| 
  • If you are citizen of an European Union member nation, you may not use this service unless you are at least 16 years old.

  • You already know Dokkio is an AI-powered assistant to organize & manage your digital files & messages. Very soon, Dokkio will support Outlook as well as One Drive. Check it out today!

View
 

1990s

Page history last edited by Collier 7 years, 2 months ago

YEAR

IN HOUSTON/TEXAS

OTHER EVENTS in the United States

1990

Church groups, families, and—for the first time—corporate sponsors such as Budweiser, in addition to gay organizations and businesses, make up the 75 entries in the Pride Parade. Honorary Grand Marshals U.S. Congressman Craig Washington and Texas State Representative Debra Danburg give visible evidence of the growing political strength of Houston's gay community.
 
A new spate of violence against the community begins. On July 29, Michael James Burzinski is abducted outside the nightclub Heaven (where South Beach is now) by four youths from Aldine, Texas, and shot in the back of the head.    
 
 
The State of Texas Courts determine that Section 21.06, the infamous "homosexual Conduct " statue, is unconstitutional as it violates Texans' rights to privacy
 
 
Gay & Lesbian Yellow Pages, Inc. formed Houston-based Corporation is the creation of its dynamic Publisher and CEO, Laura Villagran
 
The American Psychological Association stated that scientific evidence shows that “reparative” therapy does not work and that it can do more harm than good.
 
The first national Lesbian/Gay Writers Conference is held in San Francisco.
 
The Hate Crimes Statistic Act is signed into law by President George Bush. It is the first U.S. bill to use the phrase "sexual orientation."
 
Polk County Jail in Florida discontinued the practice of forcing gay inmates to wear pink bracelets to distinguish them from the rest of the prisoners.
 
U.S. law prohibiting Gay and Lesbian Immigration revoked
 

1991

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

1991

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Jack Valinski, Carol Clark and Brian Keever co-found the Pride Committee of Houston so that Pride could become a year-round project, separate from the Caucus.

 

 

July 4th

Paul Broussard murdered.

 

 

November 3rd Phillip W. Smith, 24, shot outside Heaven at about 1:30 a.m. He died in Ben Taub Hospital about 3 a.m. of a gunshot wound to the chest.

 

 

Houston Chronicle Nov 7, 1991. p. 28

“Members of Queer Nation march outside Houston Police Department headquarters Wednesday night to protest the Sunday slaying of Phillip W. Smith, 24, outside a gay bar in Montrose. Police say the accused assailant believed Smith was a homosexual, making it the second anti-gay slaying in the area in four months. Paul Broussard was killed July 4. Queer Nation says HPD should hire openly gay officers and continue its undercover operation to weed out anti-gay violence.”

 

 

In response to the rise in hate crimes, the Houston Police Department start “Operation Vice Versa” an undercover sting operation in which officers posed as homosexuals. During the 15 days of "Operation Vice Versa," five undercover officers were attacked-sprayed with Mace and hit with a baseball bat and a tree branch. One policeman was punched in the face by a man who apologized after his arrest, saying he had thought the officer was "a damn queer."

 

 

Q-Patrol founded.

 

 

State Representative Glen Maxey wins the run-off election to become the first openly gay official in the history of the state of Texas.

 

 

Texas Human Rights Foundation files a Friend of the Court Brief in the Texas Court of Appeals against the Texas Penal Code Section 21.06, the state's notorious anti-sodomy statue, while the Texas Attorney General pushes on with his appeal to have the law reinstated.

 

March 2 - Transman pioneer Lou Sullivan dies from an AIDS-related illness

 

 

1992

 

Lesbian/Gay Pride Week in Houston gains 501 (C)(3) status and takes on the new name PRIDE Committee of Houston, Inc.It is set to operate as a year-round organization to plan, organize, and manage events in celebration of Gay and Lesbian Pride Week. As one of its first acts, the new board establishes the Founder's Award, which it presents to Larry Bagneris, former president of the Gay Political Caucus and, from its inception until his move back to his native New Orleans, the driving force behind the parade's form and structure. In keeping with the parade's theme, “Pride = Power,” and its emphasis on the volunteerism of the community, the Gay/Lesbian Switchboard of Houston (which has served as a clearinghouse for information about the gay community, its people, organizations and their events for the past decade) is chosen Honorary Grand Marshal and leads more than 80 units, including a group from Texas A&M University. State Representative Debra Danburg, Congressional candidate Ben Reyes, City Councilwoman Shelia Jackson Lee, and Harris Country Precinct 1 Constable Jack Abercia appear at the post-parade rally, evidence of the increasing acceptance of gays and the recognition of their political power.

