1998
U.S: The U.S. Dept. of Justice files suit in federal court in San Francisco and San Jose to close down six marijuana distribution clubs that provide the herb for medicinal purposes. * Dean X. Johnson, a composer, conductor and choral arranger who worked with singers including Eartha Kitt and Stockard Channing, dies of AIDS at age 42. * An article about gay former football player David Kopay appears in Gentlemen's Quarterly magazine. * Stanley Grzadzinski, a Michigan man with AIDS, sues a drugstore chain, claiming his children found out about his illness after a pharmacy clerk disclosed it to her teenage son; who proceeded to taunt Grzadzinski's kids at school. * Ma Vie En Rose, starring Georges du Fresne as a wide-eyed 7-year-old boy who wants to be a girl, is the hot gay movie. * Attorney General Janet Reno urges Congress to pass legislation expanding the scope of hate crimes as the FBI reports 8,759 incidents in 1996, 1,016 of which were based on sexual orientation. * Britain: Gay composer, Sir Michael Tippett, dies in London at age 93. In his third opera, The Knot Garden, he composed a love scene between two men. * Italy: Enrico Sini Luzi, 67, an Italian nobleman who belonged to the Vatican protocol corps, is found dead in his Rome apartment with his skull bashed in and a silk white scarf around his neck. This is the latest in a spate of gay men being murdered in the city. * Netherlands: The country's first gay marriage takes place.
1993
U.S.: Police in Laguna Beach, Calif., arrest a third suspect in the vicious gay bashing of Loc Minh Truong, a 55-year-old Vietnamese immigrant. * Mayor David Dinkins issues an executive order that allows gay and lesbian couples in New York to register as domestic partners. * In Los Angeles, three gay and lesbian community leaders officially declare their candidacies for the same district seat on the City Council: former L.A. school board member, Jackie Goldberg, AIDS healthcare executive Michael Weinstein and TV executive Conrad Terrazas. * France: Rudolf Nureyev, the Soviet defector who helped define male-dancing for the second half of the 20th century, dies from AIDS at age 54.
1988
U.S.: Far-right Republican Arizona Gov. Evan Meacham refuses to resign his position after being indicted for criminal fraud. He describes his enemies as 'a band of homosexuals and dissident Democrats.' * The 'Houston Declaration,' a document drafted by 50 conservative United Methodist preachers, is mailed to pastors and lay leaders. It urges the church to adhere to conservative values and labels homosexuality as not acceptable in the context of the Christian faith.' * In Orlando, Fla., The National Gay Rights Advocates file a suit against Dr. Hermino Orizondo for breaching a patient's medical confidentiality when the patient tested positive for HIV antibodies. Orizondo informed the patient's employer. * Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund publishes a new booklet on the legal problems associated with AIDS. It's called Living With AIDS.
1983
U.S.: In Riverside, Calif., after a two-year struggle with authorities, 27-year-old David Frater adopts Kevin, a 17-year-old boy. This is believed to be the first legal adoption by an out-gay man. * Milwaukee police raid the city's Club Baths twice within 36 hours, arresting 10 men on charges of sexual perversion, and lewd and lascivious conduct. * NunCon '83 takes place in Sacramento, Calif. Organized by San Francisco's Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, groups attending include Sacramento's Charitable Sisters of Izod and Davis, and California's Order of the Candle Burns at Both Ends.
