted Aquia sandstone in the Neoclassical...
, the US State Department, and at Independence Hall in Philadelphia to protest the federal government's policy on discrimination of homosexuals, holding a sign that read "Sexual preference is irrelevant to federal employment." The men who agreed to picket had to wear suits and ties, and the women who participated were to wear dresses, heels, and pantyhose so as to look employable by the federal government. Reactions from passersby were varied. A tourist witnessing the demonstration remarked, "I still don't believe it. Somebody's kidding." A stunned high school student pointed out, "They all look so normal." Gittings recalled, "I remember a man said to his kids, 'Hold your noses — it's dirty here.' And there was a woman dragging a string of kids who said, very angrily, 'You should all be married and have children like me.'" Leaflets were distributed to passersby that described their reasons for picketing, surprising some recipients who were unaware gays and lesbians could be fired so easily, and disgusting others. Gittings remembered, "It was risky and we were scared. Picketing was not a popular tactic at the time. And our cause seemed outlandish even to most gay people." The evening prior to the group's picketing the State Department, Secretary of State Dean Rusk
Dean Rusk
David Dean Rusk was the United States Secretary of State from 1961 to 1969 under presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson. Rusk is the second-longest serving U.S...
announced the pickets at a press conference. Gittings connected the high-profile visibility with a "breakthrough into mainstream publicity." From 1965 to 1969 Gittings participated in picketing at Independence Hall in Philadelphia on July 4, until the Stonewall Riots
Stonewall riots
The Stonewall riots were a series of spontaneous, violent demonstrations against a police raid that took place in the early morning hours of June 28, 1969, at the Stonewall Inn, in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of New York City...
in June 1969. After the riots, the annual Gay Pride Parade
Gay pride parade
Pride parades for the LGBT community are events celebrating lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender culture. The events also at times serve as demonstrations for legal rights such as same-sex marriage...
commemorating the riots took its place.
Differences in Gittings' political stance and the leadership of the DOB began to show, and came to a culmination in 1966 when she was ousted as the editor of The Ladder for, as one source claims, creating the issue that reported on the DOB convention late, but according to another source because she removed "For Adults Only" on the cover of the magazine without consulting the DOB.
In November 1967, Gittings and Kameny worked together as co-counsel in hearings held by the Department of Defense
United States Department of Defense
The United States Department of Defense is the U.S...
to discredit an expert witness named Dr. Charles Socarides
Charles Socarides
Charles W. Socarides was an American psychiatrist, psychoanalyst, physician, educator, and author. Socarides was born in Brockton, Massachusetts. Socarides focused much of his career on the study of homosexuality, which he believed can be altered...
, who testified that homosexuals could be converted to heterosexuality
Heterosexuality
Heterosexuality is romantic or sexual attraction or behavior between members of the opposite sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, heterosexuality refers to "an enduring pattern of or disposition to experience sexual, affectional, physical or romantic attractions to persons of the opposite sex";...
, and to call in question the policy held by the Department of Defense that homosexual employees could be fired for being named as homosexuals. "Publicity was the objective," Gittings recalled many years later. Kameny and Gittings dressed conservatively, but wore buttons that said "Gay is Good" and "Pray for Sodomy." "We held press conferences for the benefit of sharp-eyed reporters. When we first went into a hearing room, we made certain to shake hands with all...participants so (they) could not avoid reading our buttons. Although neither were attorneys, at the end of their cross-examination, the Department of Defense removed Socarides from their lists of expert witnesses.
Gittings made hundreds of appearances as a speaker in the late 1960s. She carried on her mission to convince heterosexuals and homosexuals alike that homosexuality is not an illness, stating in a letter in 1967:
"I keep trying to convince people in the movement that the charge of sickness is perhaps our greatest problem... we can't really progress in other directions until the unsubstantiated assumption of sickness...is demolished! It's almost always there, however slyly or covertly or even unconsciously, however 'sympathetic' the person: the attitude that homosexuality is somehow undesirable, some sort of twist or malfunction or failure or maladaptation or other kind of psychic sickness. And in our society sick people, by any definition of sick, just DO not get equal treatment. Equal treatment — no more, no less — is what we want! And compassion — which many homosexuals gladly swallow because they think it represents an improvement in attitudes toward them — is not equal treatment."