 

 

First Annual Houston Transgender Unity Banquet began as a way for the different Trans Groups to find a cohesive place to unify and to rid the community of divisiveness.

 

 

The National Gay Task Force leads demonstrations at the Republican National Convention in Houston, Texas, where Pat Buchanan has declared a culture war on gay and lesbian people. (have Chronicle articles to type up)

 
 

Keith Meinhold becomes the first member of the armed forces to return to active service following dismissal for homosexuality.

 

 

The first transgender activist group, Transgender Nation, founded as an offshoot of Queer Nation's San Francisco chapter

 

January 3

Transgender Pioneer Reed Erickson dies in Mexico

 

Roy Simmons the second professional football player to voluntarily come out.

 

Sculptor George Segal's four statue work, collectively titled “Gay Liberation Monument,” unveiled in Christopher Park, NYC, near the site of the 1969 Stonewall Riots.  

1993

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

1993

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 

Houston is the site of a national conference of Southern Baptists, which makes homosexuality a central theme and pledges to defeat politicians who support or tolerate homosexuality. Five city officials attend the parade or other Pride events, but Mayor Bob Lanier does not accept the invitation to join in.  

 
 
PFLAG Houston is named first Organizational Grand Marshal to the Pride Parade

 

 

A Texas Court of Appeals affirms the invalidity of Section 21.06, the second such decision that will be appealed yet once again by proponents to the Texas Supreme Court.

 

 

In Williamson County, Texas commissioners reversed a decision to deny Apple Computer tax breaks for a new facility in the county because of its policy of extending benefits to employees' same-sex domestic partners. Several of the commissioners, however, continued to express condemnation of "the gay lifestyle."

 

Don't Ask, Don't Tell enacted. 

 

 

Roberta Achtenberg becomes the first openly openly gay person to be confirmed by the United States Senate for a major political post, Assistant Secretary of Housing and Urban Development.

 

 

Brandon Teena born Teena Renae Brandon lived as a transsexual man. He was raped and eventually murdered in Richardson County, Nebraska in one of the most infamous American hate crimes of the 1990s

 

 

Minnesota first state to have trans discrimination protection laws

 

 

National Public Radio in the US announced it would offer domestic partner medical and dental benefits to employees in same-sex relationships. The policy also included unmarried heterosexual couples.

 

 

Retired Episcopal bishop E. Otis Charles, 67, who had been bishop of Utah from 1971-1986, publicly comes out

 

 

The US Supreme Court refused to hear an appeal from a former CIA employee who was fired for acknowledging he was gay

 

1994

 
 
 

A hearing on discrimination against transgendered people took place in San Francisco before the San Francisco Human Rights Commission. It resulted in a paper on transsexual discrimination and unanimous passage by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors of an amendment to add gender identity to the list of those protected from discrimination.

 

1995

 

In recognition of Pride festivities, the Houston City Council approves the hanging of pink triangle banners along both sides of Westheimer through The Montrose.

 
 

First annual Houston Splash Black Gay Pride Event held

 
The Employment Non-Discrimination Act was re-introduced in Congress. H.R.C. demanded that transsexuals not be included in the legislation.
 

First FTM conference takes place in San Francisco

 
Students at East High School in Salt Lake City denied permission to form a Gay Straight Alliance. Students cited the Equal Access Act which requires that school districts either allow all extracurricular clubs or none at all. In 1996 the school board responded by voting 4 to 3 to ban every extracurricular club (The Salt Lake City district relented in 2000, agreeing to allow all clubs.)
 

1996

 
 

Candace Gingrich, the outspoken lesbian half-sister of Speaker of the House and gay rights foe Newt Gingrich, is named Grand Marshal of the Houston Pride Parade. The choice thrusts a national spotlight on Houston's parade and adds Houston's voice to the growing national demand that there be an end to civilly sanctioned discrimination.

   

Marvin Davis, a.k.a. Lady Victoria Lust, one of the community's biggest AIDS fundraisers and founder of the Lady Victoria Lust Holiday Fund, dies suddenly of a Pulmonary Aneurysm.

 

 

 

 

The Employment Nondiscrimination Act (EDNA) fails to pass in the U.S. Senate by just one vote.

