Jam Kirchick's New Book Explor DC’s Gay History

Contents:

• WASHGTON, D.C.'S HIDN GAY HISTORY IS UNVERED 'SECRET CY'
• MOVG TO LGBT WASHGTON DC? HOW TO FD YOUR PERFECT GAY NEIGHBORHOOD!
• A HISTORY OF GAY WASHGTON THAT LETS HOMOPHOBIA STEAL THE SPOTLIGHT
• SECRET CY: THE HIDN HISTORY OF GAY WASHGTON
• JAM KIRCHICK EXPLOR DC’S GAY HISTORY AN AMB NEW BOOK

WASHGTON, D.C.'S HIDN GAY HISTORY IS UNVERED 'SECRET CY'

A new book exam the unknown or barely known liv of gay people workg and livg our natn’s pal, a cy known for s mix of power and secrets. “Secret Cy: The Hidn History of Gay Washgton, " by Jam Kirchick, is a 654-page tome that took years of rearch and an exhstive vtigatn to printial archiv, historil terviews and once-classified ernment rerds.

“I realized that all the stori I was readg, and the personali and phenomena, whether was McCarthyism or the Reagans, FDR or JFK, that there were the gay stori lurkg the background, ” Kirchick said.

MOVG TO LGBT WASHGTON DC? HOW TO FD YOUR PERFECT GAY NEIGHBORHOOD!

Those stori lurked the background out of necsy: The st of g out as gay — or, more likely, beg outed agast one’s will — was enormo profsnally and socially. “It was the specter of homosexualy that provoked the first and only suici by a member of Congrs his Capol Hill office, ed Lyndon Johnson to et that his historil lead would evaporate, and seized the paranoid md of Richard Nixon send only to the plots of his ever-expandg enemi list, ” Kirchick wr. ” Rumors of homosexualy were tastrophic to those who were acced of , but Kirchick also asks the rear to nsir the broar human and societal impact of such wch hunts on gay Amerins workg ernment.

A HISTORY OF GAY WASHGTON THAT LETS HOMOPHOBIA STEAL THE SPOTLIGHT

“To asss the full sle of the damage that the fear of homosexualy wrought on the Amerin polil landspe, one mt take to acunt not only the reers ed and the liv cut short, but somethg vaster and unquantifiable: the possibili thwarted, ” Kirchick wr. Although openly LGBTQ people have ma their way to the hight ranks of ernment today, was not long ago that spected homosexuals workg for the feral ernment were hunted down, publicly huiated and termated wh the full force of the ernment. “I don’t thk people unrstand or realize that was more dangero to be gay than was to be a munist.

But one man said Waldron had “homosexual tennci” and shared a story about Waldron’s makg a pass at him. ”There was not one person whose power uld not be danger of beg promised if there was even a whisper of possible homosexualy activy. There were whispers that Reagan was possibly participatg “homosexual nduct, ” and some Republins saw Reagan’s potential nomatn as a “danger to the Republin Party and the untry.

SECRET CY: THE HIDN HISTORY OF GAY WASHGTON

Y., a former Buffalo Bills and San Diego Chargers quarterback, to be his vice printial nng mate — another person mored to be gay. The possibily that Kemp uld jo the ticket was evince that there was a “homosexual rg” around Reagan and that he was “the ventriloquized pawn of shadowy and sister forc, ” Kirchick wr. When a ngrsman later asked Reagan’s munitns ai about the loss of the nomatn for Kemp, he reportedly said, “It was that homosexual thg, ” Kirchick wr.

JAM KIRCHICK EXPLOR DC’S GAY HISTORY AN AMB NEW BOOK

“Secret Cy” ends wh the princy of Bill Clton, who said a mpaign speech ont of a largely gay dience Los Angel 1992, “I have a visn, and you are a part of .

” Wh those words, Clton would do somethg that would have seemed unfathomable to most, if not all, of his precsors: make an explic appeal to gay Amerins for their support a printial electn. When the book begs, queer people are visible, ’s illegal to be gay, and the medil tablishment nsirs LGBTQ people to be mentally ill.