While growg up on a Washgton state dairy farm the 1950s, Patrick Haggerty realized he was gay. In this animated feature om our partners at StoryCorps, he tells his dghter, Rob, about the day his father showed up unexpectedly to his performance at a school assembly.
Contents:
- THE GAY FATHER I NEVER KNEW
- I'M GAY, MY DAD'S A PASTOR, AND ... WE'RE WORKG ON IT
- A GAY SON’S RELLECTN OF HIS DAD’S ADVICE ON HOW TO LIVE HIS LIFE
THE GAY FATHER I NEVER KNEW
My dad knew he was gay at age 16, but he did what he thought he was supposed to: He married a woman and had children.
Once he uld live openly as a gay man, his anger dissipated, but also unvered a well of emotns he had supprsed for years. He was a gay man a society that did not approve of his sexualy.
I'M GAY, MY DAD'S A PASTOR, AND ... WE'RE WORKG ON IT
He was raisg a teenage girl—hard enough on s own, but most gay men were not fathers. I never felt the need to five my father for beg gay. I also knew that my dad mt be gay—bee, well, of urse.
While I’d never met an out gay man, I kd of knew what they were supposed to be like om movi and TV, and Dad f the mold: He loved to ok; he cleaned obssively; he kept the Internatnal Male talog around, bee, he said, “I like the cloth. “You know, ” I said to Dad, “I asked Mom once if you were gay. “Gay?
“I’m not gay.
A GAY SON’S RELLECTN OF HIS DAD’S ADVICE ON HOW TO LIVE HIS LIFE
” she’d said our kchen—after a long nversatn she’d had wh an openly gay iend om llege, Pat, who had, apparently, been a nfidant of Dad’s. Years later Mom told me that, acrdg to Pat, Dad had been active Lexgton and Louisville’s gay club scene.
) But to actually let me —to s on that blue blanket, look me the eye and tell me he was gay—was somethg he uldn’t do. “I asked Mom once if you were gay, ” I would have said.