Contact LHA at dyv.lha@gmail.com

]]> Contact LHA at dyv.lha@gmail.com

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The interviewee's name has been withheld at her request.]]> Contact LHA at dyv.lha@gmail.com

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Ruth and Connie discuss issues with unprocessed trauma and how being triggered can cause a trauma response, unconditional love and the importance of not weaponizing love, and take calls from listeners. They talk about upcoming workshops and counseling that they offer.

Songs played during the show include "I Am What I Am" by Gloria Gaynor and "She" by Holly Near
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The talk about the environments they grew up in, Maxine in Brooklyn and Anne in Dublin, and their early interest in, and awareness of, politics. Anne talks about the political climate of Ireland that made her want to leave, eventually winning a green card in a lottery, and moving to New York City. Anne describes meeting Maxine at a Thanksgiving Dinner through a friend, Marie, who would eventually become her partner.

Maxine discusses her involvement in various LGBTQ and Radical organizations in NYC that lead her to ACT UP. Anne discusses being part of the founding group of ILGO, the Irish Lesbian and Gay Organization, which started in 1990, and which she was part of for 10 years. She talks about ILGO's rejection from the St. Patrick's Day Parade and the publicity the group got from that.

They talk about the erasure of lesbian organizers and leadership within LGBTQ history which tends to focus on gay men, and how Lesbians had to advocate for themselves and form their own movements to be heard and to focus on Lesbian issues. They talk about Lesbian and women erasure during the AIDS crisis and how that lead them to for the Lesbian Avengers along with Ana Maria Simo, Anne-Christine D'askey, Marie Honan, and Sarah Schulman. They decided they wanted to focus on serious politics rather than cultural issues, and to not be a top-down organization. Anne and Maxine discuss the first meetings and actions of the Lesbian Avengers and talk about offering organizing help and support to other Lesbian groups around the country.

Maxine and Anne talk about the real depth of activism, and the dangerous legal and personal implications of direct actions. They discuss the importance of being part of a group and having a support structure when taking part in a direct action. Maxine talks about the learning and training and teaching that happens behind the scenes before any direct actions. They go into more detail about work they did as the Lesbian Avengers around the country, and the effect that their bottom-up structure had on small community movements.

They talk about the Alice Austen House and the fact that the Board was homophobic and hiding the queer part of that story, and work they did around protesting how the history was being handled. They discuss the importance of recovering queer histories from the 19th Century, and making gay history available to the public. Maxine talks about the role of the Lesbian Herstory Archives in preserving the history and lives of all lesbians for this reason. They talks about how visibility and survival are related for Lesbians, and the need for people to see themselves represented.

Maxine and Anne talk about seeing the fruits of their activist labor come to fruition after 25 years, and their thoughts about current acceptance of LGBTQ people as being partially related to capitalism and revenue. They discuss more recent LGBTQ history and archive projects and the celebrating of gay institutions that have survived over the past 50 years. However, through some of these projects, they are still experiencing Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender erasure and erasure of the history of every day people.
]]> Rights belong to the New York Preservation Archive Project, site Liz H. Strong & Anthony Belove To request a copy of this oral history, please contact info@nypap.org]]>
Side 1 Ruth starts off by singing "I Am What I Am" by Gloria Gaynor and then talks about her life and knowing she was a lesbian from a young age and her journey to get rid of the same she originally felt about her sexuality. She talks about being married and having children, being in the closet, and her early relationship with Connie. She expresses the shame she first felt when being with Connie and regretting how much time she lost being in the closet. Ruth talks about going on the Phil Donahue show and the lawsuit after being denied partner benefits for Connie by the NYC Board of Education because they weren't married. She encourages the audience to undo the damage of being brought up as heterosexual women and to come out.

At 21:40 Connie speaks and talks about being a mother and grandmother, and her relationship to her family. She talks about how abuse has been perpetuated throughout her life about working through her problems and celebrating changes. Connie shares her experience of being diagnosed with cancer and her experience trying to heal herself and going into remission.

At 38:30 Karen Thompson discusses trying to be what other people wanted throughout her early life and meeting a partner who taught her how to live and be herself. She recalls not being able to admit her sexuality to herself or her partner, the car accident that her partner was involved in, and realizing she had to come out to get through this challenging time.

Side 2 The second part of this tape is a duplicate of the audio described in "National Organization for Women (NOW) NYC - Ruth Berman and Rosemary Dempsey"]]> Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND]]> the Michelangelo Signorile Show on Sirius OutQ which aired July 20, 2003 in which have Ruth Berman and Connie Kurtz to talk about their life and new film “Ruthie and Connie: Every Room in the House.” At the beginning of the episode, they also talk about other people they are having on the show.

