Queering Up History: Sept 9th

"Queer Events On This Day In History...

1707 William Huggins of England is indicted for sodomy and would be found guilty.

1980 A federal judge orders the US Air Force to reinstate Leonard Matlovich. The Air Force offered a settlement of $160,000 to avoid reinstating him; he accepted in order to pay the legal bills accumulated during his five-year fight.

1980 Toronto's Metro Council, governing body of greater Toronto area, refuses to pass Metro Bill of Rights which includes sexual orientation.

1987 A San Francisco Superior Court jury awards palimony in the amount of $2.28 million to James B Short for the 19 years he lived with realtor Charles Gale. It was believed to be the first gay palimony case to be decided by a jury.

1994 In California, three white supremacists are arrested in the kidnapping and beating of Thomas Lee, who they believed was gay. Lee was threatened with a shotgun, beaten with a baseball bat, stripped, and tied to a tree.

1994 Jurists rule that Lynne Tucker of Salt Lake City Utah could not be declared an unfit parent solely on the basis that she lives with her lesbian lover.

1994 Oregon activists working for the defeat of Measure 9, which sought to ban gay rights laws, stage news conferences in Portland, Eugene, and Bend.

1995 A federal judge in Omaha Nebraska temporarily blocks the Air Force from discharging a gay Captain, Richard Richenberg.

1999 The Times of London publishes an article in which ex-government minister Michael Portillo is quoted as saying that he had 'homosexual experiences' in his youth.

2005 What would have been Great Britain's first gay TV channel, Faze TV, folds for financial reasons before even transmitting (broadcasting) its first show."

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