Windy City Media Group Frontpage News

THE VOICE OF CHICAGO'S GAY, LESBIAN, BI, TRANS AND QUEER COMMUNITY SINCE 1985

home search facebook twitter join
Gay News Sponsor Windy City Times 2023-12-13
DOWNLOAD ISSUE
Donate

Sponsor
Sponsor
Sponsor

  WINDY CITY TIMES

PASSAGES Michael O'Reilly, aka Penny
By Web Behrens
2019-07-14

This article shared 7289 times since Sun Jul 14, 2019
facebook twitter pin it google +1 reddit email


Longtime Chicagoan Michael Francis O'Reilly—a queer artist, activist, Radical Faerie and sometime provocateur best known as Penny—has died at age 57. After surviving decades with HIV, he received a lymphoma diagnosis last autumn; he passed away peacefully June 10, surrounded by friends and family in his Rogers Park home.

Born in 1962 in Lansing, Michigan, Penny moved with his parents and four siblings to Wilmette in the early '70s. He attended New Trier East High School, where he was president of the 1980 graduating class. He studied engineering at Rice University in Houston, where he also came out. After college, he lived in Kankakee, Illinois, before settling in Chicago. Penny worked for many years as a phone installer for AT&T, then took an early retirement and worked for himself as a painter, handyman and declutterer.

Those varied professional skills abetted his artistic pursuits. For a 2001 large-scale public-art/activism project, he constructed and painted an enormous canvas with a pro-environment message, which he used to cover an abandoned billboard on Peterson Avenue just west of Ravenswood. Meanwhile, his penchant with telephone technology led to a few occasions of him performing in drag as Ernestine, Lily Tomlin's classic phone-operator character.

In 2002, Penny and his then-partner and dear friend Matthew Gleeman Long bought a home in Rogers Park that the pair envisioned as a small urban sanctuary for faeries. They dubbed it "The Castle," although it's known to most as as the leopard-print house, thanks to Penny's bold animal-print paint job. Penny and Gleeman welcomed dozens of faeries, queers and artists under The Castle's roof—both as permanent residents and as travelers. Some of those wandering through hailed from rural faerie communities in Tennessee and Minnesota, both circles in which Penny was active.

Penny Michael O'Reilly is survived by his siblings, nieces and nephews: sister Camille; sister Eileen, her husband Tom Gerspach and their children Ryan, Megan and Annie; brother Kevin and his son Dylan; and brother Steve, his wife Christine and their sons, Joseph and Eric. ( The middle child of five, Penny often joked that he was "the youngest girl, oldest boy." ) He is also survived by many aunts, uncles, cousins and countless friends.

In his final years and months, Penny found great joy and fellowship in the Queer Contra and Chi-Town Squares dancing groups. The Queer Contra group is dedicating its Saturday, July 27, dance gathering to Penny's memory. All are welcome; details are on Facebook ( at www.facebook.com/events/315922625977629/ ). A private memorial will be held Saturday, Sept. 14.

His family requests that donations can be made in his name to Howard Brown Health Center ( HowardBrown.org/donate/ ), where he long received care.


This article shared 7289 times since Sun Jul 14, 2019
facebook twitter pin it google +1 reddit email

Out and Aging
Presented By

  ARTICLES YOU MIGHT LIKE

Gay News

PASSAGES Dorothy Elizabeth McGroarty 2024-03-14
- Dorothy Elizabeth McGroarty, 82, of The Breakers at Edgewater Beach, and a former resident of Andersonville, passed away Feb. 16 surrounded by her loving family. Born in Dearborn, Michigan, Dorothy was raised on Chicago's South and ...


Gay News

PASSAGES Bryan Dean Wilson 2024-03-14
- Bryan Dean Wilson, 64, of Chicago, passed away March 11. Born in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Bryan graduated from Washington High school in Cedar Rapids before earning his B.S. in Biology from Mount Mercy University, also in ...


Gay News

PASSAGES: Former Chicago Commission on Human Relations chair Clarence Wood 2024-03-13
- LGBTQ ally and former Chicago Commission on Human Relations (CCHR) Chair and Commissioner Clarence N. Wood died March 5. He was 83. Wood was born April 14, 1940, in Alabama. While primarily raised in Alabama, Wood ...


Gay News

Longtime LGBTQ+-rights activist David Mixner dies at 77 2024-03-12
- On March 11, longtime LGBTQ+ and HIV/AIDS activist David Mixner—known for working on Bill Clinton's presidential campaign but then splitting from him over "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" (DADT)—died at age 77, The Advocate reported. ...


Gay News

LGBTQ+ Victory Fund remembers co-founder David Mixner 2024-03-12
--From a press release - Today, LGBTQ+ Victory Fund President & CEO Mayor Annise Parker released the following statement on the passing of LGBTQ+ civil rights activist and LGBTQ+ Victory Fund co-founder David Mixner: "Today, we lost David Mixner, a founding ...