American Library Association
In the 1970s, Gittings continued her search for resources in libraries that addressed homosexuality in a positive, supportive way. In discussing her pursuit of the improvement of materials for gays and lesbians in libraries, she said, "For years I would haunt libraries and secondhand book shops trying to find stories to read about my people, and then I became active in other arenas of the gay rights movement, but I always kept an eye on the emerging literature...It began to talk about homosexuals who were healthy and happy and wholesome and who had good lives...That rang the bells for me—libraries, gay books!" Gittings found a home in the gay group that formed in 1970 in the American Library AssociationAmerican Library Association
The American Library Association is a non-profit organization based in the United States that promotes libraries and library education internationally. It is the oldest and largest library association in the world, with more than 62,000 members....
, the first gay caucus
Caucus
A caucus is a meeting of supporters or members of a political party or movement, especially in the United States and Canada. As the use of the term has been expanded the exact definition has come to vary among political cultures.-Origin of the term:...
in a professional association, and became its coordinator in 1971.
She pushed the American Library Association for more visibility for gays and lesbians in the profession. She staffed a kissing booth
Kissing booth
A kissing booth is a carnival attraction where the person running the booth kisses customers for money, often to raise funds for charity. Animals may also be used.-External links:* http://www.sptimes.com/2006/08/28/Pasco/A_fundraiser_in_the_b.shtml...
at the Dallas convention of the ALA, underneath the banner "Hug a Homosexual," with a "women only" side and a "men only" side. When no one took advantage of it, she and Patience and Sarah
Patience and Sarah
Patience and Sarah is a 1969 historical fiction novel with strong lesbian themes by Alma Routsong, using the pen name Isabel Miller. It was originally self-published under the title A Place For Us and eventually found a publisher as Patience and Sarah in 1971.Routsong's novel is based on a...
author Alma Routsong
Alma Routsong
Alma Routsong was an American novelist best known for her lesbian fiction, published under the pen name Isabel Miller.-Biography:...
(better known by her pen name, Isabel Miller) kissed in front of rolling television cameras. In describing its success, despite most of the reaction being negative, Gittings said, "We needed to get an audience. So we decided, let's show gay love live. We were offering free—mind you, free—same-sex kisses and hugs. Let me tell you, the aisles were mobbed, but no one came into the booth to get a free hug. So we hugged and kissed each other. It was shown twice on the evening news, once again in the morning. It put us on the map."
Gittings made an appearance on the Phil Donahue Show in 1970 and on PBS' David Susskind
David Susskind
David Susskind was a producer of TV, movies, and stage plays and also a pioneer TV talk show host.-Personal:...
Show in 1971, along with six other lesbians, including Lilli Vincenz and Barbara Love. They were among the first open lesbians to appear on television in the US, and debated long-held stereotype
Stereotype
A stereotype is a popular belief about specific social groups or types of individuals. The concepts of "stereotype" and "prejudice" are often confused with many other different meanings...
s about gays with Susskind. A week after her appearance on the David Susskind Show, a middle-aged couple approached Gittings in the supermarket
Supermarket
A supermarket, a form of grocery store, is a self-service store offering a wide variety of food and household merchandise, organized into departments...
to claim, "You made me realize that you gay people love each other just the way Arnold and I do."
American Psychiatric Association
John E. Fryer
John E. Fryer, M.D. was an American psychiatrist and gay rights activist best known for his anonymous speech at the 1972 American Psychiatric Association annual conference where he appeared in disguise and under the name Dr H. Anonymous...
, and he discussed how he was forced to be closeted while practicing psychiatry. Gittings read aloud letters from psychiatrists she had solicited who declined to appear for fear of professional ostracism. She described the event as "transformative". In 1973, homosexuality was removed from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual as a mental disorder, and Gittings celebrated by being photographed with the Philadelphia newspaper headlines, "Twenty Million Homosexuals Gain Instant Cure."
Gittings spent 16 years working with libraries and campaigning to get positive gay and lesbian-themed materials into libraries and to eliminate censorship
Censorship
thumb|[[Book burning]] following the [[1973 Chilean coup d'état|1973 coup]] that installed the [[Military government of Chile |Pinochet regime]] in Chile...
and job discrimination
Discrimination
Discrimination is the prejudicial treatment of an individual based on their membership in a certain group or category. It involves the actual behaviors towards groups such as excluding or restricting members of one group from opportunities that are available to another group. The term began to be...
. She wrote Gays in Library Land: The Gay and Lesbian Task Force of the American Library Association: The First Sixteen Years., a brief history of the group.
