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SBI Accuses Five of Immoral Acts
Before the 1970s the only articles to be found about LGBTQ+ people in mainstream newspapers focused on encounters with law enforcement or homosexuals as victims of violent crimes.
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I-85 Rest Areas Said Problems
Before the 1970s the only articles to be found about LGBTQ+ people in mainstream newspapers focused on encounters with law enforcement or homosexuals as victims of violent crimes.
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Orange-Durham Coalition for Battered Women (ODCBW), now Durham Crisis Response Center, circa 1976–present
The Coalition for Battered Women first counseled and later also provided shelter for survivors of domestic violence, and offered other services including educational sessions for members of the police force, men who were abusers, and other groups such as churches and women’s clubs. Lesbians were an integral part of the creation of ODCBW and served on its board and in leadership positions. The first organization in Durham to provide help for women experiencing domestic violence, ODCBW literally saved women’s lives.
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Durham Rape Crisis Center (DRCC), now Durham Crisis Response Center, 1978 to date
The women’s movement set the stage for the anti-rape movement of the 1970s, in which rape was redefined as an act of violence carried out to assert power and domination, rather than as a sex crime. From its beginnings, the DRCC provided support services for rape survivors, including a hotline, and lobbied newspapers not to print names of rape victims in the paper. Lesbians were integrally involved in creating DRCC, serving on the board and in positions of leadership. It merged with Orange-Durham Coalition for Battered Women in 2001 to become the Durham Crisis Response Center: Domestic and Sexual Violence Services.
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Great Southeastern Lesbian Conference, Atlanta, May 24-26, 1975, and the “Atlanta Five”
Twenty to thirty Triangle women made the trip to Atlanta for the first Atlanta Lesbian Feminist Alliance-sponsored conference, the theme of which was “Building a Lesbian Community.” Five Durham women were arrested late one night at a coffee shop, officially charged with “creating turmoil and criminal trespassing,” but apparently the charges were largely based on their appearance and talking back to an undercover officer. Lesbians at the conference raised funds for the $1,100 dollar per person bonds and lawyers’ fees and charges were dropped. This run-in with the law reinforced to many that being a lesbian could be dangerous and made the need to organize even more important to many Triangle Area Lesbian Feminist members.
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Little River Attacks and Vigil at Durham County Judicial Building, April 1981
On April 12, 1981, two men attacked four other men at a swimming hole on the Little River, four miles north of Durham, at a site popular with gay men. The attackers shouted homophobic slurs and threatened to kill gay people. The four men were badly beaten, and one, Ronald Antonevitch, who did not identify as gay, died three days later of his wounds.
In response, approximately 125 lesbians, gay men, and allies rallied in protest of violence against homosexuals. While lesbian and gay men wanted the attackers punished, many did not want the death penalty.
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Our Day Out, June 27, 1981
North Carolina’s first gay and lesbian march was organized after the hate crime at Little River. Called “Our Day Out,” it was held June 27, 1981, planned by Debbie Swanner and David Ransom in response to the violence. Around 300 marchers traversed Durham’s downtown loop, some with bags over their heads to avoid being recognized. Dannia Southerland and Steve Summerford of War Resisters League (WRL) coordinated the peacekeepers, and numerous police were present because of threatened Klan violence, which did not occur.
Sherri Zann Rosenthal, assistant city attorney for Durham, had this to say in qnotes, an LGBT arts, entertainment, and news publication based in Charlotte:
Transcript “Our Day Out” was the very first march and rally in 1981, and yes I was there. It was fascinating because there weren’t very many of us marching down the street and a bunch of obviously very poor folks were looking at us very oddly.
“Our Day Out” came in the wake of anti-gay attacks at the Little River in Durham, which resulted in the death of one man, Ron Antonevitch. But there were years of community organizing in other areas that made that first event possible.
Many had been active in movements for other people’s rights—civil rights, all kinds of voter registration drives, protesting against racial discrimination, but it was after the Antonevitch murder that more public organizing around coming out as being gay began to happen.
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Triangle Women’s Karate Association/Triangle Women’s Martial Arts/SafeSkills Dojo 1982-2015
Life partners Kathy Hopwood and Beth Siegler founded Triangle Women’s Karate Association (later Triangle Women’s Martial Arts and then SafeSkills) in 1982 to provide a safe, independent space for women to train in self-defense and martial arts. Offering an alternative to the mostly militaristic, male-dominated schools, Hopwood and Siegler welcomed all ages and genders, with a focus was on women’s self-defense. They taught multitudes of people to create safety in their lives, including workshops for the LGBT community focused on hate crimes.
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Carolina Pines Dojo, 1987-mid-2000s
Many of the women involved in this school for training in the martial arts were lesbians, including the sensei (teacher) and her teacher in Ann Arbor, Michigan—an uncommon lineage in the mostly male martial arts community! The school embodied a national trend in women’s martial arts and self-defense schools and collectives, with a political take on sexism, self-defense, and women’s empowerment. Betsy Barton, a member of the dojo, says, “We did self-defense demonstrations at the Pride march, once while on a moving float. We also did demos at Centerfest and taught children’s karate for a few years at one point, when the kids of local lesbians that we knew and loved were old enough to attend.”
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Durham Unstalled
In 2011 several Durham activists started an initiative to increase bathroom access for trans and gender-nonconforming people. Upon discovering that the plumbing code used by North Carolina restricted the ability of small businesses to have single-stall, gender-neutral restrooms, Durham Unstalled members brought about a change in the statewide code.