How a Queens Home Became a Cradle of the Gay Rights Movement
From Today's NY Times:
The Manfords’ door on 171st Street in Queens was always open, especially if you were a young gay man whose own family had closed the door on you.
Dr. Jules Manford was a dentist and collector of dental tchotchkes.
The rambling three-story house between 33rd and 35th Avenues doesn’t look like a cradle of the gay rights movement. But it became just that in 1972, when Dr. Jules Manford and his wife, Jeanne, publicly supported their son Morty, 21, a member of the Gay Activists Alliance who had been badly beaten for his political advocacy. They also offered themselves as informal counselors to gay children and their parents. Their initiative led to the creation of a group called Parents of Gays, which grew over time into the national organization Pflag (Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays).
Mrs. Manford’s death on Jan. 8 was a reminder that some deep roots of the gay rights struggle are not found in Greenwich Village or the Castro in San Francisco. Instead, they can be found in places like Flushing, Queens, on a block that might be described as tranquil if it weren’t for the youngsters of Public School 32 squealing while they play outdoors.
“It was a very Ozzie-and-Harriet-type house,” recalled Allen Roskoff, a friend of Dr. Manford. “It was a great feeling of warmth for people involved with the gay-rights movement to be in a house with parents who embraced them.”
“It was like having chicken soup,” he said.
Ethan Geto, another friend, reached for a different homey analogy. “Jeanne,” he said, “was like the den mother for a lot of gay young people who were thrown out of their homes, who were rejected by their parents, who were having terrible anguish over what to do or who were eager to come out but terrified of the consequences.”
That sense was undiminished two decades later, as an advocate named Daniel Dromm discovered when he paid a call on Mrs. Manford to ask her to be grand marshal of the lesbian and gay pride parade in Queens. “When I walked into that house, I felt immediately secure, comfortable and safe,” said Mr. Dromm, who is now a City Council member.
Pictures and the rest:
http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/01/21/in-queens-an-unlikely-and-cozy-landmark-of-the-early-gay-rights-movement/
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