Ruth and Connie's interview starts at 10:55 and ends at 30:30. They discuss their Cotello Towers neighbohood where they met when they were both married and young mothers. There they started the "Mother's Action Committe" within their community. They talk about their own internalized homophobia at the beginning of their relaionship and their fear that they would have been found out, and the transition to feeling comfortable with themselves and their sexuality. They discuss their lawsit with the New York City Board of Education for Domestic Partnership Benifits and their apperance on the Donahue Show in 1988.

They take questions from callers which relate to being lesbian and Jewish, the community they have found there, and the importance for others around the country to find similar communities, or to create them.

After Ruth + Connie's interview the hosts discuss a NYC teen, Natalie Young, who is sueing her teacher for harasmeent over comments made about the teenagers shirt that said "Barbie is a Lesbian"and other LGBT current events.]]> Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND]]>
10:00 mins into the tape, Rosemary Dempsey from NOW discusses the importance of legal tools to protect gay people and their families, ad how coming out is an important part of that process.

Audio ends at 13:11, the rest of the tape is blank.

]]> Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND]]>
Side1
Blythe Masters from JP Morgan Chase introduces Ruth Berman and Connie Kurtz . Connie recalls feeling different from an early age, issues with shame about being different, and the necessity to challenge the system that makes people feel that way. She talks about her relationship with her family and with Ruthies Family. Ruthie talks about being a mother, coming out as a lesbian as a parent, and her illness that resulted from her internal struggle and shame related to being a Lesbian. Ruthie talks about applying for partner benefits for Connie that lead to the lawsuit against the New York State Board of Eduction and her experience working with Lambda Legal. Ruthie discusses the collective power that queer people and their allies have.

Side 2
Ruthie + Connie talk about their film and take questions from the audience. They discuss making politicians accountable during their time in office and demanding full legal acknowledgement and recognition of rights and personhood. They talk about their involvement with their synagogue, and the power of corperate and professional LGBT groups.
]]> Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND]]> Audio from SAGE's Second National Conference on Aging, which took place from May 5-6, 2000 in New York, NY.

The audio starts with a conversation with a woman discussing activism, being an out lesbian parent, and atheticism and answering questions from the auidence. She talks about "The Gay Games" and the healing effect of sports for women and girls. Questions from the audience include comments on finding community at the intersection of elder lesbians and sports.

At 9:41 the audio cuts to a panel discussion with Ruth Berman and Connie Kurtz. They play a clip of Ruthie + Connie's 1988 apperance on the Phil Donahue Show. Ruth and Connie talk about their personal hsitroy and early activism, their lawsuit against the New York City Board of Education for domestic partner benefits, the importance of being political and of coming out. They also talk about oening a counceling cener in their home and issues with the Butch/Femme Bianary.

At 28:41 the audio switches to Joan Nestle speaking about the Lesbian Herstory Archives and the importance of including reords about diverse Lesbian History.

AT 33:11 a woman from the aidence speaks from the perspective of radical lesbians who have never had children or been married and about expanding the lesbian agenda in the future. She reads from a a piece she wrote called “a week in the life of a 60 Year Old Lesbian” about her activism within the lesbian community.

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Ruth and Connie discuss how they met, their early activism within their communities, being married to men and having families, and their eventual falling in love with one another and coming out as Lesbians. They discuss their relationships with their families then and now, and the importance of coming out of the closet.

Deborah talks about her process when working in this film, and how she tried to make the film for both gay and striaght audiences ]]> Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND]]> Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND]]> Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND]]> Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND]]>
]]> Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND]]> In this oral history conducted by the Rossmoor Lesbian Social Club, Bev Lyon discusses her family background and history, her early feelings for other girls in High School and her coming out in her early 40s. She speaks about getting married to a man in her senior year of college and their adoption of a child together. She discusses her her first relationship with a women and breaking into the lesbians and feminist world, and her later coming out to her family amf her reations. Bev talks about her life long ilness and how that affecter her life as well as the misogyny that she encoutered in law school. She speaks about meeting her partner and her involvement with the Bay Area Career Women group.
]]> Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND]]> Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND]]> ]]> Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND]]> ]]> Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND]]> Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND]]> Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND]]> Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND]]> Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND]]> Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND]]> ]]> Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND]]> Copyright Deborah Wolf

See the Lesbian Herstory Archives Rights Statement

]]> Copyright Deborah Wolf

See the Lesbian Herstory Archives Rights Statement

]]>
See the Lesbian Herstory Archives Rights Statement]]> Copyright Deborah Wolf

See the Lesbian Herstory Archives Rights Statement

]]> Copyright Deborah Wolf

See the Lesbian Herstory Archives Rights Statement

]]>
See the Lesbian Herstory Rights Statement ]]> Copyright Deborah Wolf

See the Lesbian Herstory Archives Rights Statement

]]>

]]> Copyright Deborah Wolf

See the Lesbian Herstory Archives Rights Statement

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