Gay News

PASSAGES Charles R. Tobin 2024-03-03
- Charles R. Tobin, 81, peacefully passed away on Dec. 23, 2023, in the company of his husband, after living with Lewey body dementia for several years. Charlie was born and raised in the Fernwood neighborhood on ...


Gay News

PASSAGES Trailblazing judge and attorney Patricia M. Logue passes away 2024-02-26
- The Honorable Patricia Logue ("Pat" to her friends, Trish" to her family) was a brilliant lawyer, a trailblazing jurist and a hero to the LGBTQ community. Pat's legacy includes numerous landmark cases she litigated over her ...


Gay News

Oklahoma non-binary student dies after being assaulted 2024-02-21
- Officials acknowledged there are unresolved questions about a 16-year-old non-binary Oklahoma student who died one day after a fight in a high school bathroom, NBC News noted. Chuck Hoskin Jr., principal chief of the Cherokee Nation, ...


Gay News

GLAAD remembers Cecilia Gentili, transgender Latina, actress, activist, health care activist, journalist 2024-02-06
--From a press release - (New York, NY - February 6, 2024) GLAAD, the world's largest LGBTQ media advocacy organization, is responding to the death of transgender actress and advocate Cecilia Gentili and elevating voices of transgender and political leaders honoring ...


Gay News

More information emerges about death on Atlantis gay cruise 2024-02-04
By Lu Calzada - Further details have emerged following the death of a Chicago man on a Royal Caribbean's Oasis of the Seas Atlantis cruise targeted towards gay men. Following a Reddit post by the man's sister — which has ...


Gay News

PASSAGES Imperial Court's Scott Archer remembered as selfless, devoted 2024-02-04
By Alec Karam - As the old saying goes, we all have an angel on one shoulder, and a devil on the other. Well, Scott Archer was all angel, his best friend Herman Coen believes. "Everybody wanted to talk to Scott, because Scott was Scott," ...


Gay News

Broadway star Chita Rivera dies at 91 2024-01-30
- Chita Rivera—a Broadway legend with more than seven decades of credits—has died at age 91 after a short illness, People Magazine reported. "It is with immense personal sorrow that I announce the death of the beloved ...


Gay News

PASSSAGES Chef Michael Thomas Zito 2024-01-02
- Chef Michael Thomas Zito, 55, ("Chef Bear Italia" and "Big Chef") passed away December 12, 2023, unexpectedly at home in Chicago's Belmont Gardens neighborhood. Born in Kentucky to Pentecostal missionaries from New York, Mike began cooking ...


Gay News

Gay political trailblazer Ken Sherrill passes away at age 81 2023-12-30
- Kenneth Sherrill—a pioneering political scientist who was also the first out gay elected official in New York history—died in early December at age 81 from surgical complications, Gay City News reported. He is survived by his ...


Gay News

PASSAGES Paris Johnson 2023-12-29
- Paris Johnson, 29, of Chicago's West Loop neighborhood, passed away unexpectedly Nov. 28. He would have celebrated his 30th birthday Dec. 20. Born into a military family in Sacramento, California, Paris moved often in his youth, ...


 


Copyright © 2024 Windy City Media Group. All rights reserved.
Reprint by permission only. PDFs for back issues are downloadable from
our online archives.

Return postage must accompany all manuscripts, drawings, and
photographs submitted if they are to be returned, and no
responsibility may be assumed for unsolicited materials.

All rights to letters, art and photos sent to Nightspots
(Chicago GLBT Nightlife News) and Windy City Times (a Chicago
Gay and Lesbian News and Feature Publication) will be treated
as unconditionally assigned for publication purposes and as such,
subject to editing and comment. The opinions expressed by the
columnists, cartoonists, letter writers, and commentators are
their own and do not necessarily reflect the position of Nightspots
(Chicago GLBT Nightlife News) and Windy City Times (a Chicago Gay,
Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender News and Feature Publication).

The appearance of a name, image or photo of a person or group in
Nightspots (Chicago GLBT Nightlife News) and Windy City Times
(a Chicago Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender News and Feature
Publication) does not indicate the sexual orientation of such
individuals or groups. While we encourage readers to support the
advertisers who make this newspaper possible, Nightspots (Chicago
GLBT Nightlife News) and Windy City Times (a Chicago Gay, Lesbian
News and Feature Publication) cannot accept responsibility for
any advertising claims or promotions.

 
 

TRENDINGBREAKINGPHOTOS







Sponsor


 



Donate


About WCMG      Contact Us      Online Front  Page      Windy City  Times      Nightspots
Identity      BLACKlines      En La Vida      Archives      Advanced Search     
Windy City Queercast      Queercast Archives     
Press  Releases      Join WCMG  Email List      Email Blast      Blogs     
Upcoming Events      Todays Events      Ongoing Events      Bar Guide      Community Groups      In Memoriam     
Privacy Policy     

Windy City Media Group publishes Windy City Times,
The Bi-Weekly Voice of the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Trans Community.
5315 N. Clark St. #192, Chicago, IL 60640-2113 • PH (773) 871-7610 • FAX (773) 871-7609.