Gittings helped start what was then called the National Gay Task Force, later to be named the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force
National Gay and Lesbian Task Force
The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force builds the political power of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community from the ground up. The Task Force is the country’s premier social justice organization fighting to improve the lives of LGBT people, and working to create positive, lasting...
(NGLTF) in 1973. Gittings served on the board of the NGLTF throughout the 1980s. She inspired nurses to form the Gay Nurses Alliance in 1973. She held exhibits at APA conventions in 1972, 1976, and 1978, her last one being "Gay Love: Good Medicine" that portrayed gays as happy and healthy.
Legacy
Gittings appeared in the documentary films Gay Pioneers, Before StonewallBefore Stonewall
Before Stonewall: The Making of a Gay and Lesbian Community is a 1984 American documentary film about the LGBT community prior to the 1969 Stonewall riots. It was narrated by author Rita Mae Brown, co-produced by John Scagliotti and Robert Rosenberg, and co-directed by Rosenberg and Greta Schiller...
, After Stonewall
After Stonewall
After Stonewall is a 1999 documentary film directed by John Scagliotti about the 30 years of gay rights activism since the 1969 Stonewall riots. It is the sequel to the Scagliotti-produced 1986 film Before Stonewall and is narrated by musician Melissa Etheridge...
, Out of the Past, and Pride Divide
Pride Divide
Pride Divide is a 1997 documentary film directed by Paris Poirier. It examines the issues within the LGBT community relating to apparent divisions between lesbians and gay men.-Participants:*Joan Jett Blakk*Kate Clinton*Martin Duberman*Lillian Faderman...
. In 1991 she remembered her decisions to be as open as she was throughout her life when she said, "Every time I had to make a decision to put myself forward or to stay back, to use my real name or not, to go on television or decline, to get out on some of the earliest picket lines or remain behind. I usually took the public position because there weren't many of us yet that could afford the risk."
Gittings was renowned for her "ferocious dedication to the cause with a cock-eyed optimism, kindness, and gentle sense of humor." As recognition for Gittings' contributions to the promotion of gay and lesbian literature, in 2002 the Round Table of the ALA renamed their book award the Stonewall Book Award
Stonewall Book Award
Sponsored by the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Round Table of the American Library Association , the Stonewall Book Award is for LGBT books...
: Barbara Gittings Literature Award for Fiction. In 2001, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation
Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation
The Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation is a non-governmental media monitoring organization which promotes the image of LGBT people in the media...
honored her by bestowing her the first Barbara Gittings Award, highlighting dedication to activism. The same year, the Free Library of Philadelphia
Free Library of Philadelphia
The Free Library of Philadelphia is the public library system serving Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.-History:History of the Free Library of Philadelphia: Initiated by the efforts of Dr...
announced its Barbara Gittings Collection of books dedicated to gay and lesbian issues. There are over 2,000 items in the collection, the second largest gay and lesbian collection of books in the US outside the San Francisco Public Library
San Francisco Public Library
The San Francisco Public Library is a public library system serving the city of San Francisco. Its main library is located in San Francisco's Civic Center, at 100 Larkin Street at Grove. The first public library of San Francisco officially opened in 1879, just 30 years after the California Gold...
's. In 2003, the American Library Association
American Library Association
The American Library Association is a non-profit organization based in the United States that promotes libraries and library education internationally. It is the oldest and largest library association in the world, with more than 62,000 members....
rewarded her with its highest tribute, lifetime honorary membership. She also earned the first John E. Fryer Award from the American Psychiatric Association in 2006 with Frank Kameny. The award goes to people who have made a significant impact on the mental health of gays and lesbians. In October 2006, The Smithsonian Institution
Smithsonian Institution
The Smithsonian Institution is an educational and research institute and associated museum complex, administered and funded by the government of the United States and by funds from its endowment, contributions, and profits from its retail operations, concessions, licensing activities, and magazines...
acquired a sign she carried in her picketing in 1965, donated by Frank Kameny. In 2007, readers of The Advocate
The Advocate
The Advocate is an American LGBT-interest magazine, printed monthly and available by subscription. The Advocate brand also includes a web site. Both magazine and web site have an editorial focus on news, politics, opinion, and arts and entertainment of interest to LGBT people...
included Gittings on a list of their 40 favorite gay and lesbian heroes.
