June is when members of the LGBTQ+ community come together and celebrate Pride Month. This is celebrated in June to honor and remember the Stone Wall riots, which were protests by the members of the LGBTQ+ community that later led to queer liberation. Pride Month helps us remember LGBTQ+ people in history and how they paved the way for people today. This post will discuss the LGBTQ+ people in history that impacted the different shops at our school.
Brenda Berkman was not only the first openly gay professional firefighter in America but was also the founder of United Women Firefighters and was the first female head of a career fire department in Tiburon, California. Brenda was always interested in law and was in her third year of law school when it was announced that women could now take the exam to be firefighters. Berkman passed the written part of the exam but failed the physical exam. An official said that the physical portion of the exam she, and other women, took was “the most difficult the department had ever administered, was designed more to keep women out than to accurately assess job-related skills”. Berkman requested for a fairer exam but was ignored. Because of this, she filed a lawsuit and won. Berkman then became a firefighter and in 2006 retired as the rank of captain and today is still an advocate for gender equality. Brenda inspires young girls and LGBTQ+ members who want to join the legal field to fight for fairness.
Carolyn Innes was a lesbian nurse who co-founded the Gay Nurses Alliance along with G. David Waldron in 1973 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The Gay Nurses Alliance was a professional association created to promote gay patients’ and nurses’ interests. Innes came up with the idea of establishing a meeting of supporters of the Gay Nurse Alliance under the American Nurses Association. The response to them was very positive, despite not being officially noticed by the association. The GNA grew and was even established in other cities like Boston and New York City. A letter from Howard J. Brown, one of the first advocates for LGBTQ+ health, to the American Journal of Nursing, stated that GNA was “a beacon of hope to homosexuals”. Carolyn Innes then went on to help organize the first pride parade in Philadelphia, continuing to spread pride. Coryln Innes was very influential and helped LGBTQ+ nurses and patients to have hope and be strong.
Lou Rand Hogan was a gay culinary artist and an activist in the 1960s. In the 1960s, lots of obscenity laws were being repealed, because of this, many books about or targeted towards LGBTQ+ people were being published. Lou Rand Hogan got inspired by these books and decided to mix his passion for cooking and his passion for gay rights and created The Gay Cookbook. The book was marketed as a silly, fun book with recipes and illustrations of gay men cooking next to them. With this book, Lou Rand Hogan helped normalize LGBTQ+ people in the culinary field and inspired future LGBTQ+ culinary artists by doing so.
There are diverse people in every career path and they are empowered today because of amazing LGBTQ+ people in history who have paved the way for them. These were just a few examples but there are people for every shop to look into. When celebrating Pride Month it is important to remember those throughout history who made it possible for people to be who they are today.