On July 2, Chicagoans gathered to celebrate and discuss the history of Chicago LGBTQ+ newspapers at the Gerber/Hart Library and Archives, 6500 N. Clark St., as recounted by Michal Brody and Tracy Baim (who is co-founder and owner of Windy City Times).
Brody was a member of the Lavender Woman Collective, which published the first lesbian newspaper in Chicago, The Lavender Woman, in the ‘70s.
Brody and Baim discussed the many challenges of being openly LGBTQ+ journalists in the ‘70s and ‘80s.
Challenges included being female in a male dominated field, infighting within the community and the newspapers themselves, and striving to express not only their own voices but the voices of the LGBTQ+ community itself within Chicago.
