Marshall Kirk
Encyclopedia
Marshall Kenneth Kirk was a New England Historic Genealogical Society
librarian, and a noted writer and a researcher in neuropsychiatry
. He is, however, best known as one of the co-authors of "After the Ball" a strategy for the LGBT
movement in the 1990s.
. Marshall had two brothers, Roger and Douglas, and a sister, Kathy. Growing up Kirk took interest in weather
; his brothers report that at age 10 his fellow townsmen in Mechanic Falls, Maine, preferred his forecasts to anything on television. He was valedictorian of his high school class and graduated magna cum laude from Harvard University
in 1980, majoring in psychology, and writing his honors thesis on the testing of gifted children.
forebears broadened into the study of pre-American ancestry
. He became internationally known as one of the three or four major American authorities on medieval and ancient genealogy (Greece
, Rome
, Egypt
, Persia, Armenia
, the Merovingians and Carolingians).
Writing sometimes under his own name and at other times under the pseudonym
“Kenneth W. Kirkpatrick,” he authored or co-authored several articles in the NEGHS Register and also wrote for the New Hampshire Genealogical Record, Vermont Genealogist and The Island Magazine. His accumulation of arguments to "build a case" for speculative identifications in the near English ancestry of New England immigrants was widely perceived as brilliant, and he published such pieces on the five Winslow brothers and Thomas Bradbury in the NEGHS Register (the second article published 2007) and on John Cotton in the last 1999 issue of The New Hampshire Genealogical Record.
His research on Gov. Thomas Dudley
was used by both Doug Richardson in Plantagenet Ancestry and in The Royal Descents of 600 Immigrants (RD600) by Gary Boyd Roberts
. Marshall was especially pleased by the prospect of an Edward III descent through Katherine Deighton (Dudley's second wife), Dennis and Stradling, and after publication of an article in Foundations attempting to refute it, was strong in its defense.
Marshall also contributed to the fourth edition (1999) of the Genealogist’s Handbook for New England Research, the CD-ROM edition of Clarence A. Torrey’s New England Marriages Prior to 1700, and John A. Schutz, Legislators of the Massachusetts General Court, 1691–1780: A Biographical Dictionary (1997).
He was associate editor of The Mayflower
Descendant from 2002 to 2003.
The book is often critically described by social conservatives as important to the success of the LGBT Movement in the 90's and as part of an alleged "homosexual agenda
". The conservative Christian group Focus on the Family
claim that,
that required Electroconvulsive therapy
(ECT) on three occasions. Because of the negative effects on his memory, he considered ECT to be the last alternative to avoid death. In part due to this medical history, his knowledge of pharmacology
was usually greater than that of anyone who treated him. When he died, he was found alone in his apartment by two friends. The cause of death has never been publicly revealed.
New England Historic Genealogical Society
The New England Historic Genealogical Society is the oldest and largest genealogical society in the United States, founded in 1845. A charitable, nonprofit educational institution, NEHGS is located at 99-101 Newbury Street, in Boston, Massachusetts, in an eight-story archive and research center....
librarian, and a noted writer and a researcher in neuropsychiatry
Neuropsychiatry
Neuropsychiatry is the branch of medicine dealing with mental disorders attributable to diseases of the nervous system. It preceded the current disciplines of psychiatry and neurology, in as much as psychiatrists and neurologists had a common training....
. He is, however, best known as one of the co-authors of "After the Ball" a strategy for the LGBT
LGBT
LGBT is an initialism that collectively refers to "lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender" people. In use since the 1990s, the term "LGBT" is an adaptation of the initialism "LGB", which itself started replacing the phrase "gay community" beginning in the mid-to-late 1980s, which many within the...
movement in the 1990s.
Background
Marshall was born in Norway, Maine, the third child of Roger Marchant and Kathleen Marie (Murphy) Kirk, and was raised in Mechanic FallsMechanic Falls, Maine
Mechanic Falls is a town in Androscoggin County, Maine, United States. The population was 3,138 at the 2000 census. It is included in both the Lewiston-Auburn, Maine metropolitan statistical area and the Lewiston-Auburn, Maine metropolitan New England city and town area.-History:It was originally...
. Marshall had two brothers, Roger and Douglas, and a sister, Kathy. Growing up Kirk took interest in weather
Weather
Weather is the state of the atmosphere, to the degree that it is hot or cold, wet or dry, calm or stormy, clear or cloudy. Most weather phenomena occur in the troposphere, just below the stratosphere. Weather refers, generally, to day-to-day temperature and precipitation activity, whereas climate...
; his brothers report that at age 10 his fellow townsmen in Mechanic Falls, Maine, preferred his forecasts to anything on television. He was valedictorian of his high school class and graduated magna cum laude from Harvard University
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...
in 1980, majoring in psychology, and writing his honors thesis on the testing of gifted children.
Genealogical research
His interest in his own colonial New EnglandNew England
New England is a region in the northeastern corner of the United States consisting of the six states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut...
forebears broadened into the study of pre-American ancestry
Genealogy
Genealogy is the study of families and the tracing of their lineages and history. Genealogists use oral traditions, historical records, genetic analysis, and other records to obtain information about a family and to demonstrate kinship and pedigrees of its members...
. He became internationally known as one of the three or four major American authorities on medieval and ancient genealogy (Greece
Greece
Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....
, Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...
, Egypt
Egypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
, Persia, Armenia
Armenia
Armenia , officially the Republic of Armenia , is a landlocked mountainous country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia...
, the Merovingians and Carolingians).
Writing sometimes under his own name and at other times under the pseudonym
Pseudonym
A pseudonym is a name that a person assumes for a particular purpose and that differs from his or her original orthonym...
“Kenneth W. Kirkpatrick,” he authored or co-authored several articles in the NEGHS Register and also wrote for the New Hampshire Genealogical Record, Vermont Genealogist and The Island Magazine. His accumulation of arguments to "build a case" for speculative identifications in the near English ancestry of New England immigrants was widely perceived as brilliant, and he published such pieces on the five Winslow brothers and Thomas Bradbury in the NEGHS Register (the second article published 2007) and on John Cotton in the last 1999 issue of The New Hampshire Genealogical Record.
His research on Gov. Thomas Dudley
Thomas Dudley
Thomas Dudley was a colonial magistrate who served several terms as governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Dudley was the chief founder of Newtowne, later Cambridge, Massachusetts, and built the town's first home...
was used by both Doug Richardson in Plantagenet Ancestry and in The Royal Descents of 600 Immigrants (RD600) by Gary Boyd Roberts
Gary Boyd Roberts
Gary Boyd Roberts is an American genealogist known for his scholarship in Americans of royal descent, the ancestors of American presidents, and notable kin. Roberts is the retired Senior Research Scholar of the New England Historic Genealogical Society .- Background :A native of Houston, Texas,...
. Marshall was especially pleased by the prospect of an Edward III descent through Katherine Deighton (Dudley's second wife), Dennis and Stradling, and after publication of an article in Foundations attempting to refute it, was strong in its defense.
Marshall also contributed to the fourth edition (1999) of the Genealogist’s Handbook for New England Research, the CD-ROM edition of Clarence A. Torrey’s New England Marriages Prior to 1700, and John A. Schutz, Legislators of the Massachusetts General Court, 1691–1780: A Biographical Dictionary (1997).
He was associate editor of The Mayflower
Mayflower
The Mayflower was the ship that transported the English Separatists, better known as the Pilgrims, from a site near the Mayflower Steps in Plymouth, England, to Plymouth, Massachusetts, , in 1620...
Descendant from 2002 to 2003.
Gay rights activism
In 1987 Kirk partnered with Hunter Madsen (who used the pen name "Erastes Pill") to write an essay, The Overhauling of Straight America, which was published in Guide Magazine. They argued that gays must portray themselves in a positive way to straight America, and that the main aim of making homosexuality acceptable could be achieved by getting Americans "to think that it is just another thing, with a shrug of their shoulders". Then "your battle for legal and social rights is virtually won". The pair developed their argument in the 1989 book "After the Ball: How America Will Conquer Its Fear and Hatred of Gays in the ’90s." The book outlined a public relations strategy for the LGBT movement. After its publication Kirk appeared in the pages of Newsweek, Time and The Washington Post.The book is often critically described by social conservatives as important to the success of the LGBT Movement in the 90's and as part of an alleged "homosexual agenda
Homosexual agenda
Homosexual agenda is a pejorative term used by some conservatives in the United States to describe the advocacy of cultural acceptance and normalization of non-heterosexual orientations and relationships...
". The conservative Christian group Focus on the Family
Focus on the Family
Focus on the Family is an American evangelical Christian tax-exempt non-profit organization founded in 1977 by psychologist James Dobson, and is based in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Focus on the Family is one of a number of evangelical parachurch organizations that rose to prominence in the 1980s...
claim that,
It is an agenda that they basically set in the late 1980s, in a book called 'After the Ball,' where they laid out a six-point plan for how they could transform the beliefs of ordinary Americans with regard to homosexual behavior — in a decade-long time frame.... They admit it privately, but they will not say that publicly. In their private publications, homosexual activists make it very clear that there is an agenda. The six-point agenda that they laid out in 1989 was explicit: Talk about gays and gayness as loudly and as often as possible... Portray gays as victims, not as aggressive challengers... Give homosexual protectors a just cause... Make gays look good... Make the victimizers look bad... Get funds from corporate America..
Health
Marshall suffered from severe migrane headaches that were preceded by a strong desire to talk in a rapid monologue. He found that if he gave into these "babbling fits" the headache would be alleviated. He had other medical problems and suffered from bouts of depressionClinical depression
Major depressive disorder is a mental disorder characterized by an all-encompassing low mood accompanied by low self-esteem, and by loss of interest or pleasure in normally enjoyable activities...
that required Electroconvulsive therapy
Electroconvulsive therapy
Electroconvulsive therapy , formerly known as electroshock, is a psychiatric treatment in which seizures are electrically induced in anesthetized patients for therapeutic effect. Its mode of action is unknown...
(ECT) on three occasions. Because of the negative effects on his memory, he considered ECT to be the last alternative to avoid death. In part due to this medical history, his knowledge of pharmacology
Pharmacology
Pharmacology is the branch of medicine and biology concerned with the study of drug action. More specifically, it is the study of the interactions that occur between a living organism and chemicals that affect normal or abnormal biochemical function...
was usually greater than that of anyone who treated him. When he died, he was found alone in his apartment by two friends. The cause of death has never been publicly revealed.