GLLA 2018 Pride Guide

GAYLIFE LA PRIDE ISSUE SUMMER 2018
30 GAYLIFE LA PRIDE ISSUE SUMMER 2018
31
OUR HEROES:
AN EMPLOYEE OF USC, SHE
FORCED THE UNIVERSITY TO
RECOGNIZE LGBT PEOPLE
Del Whan (1941 - ) These days Del Whan, who lives in Long
Beach, describes herself as a “pet sitter.” That evokes an
image of a passive and quiet woman, content to stay at home
with her dog. In so doing it belies both Whan’s early history
as a lesbian activist and her continuing advocacy today for
environmental protection, animal rights and the legalization
of marijuana, among other things.
DEL
WHAN
1975
In a chapter in “Old Lesbians and Their Brief Moments of
meetings, classes, dances and other events. Failing to
Fame,” Whan describes what got her out of the gay closet. It
attract the volunteers and money it needed, the GWSC
was 1970, and she was director of the foreign language lab
closed in 1972.
at the University of Southern California. Her nights out were
at “gay girl” bars in Los Angeles. During the day, she writes,
Whan remained active in Morris Kight’s Gay Liberation
“I suffered from hangovers, internalized homophobia, eye
Front and for a while was a member of the Lesbian
twitches and muscle cramps from hiding in the closet.” Then,
Feminists, a group that saw oppression of all as an issue
feeling a little apprehension, she went to hear a speech on
as big as homophobia. Whan eventually pulled out of that
campus that spring by gay activist Morris Kight.
group, but she continued to speak speaking out against
oppression, whether by the Republican Party, Wall Street
Kight invited his gay listeners to visit the Gay Liberation
bankers, the oil industry or the Sultan of Brunei.
Front, which he had founded, in Silver Lake. Soon Whan
was picketing a Los Angeles Police station and working with
Kight and others to create the nation’s first gay pride parade.
“I suffered from
hangovers,
internalized
homophobia,
eye twitches and
muscle cramps
from hiding in
the closet.”
Whan also stepped boldly out of the closet at USC, founding
the Gay Liberation Forum with a group of students, staff
members and faculty. In 1971, the USC Board of Trustees
refused to recognize the GLF as a legitimate student
organization. Whan pressed on, holding GLF meetings at the
Religious Center off the USC campus. For a long time she was
the only woman in the group. She hung out with gay male
students, going to their apartments to listen to Judy Garland
records.
It wasn’t until 1975 that the trustees officially recognized the
group as the “Gay Student Union,” responding from threats
by gay alumni that they would cut off their donations.
Meanwhile, Whan was making other moves. In 1970, the
year she formed GLF, she also created the Gay Women’s
Services Center (GWSC) in Echo Park, the first lesbian social
services center in the nation. It hosted consciousness-raising