Dr. Franklin E. Kameny Residence (by Kylie Cochran)

    Who would have thought that the quaint house at 5020 Cathedral Avenue in Washington D.C. would someday hold enormous significance to LGBTQ+ history?  This red brick home has three beds and two baths.  The house was built in 1955 and was owned by gay rights activist Dr. Franklin E Kameny until his death in late 2011.  Frank Kameny is considered by many, to be the “father of gay rights activism.”  Frank Kameny’s house is particularly significant because in March 2009, the house was identified as a historic landmark by the D.C. Historic Preservation Review Board (1).  The house was the first LGBTQ+ landmark in the capital.  Then in November 2011, the house was listed on the National Register of Historic Places by the federal government (2).

    Dr. Frank E Kameny was born in 1925 into a New York middle class Jewish family (3).  He went to Harvard, became an astronomer, and a World War II veteran.  In 1957, Kameny was arrested on a morals charge in Lafayette Park, which was, at the time a popular gay cruising area (4).  An investigator from the Civil Service Commission questioned Kameny about his sexual orientation and Kameny refused to answer any of his questions.  Dr. Frank Kameny was fired from his job at the Army Map Service (the precursor to NASA) because it was suspected that he liked men.  Later,  Kameny found out  he was banned from all jobs in the federal government (5).  During this time, many men and women were discriminated against based on their sexual orientation and lost their homes, jobs, friends, and family.  During the McCarthy Era, people who were not heterosexual were considered traitors, threats, and unfit to hold government employment.  Dr. Kameny took this as a declaration of war and decided to fight back against the unfair treatment of homosexuals by the government.  He decided to sue the federal government.  It was a long four year battle, and Kameny’s attorney eventually gave up on trying to move the case forward.  But Kameny took it upon himself to push onwards.  In his Washington home, he wrote and filed a pro se appeal to the Supreme Court in early 1961.  The Supreme Court declined to hear his case on March 17th, 1961, however it was the first time that a gay rights issue was taken to the high court.  The case also impacted Kameny’s activism (6).  The experience and knowledge that he obtained through fighting the government in legal battles and writing his petition would allow him to help with gay rights legal cases in the future, many of which brought victories to the gay community.

    After this first encounter with activism, Kameny forged ahead.  In November 1961, Kameny and Jack Nichols founded the Mattachine Society of Washington, or MSW (7).  Kameny was elected as the MSW's first president.  Kameny’s home is considered the epicenter of Washington D.C.’s gay rights movement.  The Mattachine Society held many meetings inside Kameny’s residence.  Kameny’s home also served as an archive, counseling center, as well as a safe haven for gay and lesbian activists.  MSW  was committed to making things right and getting equality for homosexuals.  The organization was able to pressure the government to change many of their policies.  Some of these policies included denial of security clearances to homosexuals, removal of homosexuals from the military, denial of employment by the federal Civil Service Commission, the criminalization of homosexuality and homosexual practices, entrapment and harassment by police and other civil authorities, and classification of homosexuality as a psychiatric disorder in the American Psychiatric Association's DSM-II (8).  

    In April of 1965, the Mattachine Society organized the first gay demonstration at the White House (9).  About a dozen gay men and lesbians dressed in business attire, and carried signs reading "First Class Treatment for Homosexuals" and "Civil Service Commission is Un-American."  A few months after that demonstration, the U.S. Court of Appeals came to the decision that rejection of an application for federal employment on the grounds of "homosexual conduct" was "too vague."  The Civil Service Commission finally amended its anti-gay policy in 1975.  In 1971, Kameny participated in the annual meeting of the American Psychiatric Association, where he accused psychiatrists of victimizing gay men and women with their unscientific theories that homosexuality was an illness that needed to be “cured.”  Dr. Kameny urged the American Psychiatric Association to remove homosexuality from its list of psychiatric illnesses.  The organization finally did in 1973 (10).  Dr. Frank Kameny’s Washington D.C. house on Cathedral Avenue wasn’t just his house, but also his office.  In this charming home, Dr. Kameny developed the civil rights strategies and tactics that established the gay rights movements and allowed for major progress to be made for equality for the LGBTQ+ community.  He wrote many papers, speeches, kept newspapers in his home, which were donated to the Library of Congress after his death (11).

