Hank Wilson, community organizer.

I wrote in my last post about Hank Wilson. Here's a much more lovely long remembrance of Hank Wilson, by his friend Bob Ostertag. Read it.

Here's the last paragraph:
What, exactly, is a "community?" At the university where I teach, there are "experts" in this matter who will give you definitions of community that use so many big words, you will need a PhD of your own just to figure out what they are talking about. Hank Wilson had a definition his kindergarten students could understand: a community was something that took care of its least privileged members. If this simple thing could not be done, then you didn't have much in the way of community. This was Hank's life project, his singular, profound contribution to the gay and lesbian community, and to the city of Saint Francis.

Also, some memories at the San Francisco Bay Guardian's web site (read the comments section);

the Chronicle's article;

for the historians in the crowd, here's the finding aid to the Hank Wilson Papers, which Hank donated when he thought he was about to die of AIDS in 1996, right before highly active antiretroviral therapy saved his life;

and finally, a Magnum Photos photo essay about the Ambassador Hotel.

Of course, you can always help out with the Wikipedia page, in progress.

in memoriam

Anybody who's lived in San Francisco might be forgiven for getting jaded about how many times Del and Phyllis had presided over one occasion or another, or been honored at some other occasion. As the National Center for Lesbian Rights put it, more kindly, "It is difficult to separate Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon and write about only one of them. Their lives and their work have intertwined and their enduring dedication to social justice has been recognized many times."

But the couple deserved their iconic status, and more, and I was sad and moved by Del Martin's death today. And I was even more moved by the fact that Del and Phyllis--a legendary San Francisco couple, and lesbian pioneers--were finally married, by law, when she died.

As many in the media make note of the progress from the March on Washington to Barack Obama, in many ways Del Martin's trajectory is even more improbable and surprising. In 1955, when Martin Luther King was publicly leading the Montgomery bus boycott, Del and Phyllis were starting what was basically an underground lesbian cell, which later became an early civil rights organization. Theirs was a long and amazing road. Condolences to Phyllis Lyon.

Here's the SF Chronicle obit.
And here's the National Center for Lesbian Rights more detailed obituary.

Pictures from sfgate.com/SF Chronicle