Personal life
Gittings was an avid music lover, most interested in BaroqueBaroque music
Baroque music describes a style of Western Classical music approximately extending from 1600 to 1760. This era follows the Renaissance and was followed in turn by the Classical era...
and Renaissance music
Renaissance music
Renaissance music is European music written during the Renaissance. Defining the beginning of the musical era is difficult, given that its defining characteristics were adopted only gradually; musicologists have placed its beginnings from as early as 1300 to as late as the 1470s.Literally meaning...
. She sang in choral groups for most of her life, spending over 50 years in the Philadelphia Chamber Chorus. She was also a hiking and canoe
Canoe
A canoe or Canadian canoe is a small narrow boat, typically human-powered, though it may also be powered by sails or small electric or gas motors. Canoes are usually pointed at both bow and stern and are normally open on top, but can be decked over A canoe (North American English) or Canadian...
ing enthusiast.
Gittings met her partner, Kay Tobin Lahusen (b.1930) in 1961 at a picnic in Rhode Island
Rhode Island
The state of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, more commonly referred to as Rhode Island , is a state in the New England region of the United States. It is the smallest U.S. state by area...
, and described how they began: "We hit it off, we started courting. I flew to Boston
Boston
Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...
[to see her] and got off the plane with a big bunch of flowers in my hand. I couldn't resist. I did not care what the world thought. I dropped the flowers, grabbed her and kissed her. That was not being done in 1961."
Cornell University
Cornell University is an Ivy League university located in Ithaca, New York, United States. It is a private land-grant university, receiving annual funding from the State of New York for certain educational missions...
Rare and Manuscript Collections. In 2007, Lahusen donated all of their original papers and photographs to the New York City Public Library. NYPL President Paul LeClerc said, "The collection donated by Barbara Gittings and Kay Tobin Lahusen is a remarkable first-hand chronicle detailing the battles of gays and lesbians to overcome the prejudice and restrictions that were prevalent prior to the activism and protest movements that started in the 1960s." The University of Massachusetts Amherst
University of Massachusetts Amherst
The University of Massachusetts Amherst is a public research and land-grant university in Amherst, Massachusetts, United States and the flagship of the University of Massachusetts system...
main library also received a donation of over 1,000 of Gittings' and Lahusen's books in 2007.
In 1997, Gittings and Lahusen pushed the American Association of Retired Persons (AARP) to grant couple's membership to them, for a reduced price on health insurance
Health insurance
Health insurance is insurance against the risk of incurring medical expenses among individuals. By estimating the overall risk of health care expenses among a targeted group, an insurer can develop a routine finance structure, such as a monthly premium or payroll tax, to ensure that money is...
. One of her last acts as an activist was to come out
Coming out
Coming out is a figure of speech for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people's disclosure of their sexual orientation and/or gender identity....
in the newsletter published by the assisted living facility they reside in. On February 18, 2007 Gittings died in Kennett Square, Pennsylvania
Kennett Square, Pennsylvania
Kennett Square is a borough in Chester County, Pennsylvania, United States. It is known as the Mushroom Capital of the World because mushroom farming in the region produces over a million pounds of mushrooms a year...
after a long battle with breast cancer
Breast cancer
Breast cancer is cancer originating from breast tissue, most commonly from the inner lining of milk ducts or the lobules that supply the ducts with milk. Cancers originating from ducts are known as ductal carcinomas; those originating from lobules are known as lobular carcinomas...
. She is survived by her life partner, Kay Tobin Lahusen, and her sister, Eleanor Gittings Taylor.
In 1999, Gittings summed up her inspiration for her activism: "As a teenager, I had to struggle alone to learn about myself and what it meant to be gay. Now for 48 years I've had the satisfaction of working with other gay people all across the country to get the bigots off our backs, to oil the closet door hinges, to change prejudiced hearts and minds, and to show that gay love is good for us and for the rest of the world too. It's hard work — but it's vital, and it's gratifying, and it's often fun!"
External links
- Barbara Gittings and Kay Tobin Lahusen Gay History Papers and Photographs, 1855-2009. Manuscripts and Archives, New York Public Library.
- Kay Lahusen and Barbara Gittings Digital Collection, via New York Public LibraryNew York Public LibraryThe New York Public Library is the largest public library in North America and is one of the United States' most significant research libraries...
- Barbara Gittings And Kay Tobin Lahusen Miscellany, 1965-1982, via Cornell UniversityCornell UniversityCornell University is an Ivy League university located in Ithaca, New York, United States. It is a private land-grant university, receiving annual funding from the State of New York for certain educational missions...