Gerber/Hart Library and Archives (Gerber/Hart) hosted the Queer All Year! The Gerber/Hart Spring Soiree event April 17 at Sidetrack, 3349 N. Halsted St.
The fourth annual event celebrated Sidetrack co-owners, longtime activists and married couple Arthur Johnston and José “Pepe” Peña who received the 2025 Friendship and Freedom Award (named after activist Henry Gerber’s short-lived newsletter that lasted two issues) amidst many supporters. Chicago Today producer and host Matthew Rodrigues served as the event emcee.
Rodrigues spoke at length about the importance of Gerber/Hart’s history preservation, noting that, “If we lose our history, we lose everything. They are taking advantage of us in different ways now. Ways that we don’t even know and aren’t even ready for, so we need to look back and learn from our past.” Rodrigues added that being an out queer man in the media is how he makes a difference and fights back.
Gerber/Hart Board Co-Chair James Conley said, “I am proud to be here and to be queer all year … It’s a great privilege to stand here before you as a part of this great organization, especially with all that’s happening in the government and around the country to try and suppress us. The beautiful collections in the Gerber/Hart’s archives remind us that we as a community have been here before, though each time feels freshly painful … We cannot let anyone take our joy, or our identity from us, and by being here together we’re proclaiming that publicly.”
Conley reminded the audience that Gerber/Hart is an independent library that is not beholden to a benefactor who would censor them, and that the organization is able to forge its own path, choose its own partners and lift the community up in the manner it sees fit.
Gerber/Hart Board member Craig Nadborne presented Johnston and Peña with their award. Nadborne spoke about how Johnston (a Buffalo, New York native) and Peña (who hails from Havana, Cuba) met in Chicago in 1973 at a gay bar, and it was love at first sight.
“During those early days, Art learned that Pepe had a love of music and theater,” said Nadborne. “Sidetrack opened in 1982 and was an extension of Pep’s loves and Arthur’s dream of owning a bar. At that time, it was about one-eighth its current size. I met Art in 1985 through an introduction by Tom Tunney … Art had recently formed a group called IMPACT, which eventually morphed into what is today Equality Illinois. I was interested in getting involved.”
Nadborne detailed Johnston’s accomplishments through his work at IMPACT/Equality Illinois, including work toward election victories for out gay candidates, such as now-retired Cook County Judge Tom Chiola, and Illinois state Rep. Larry McKeon; the passage of human rights ordinances in Chicago in 1988, Cook County in 1993 and Illinois in 1995; and the push for marriage equality in the state.
“During all the time that Arthur was out in front helping create those laws and ordinances, Pepe was the strong, quiet force behind the scenes,” said Nadborne. “He was the business strength that helped Sidetrack grow and prosper, and was the original VJ and DJ for Sunday afternoon showtunes. As a refugee, who escaped Cuba in the early 1960’s, he had a strong and steely strength that provided the backbone within the partnership that we are here celebrating tonight.”
Johnston said, “Gerber/Hart reminds us of the past and helps us remember that without our past, we have no future … Let’s work toward that future we know we deserve.”
Gerber/Hart Operations Director Erin Bell said their volunteer base has grown five times since she started at the library and archives in 2022. The organization recently received archival collections from community leaders Lori Cannon and Gary Chichester and former Illinois House Majority Leader Greg Harris, as well as papers from American artist John Schacht and items from the Chicago Gay Hockey Association.
“Our current exhibit, Forbidden Love at the Desert’s Edge, tells a story through photographs of a time when queer people and relationships like ours had to be hidden, had to be secreted in a way and were vilified by an unaccepting society,” said Bell. “Today, the hourly barrage of dangerous and unsettlingly familiar transphobic and homophobic rhetoric drives home the importance of queer archives. We don’t want to go back to being forbidden ever again.”
Gerber/Hart Community Outreach and Strategic Partnerships Manager Jen Dentel recalled her first encounter with the historical information at the library and archives when she first volunteered there in 2014. At the time, she was especially intrigued by the photos of drag performers in the ‘40s and those left her wondering: What else had been kept from her about LGBTQ+ people and history?
Gerber/Hart Development Manager Michael Rashid guessed that, in “another timeline” Gerber/Hart might have won the national medal that the Institute for Museum and Library Services (IMLS) bestows each year. There could have been a queer contingent heading to Washington, D.C. for an awards ceremony at the White House to receive the prize from First Gentleman Doug Emhoff, he added.
Instead, he said, the IMLS has been gutted, so no grants will be awarded to any libraries or museums like Gerber/Hart for the foreseeable future. Rashid said the grant he was working on with DePaul University students can no longer be used, and now there will be no federal support for the work they do.
“Because of you [individual supporters] there is no school board who can tell us what we can or can’t put on our shelves,” said Rashid. “They can’t do that here because you make us independent. Because of you, there’s no academic institution who can tell us what we can or can’t preserve in our collections.”
Rashid said that it’s more important than ever right now to donate to Gerber/Hart to ensure its independent future. A new film by director/writer C. J. Arellano—produced by Rashid—featured reminders that the Trump Administration has recently removed historical references to LGBTQ+ people on multiple federal governmental websites. Gerber/Hart volunteers who spoke about being “queer all year” and discussed the important work they do to preserve and protect the items that are in the library and archives.
Throughout the evening, attendees were also treated to performances by The Second City Sisters- A Mission House of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, Chicago drag sensation Coco Sho-Nell and trans, nonbinary and gender nonconforming artists from Gender Fucked Productions.
