And we put that in the middle of the table, we plant our flag. Once a month we meet in the main dining room and I take along this little gay flag and the American flag. Kay is 88 now and living in a retirement community.
I call Kay and Barbara the happy warriors of the movement because they knew how to have a good time while changing the world-our world-for the better.īarbara died in 2007. Credit: Kay Tobin Lahusen, Courtesy Manuscripts and Archives Division, The New York Public Library. Barbara Gittings and Randy Wicker (left) at the JReminder Day protest in Philadekphia.
That photo of Sylvia Rivera draped on the edge of a fountain? That was Kay, too. You’ve probably seen the black and white mid-1960s photos from Reminder Day in Philadelphia and the first protests in front of the White House. While Barbara organized, picketed and published, Kay was behind the scenes, documenting the movement in print and photographs. Kay and her partner Barbara Gittings are icons of the early LGBTQ civil rights movement. Welcome to a very special Pride episode of Making Gay History, with one of this podcast’s most beloved heroes, Kay Tobin Lahusen. Kay : I’m Kay Tobin Lahusen and this is Making Gay History.Įric’s narration : And I’m Eric Marcus. Eberlin, Courtesy Manuscripts and Archives Division, New York Public Library. Barbara Gittings and Kay Lahusen at a party in the mid-1970s. If you don’t know who Kay is, have a listen to the two Making Gay History episodes that feature Kay and her partner, Barbara Gittings, from Season One and Season Two. From left to right: José Hernandez Alvarez, Marjorie McCann, Carole Smith, John Fong, Eric Marcus (standing), Tom Ferreri, Colin Johnstone, Kay Lahusen. The gay table at Kendal Center, Kennett Square, PA, March 26, 2018. On Monday, March 26, 2018, Sara Burningham-Making Gay History’s executive producer-and Making Gay History’s host, Eric Marcus, had the pleasure of joining Kay Tobin Lahusen and several of her friends for dinner at Kay’s monthly gay table in the Kendal Center’s main dining room at the Kendal at Longwood retirement community where she lives in Kennett Square, Pennsylvania. “We’ve got all the things.” So here’s our list of 10 Midtown Village gay spots you absolutely must see to really experience the scene.Kay Lahusen at the Kendal Center, Kennett Square, PA, holding the gay table centerpiece, March 26, 2018. We get to decide together as a community what the landscape looks like, and it’s important that we make strides together.”įor all its changes, Morreale believes that what propels Philly’s gayborhood-and what truly makes it electric-hasn’t changed a bit: “Grit, character, and community,” he says. My event calendar got cleared,” says Dave Morreale, general manager and venue director of local favorite, Franky Bradley’s. But Philly, if absolutely nothing else, is good for putting up a fight. So, it’s safe to say that 2021 has presented Philly’s spirited queer scene with some challenges. By summer, Philly Pride Presents-an organization that put on Philly’s Pride and Outfest celebrations for nearly 30 years-dissolved, leaving big question marks on the local gay calendar. One of the city’s last bastians for sisterly affection, Toasted Walnut, closed for good in the spring. Watching a night unfold on 13th and its neighboring streets, one may never guess that Philly’s gayborhood, like everywhere else, has seen some major changes in the past year.
Notably, the neighborhood is the Philly’s queer epicenter, a cluster of gay and gay-friendly establishments connected by rainbow crosswalks. Philadelphia’s Midtown Village, which sits between Rittenhouse Square and the historic Old City district, is home to an ever-growing list of restaurants, bars, and shops. It’s sensory overload in a good way, a welcome shock to the system-and there’s so much more where that came from. Propulsive rhythms waft out of packed bars and nightclubs. Throngs of excited partygoers carouse and crowd the open street. Al fresco diners clink glasses on the sidewalk. On any given Saturday night, the scene on 13th Street between Chestnut and Locust is, to put it mildly, electric.