Washington pays tribute to gay civil rights icon Dr. Frank Kameny (LGBTQNation)
In a moving, and at times humorous tribute, official Washington and the city’s LGBTQ community on Thursday paid its last respects to gay civil rights icon Dr. Frank Kameny.
Kameny’s flag draped coffin — a nod to his service in the U. S. Army during the Second World War — was flanked by by an honor guard comprised of Washington’s Metropolitan Police Department’s Gay and Lesbian Liaison Unit, who served as pallbearers at the conclusion of the ceremony, and veterans and gay rights activists Lt. Dan Choi and Captain James Pietrangelo II, both former U.S. Army officers.
The ceremony was held in Washington’s old Carnegie Library in the heart of the city Kameny called home for over 50 years. Kameny died on Oct. 11 at the age of 86.
Frank’s close friends Charles Francis and Bob Witeck had placed at one end of the coffin a picket sign that Kameny made for a 1962 gay rights protest he organized outside the White House. The sign, still attached to its original wood stick handle, read, “Homosexuals Ask for the Right to the Pursuit of Happiness.” At the other end of coffin stood a portrait of Kameny painted by local gay artist Don Patron.
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Complete article at LGBTQ Nation : http://bit.ly/uXV8MG