 

 

The Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) passes in the U.S. Senate by a wide margin, giving states the right to acknowledge or reject same sex unions from other states.

 

 

President Clinton announced his signing of a bill outlawing homosexual marriages, but said it should not be used as an excuse for discrimination, violence or intimidation against gays and lesbians.

 

 

Transgendered activists demonstrated outside the annual meeting of the American Psychiatric Association to protest the labeling of transgendered people as mentally ill

 

Cobb County Georgia commissioners voted 3-2 to repeal an anti-gay resolution it had passed in 1993 which declared homosexuality incompatible with community standards. It was in response to a decision by Olympic officials decision that because of the resolution the Olympic torch would not pass through Cobb county. 

1997

 
For the first time since it’s incorporation in 1991, the Pride Committee of Houston gets an official office space at 811 Westheimer.
 
After 20 years of a parade under the intense Texas sun, the Pride Committee works outside the box, and under its aptly chosen theme, “Glowing with Pride,” it introduces the nation's first nighttime Pride parade. More than 100 entries—over half of the floats illuminated with all forms of lighting—shine brightly in the night, and a jubilant crowd of 70,000, its goodwill even extending to the group of about 40 protesters from Heritage Baptist Church in Mount Enterprise, Texas, and Grace Baptist Church in Houston. The contrast couldn't have been greater: the protesters behind barricades set up by the Houston Police Department, the gays in the middle of the street, “Glowing With Pride.”  
 
The Inklings bookstore closes
 
 
San Antonio’s first Pride Parade
 
 

The US Senate dealt a double defeat to gay-rights activists, voting to reject same-sex marriage in federal law and killing a separate bill that would have barred job discrimination against gays

 

An episode of Ellen titled "Roommates" aired. It was given an adult content warning because of a kiss between Ellen and another woman

 

 

National Gay and Lesbian Taskforce amends its mission statement to include Transgendered people

 

1998

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 

January 2

Annise Parker was sworn in as the first openly gay or lesbian elected official in the city of Houston.

 

 

Shortly after taking office Mayor Lee Brown makes good on a campaign promise to issue an executive order reversing the referendum of 1985 and issues  executive order 1-8 banning discrimination against gay city employees. Councilman Rob Todd filed an injunction against it which held it up in the courts for a number of years.

 

 

Tyrone Garner and John Lawrence are arrested while having consensual sex in their Harris County apartment complex, after a false report of an armed intruder was given to police, setting the stage for a constitutional challenge to Section 21.06

 

 

In Austin, Charles Edward Lowery successfully uses the "Gay Panic" self-defense claim to avoid being convicted of the brutal murder of deaf and mute gay man Pablo Zuniga saying that Pablo made unwanted passes at him and then told him to drop his pants and give him his wallet.

 
 

On the night of October 6-October 7, 1998

Matthew Wayne Shepard, a student at the University of Wyoming was fatally attacked near Laramie, Wyoming. The savage beating was due to his homosexuality.

  
 

Stonewall Democrats founded by Barney Frank, a gay Democratic member of the US. House of Representatives

 

 

Bi Pride Flag was unveiled at the BiCafe's first Anniversary Party on Dec. 5th 1998

 

 

PFLAG voted to include transgendered people in their mission statement.

1999

 

A record-breaking crowd of 100,000 watches as the intersection of Montrose and Westheimer glows with the light reflected off a disco ball measuring 8 1 / 2 feet across. An idea envisioned by Lee Harrington, the disco ball is made possible by funding from Jim “Mattress Mac” McIngvale who rides in the parade on a float with diva Martha Wash.

 

 

GCAM (Gulf Coast Archives and Museum of GLBT History, Inc.) founded in October.

 

Stonewall Inn added to the registry of Historical Landmarks

 

The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force drops its endorsement of ENDA, because the legislation does not include Gender Identity.

 

Hillary Swank receives an Oscar for her portrayal of Brandon Teena in Boys Don't Cry

 

 

National Transgender Advocacy Coalition founded

 

 

California adopts a domestic partnership law.

PLEASE NOTE: This Wiki is largely inactive now. J.D. Doyle

has duplicated my timeline and is expanding on it: 

http://www.houstonlgbthistory.org/timeline.html

 

1940s  1950s  1960s  1970s  1980s  2000s

 

Comments (0)

You don't have permission to comment on this page.