    It is important to remember the history of this site and other LGBTQ+ historic sites because people’s lives, personalities, and work get tied up in their homes, which is a good way to get a sense of who they were when they’re gone.  This can inspire people to stand up for something they believe in when they see victories  that once seemed like wishful thinking made possible behind the walls of an ordinary looking house.  Additionally, the preservation of LGBTQ+ historical sites legitimizes the history of the community.  Keeping the buildings up and alive is important because a person is able to learn about the history of the community firsthand, and more specifically in Kameny’s case, the hardships he faced along the way.  He fought for equality and gay rights when no one else did.  He didn’t have a big following at the time, but that didn’t matter to him; he was doing what he knew was right.  His home will forever serve as a reminder of all he accomplished for the LGBTQ+ community and the gay movement.  He worked on behalf of  the community until the very end.  Frank Kameny revolutionized gay activism in the United States and improved the lives of all homosexual American citizens.

                                                                            Notes

(1) "Dr. Franklin E. Kameny Residence (U.S. National Park Service)." National Parks Service. https://www.nps.gov/places/kameny-residence.htm.

(2) Ibid.

(3) Craig, Kaczorowski. “Kameny, Frank (1925-2011).”  glbtq Inc. 2004: 2-3,

http://dbsearch.fredonia.edu:2048/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=qth&AN=70697136&site=ehost-live

(4) "Dr. Franklin E. Kameny Residence (U.S. National Park Service)." National Parks Service. https://www.nps.gov/places/kameny-residence.htm.

(5) Ibid.

(6) Rosenwald, Michael. "The Gay Rights Pioneer Who Demanded Justice from the Supreme Court in 1960." The Washington Post. June 12, 2020. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2018/06/09/the-gay-pride-pioneer-who-demanded-justice-from-the-supreme-court-in-1960/.

(7) "The Mattachine Society of Washington DC." Omeka RSS. https://jsturge2.omeka.net/exhibits/show/frank-kameny/kameny-s-everlasting-impact/the-mattachine-society-of-wash.

(8)  Ibid.

(9) Craig, Kaczorowski. “Kameny, Frank (1925-2011).”  glbtq Inc. 2004: 2-3,

http://dbsearch.fredonia.edu:2048/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=qth&AN=70697136&site=ehost-live

(10) Rosenwald, Michael. "The Gay Rights Pioneer Who Demanded Justice from the Supreme Court in 1960." The Washington Post. June 12, 2020. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2018/06/09/the-gay-pride-pioneer-who-demanded-justice-from-the-supreme-court-in-1960/.

(11) "Kameny House Sold to Private Buyer." Washington Blade: Gay News, Politics, LGBT Rights. May 30, 2012. https://www.washingtonblade.com/2012/05/28/kameny-house-sold-to-private-buyer/.

Bibliography

Craig, Kaczorowski. “Kameny, Frank (1925-2011).”  glbtq Inc. 2004: 2-3,

http://dbsearch.fredonia.edu:2048/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=qth&AN=70697136&site=ehost-live

"Dr. Franklin E. Kameny Residence (U.S. National Park Service)." National Parks Service. https://www.nps.gov/places/kameny-residence.htm.

"Franklin Kameny Residence - This Site Recognizes the Historic Significance of Gay Rights Activist Dr. Franklin E. Kameny." DC Historic Sites. https://historicsites.dcpreservation.org/items/show/308.

"Kameny House Sold to Private Buyer." Washington Blade: Gay News, Politics, LGBT Rights. May 30, 2012. https://www.washingtonblade.com/2012/05/28/kameny-house-sold-to-private-buyer/.

"The Mattachine Society of Washington DC." Omeka RSS. https://jsturge2.omeka.net/exhibits/show/frank-kameny/kameny-s-everlasting-impact/the-mattachine-society-of-wash.

Rosenwald, Michael. "The Gay Rights Pioneer Who Demanded Justice from the Supreme Court in 1960." The Washington Post. June 12, 2020. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2018/06/09/the-gay-pride-pioneer-who-demanded-justice-from-the-supreme-court-in-1960/.