LGBTQ

Jas LaFond was just 9 years old when they met their first drag queen. This was back in the 90s. They were at home in Hartford, Connecticut. The drag queen was Black. And she was wearing a dark, sheer dress with gold lamé and flowers.

“The makeup was on point and neat and just completely transformed from the person I had met earlier in the day,” LaFond said. “Down to the nails and the hair down up and the edges were right. Like almost this deity in our living room getting ready to go out with my mom.”

June is usually a busy time for Queen City Pride. The Manchester based LGBTQ organization has always held annual Pride Month celebrations, but Pride celebrations had to be moved online this year. Three Queen City Pride organizers, Elliot Wood, Birdie de Bruyn and Richella Simard want LGBTQ+ New Hampshire residents to still feel supported, so they are launching Queer 101 - an online weekly educational series on how to be a better ally and advocate for the queer community.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled yesterday that employers cannot discriminate against LGBTQ workers under the Civil Rights Act.  

State Rep. Gerri Cannon, one of New Hampshire’s first openly transgender lawmakers, joined All Thing's Considered host Peter Biello to discuss the historic decision.

Novelist Alex Myers came out as transgender in the mid-90s, when society's understanding of what it means to be transgender was less clear than it is today. 

In his new novel, "Continental Divide," Myers writes about 19-year-old Ron, who was born female, and grew up in Tamworth, New Hampshire. Ron decides to reinvent himself as a man by moving west to work on a ranch in Wyoming. Alex Myers is an English teacher at Philips Exeter Academy. NHPR's Peter Biello stopped by his classroom earlier this week to talk about "Continental Divide," and the challenge of coming out as transgender. 

An exhibit that opened last Friday at the Portsmouth Athenaeum's Randall Gallery celebrates LGBT history on New Hampshire's Seacoast. The founder of the Seacoast LGBT History Project, Tom Kaufhold, worked for four years to collect mementos, posters, and artwork from the community. Kaufhold spoke with NHPR's Peter Biello about the exhibit, which runs through July 6.

The title of this exhibit is "Seacoast LGBT History: 50 years of Rainbow Reflections." Why focus on 50 years?

Sometimes, the clothes hanging in the closet hold dreams about who we could become.

Claremont's first-ever LGBTQ Pride celebration, called Rural Pride, drew visitors from throughout Sullivan County and beyond on Saturday. NHPR's Savannah Maher stopped by and sent us this audio postcard.

Barbara Follett had done more by the age of 25 than many will do in their lifetime. Including vanishing. Today on the show, the disappearance of an American prodigy... and how we forgot her. Plus, the rediscovery of the first known published African American in the country -- a woman from New Hampshire -- and how one woman figured out how to bring LGBTQ pride back to Concord year after year.

Tony Strat stands in the grass outside his screen-printing studio in the Upper Valley, washing the ink off of used screens with a hose. Even though he’s scrubbed the screens down, shadows of  designs he’s printed are still visible. “Gender is a social construct,” one of them reads.

Strat, 26, is an artist, entrepreneur and athlete. He’s worked in finance and started his own skateboarding company. He's also transgender. He started his transition process last year.

The Bookshelf from NHPR is New Hampshire Public Radio's series on authors and books with ties to the Granite State.  All Things Considered host Peter Biello features authors, covers literary events and publishing trends, and gets recommendations from each guest on what books listeners might want to add to their own bookshelves. If you have an author or book you think we should profile on The Bookshelf, send us an email. The address is books@nhpr.org.

The Log Cabin Republicans have long had a national presence, and now they have a New Hampshire chapter. The group of conservative supporters of LGBT rights formed last month and will hold a launch event on Friday at 5:30pm at the One Hundred Club in Portsmouth, during which Governor Chris Sununu is scheduled to speak. It’s an effort, they say, to show that the Republican party is unified.

Emily Heath is Senior Pastor at the Congregational Church in Exeter, and she recently returned from a trip to her hometown, Orlando. She was among five New England responders to provide what she calls “spiritual first aid” to people dealing with trauma from the shooting. Pastor Emily joined NHPR’s Peter Biello to discuss her experience.

So what was it like to be there, on the ground with those folks, helping them out?

Methodists from churches all over New England met last week at the New England Methodist Conference in Manchester. At that conference, they passed a resolution that attempts to make the broader church more inclusive for LGBTQIA people. It’s a decision that may have deeper resonance now after the attack at a gay nightclub in Orlando last week. Beth DiCocco is spokesperson for the New England Conference and she joined NHPR’s Peter Biello to discuss this resolution.

What is the Methodist Church's position on homosexuality?

The Obama administration's recent directive addressing the use of school bathrooms and other facilities by transgender students heightened a debate playing out in several states over so-called bathroom bills and transgender rights.  We'll look at how New Hampshire schools and communities are responding.

Since World War II, as many as 100,000 service members have been “less than honorably discharged” for being gay. Now, four years after the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” gay vets look to change the record. Today, what goes into rewriting history. And prior to the Civil War, images of battle were the stuff of legends and mystery – then came the photographs of Alexander Gardner. Plus, other stories about our nation’s veterans. 

Since World War II, as many as 100,000 service members have been “less than honorably discharged” for being gay. Now, four years after the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” gay vets look to change the record. Today, what goes into rewriting history. Then, forgery in the art industry is not rare -- but a con artist who has been caught and never sent to jail is. We’ll speak to the directors of a film that looks inside the mind of the mischievous shut-in and skilled artist who donated masterful forgeries to more than 46 museums.