Temple Honors students explore Philadelphia LGBTQ+ history through experiential learning
As students perused primary resources in Temple’s Special Collections Research Center, they found a rich repository of local LGBTQ+ books, periodicals and other information.
Old issues of the Philadelphia Gay News. City of Sisterly and Brotherly Loves by sexuality historian and activist Marc Stein. Written records of the International Gay Rights Congress in 1974 in the city. Come Out! Selections from the radical gay liberation newspaper.
At the beginning of the spring 2025 semester, these undergraduates in the Exploring Queer Philadelphia History Honors class were quickly learning just how much source material was available at their fingertips.
“I love going through the archives,” said Lizzie Rawa, a senior psychology major from Garnet Valley, Pennsylvania. “This is an important time to be learning about our history and how to move forward.”
When designing the course based on his own dissertation research, instructor and PhD history student Max Gaida wanted to ensure a hands-on experience.
“A key component of the class was getting students into the archives to look at primary sources,” he said. “We started the semester asking what is sexuality and showed it’s a historical construct. What does it mean to be gay? Where does this idea come from? We focused on exploring these questions and finding archival resources to learn what they say. In students’ feedback at the end of the semester, they noted this was a highlight of the course.”
History major Athen Schaper found the class a natural fit because of her interest in the subject matter and the opportunity to do research as a first-year student. “Because this history is marginalized, it can be affirming and uplifting to tell these stories,” said Schaper, a native of Lower Merion, Pennsylvania. “LGBTQ+ history is suppressed or hidden from so many places, and we’ve only just begun uncovering it.”
Immersed in queer culture
Students smiled as John Anderies, director of the John J. Wilcox Jr. Archives and Library at the William Way LGBT Community Center, showed them an Earring Magic Ken doll. Debuting in the 1990s, it became a popular icon for the queer community. The doll’s design and homosexual associations sparked controversy, and Mattel discontinued it.
Items like this documenting LGBTQ+ history abound in the center’s archives. As Philadelphia’s most extensive collection of personal papers, periodicals, audiovisual materials and ephemera, these archives introduced students to various materials, even inspiring ideas for their own research. Students were also able to check out the John J. Wilcox Jr. Library, the country’s oldest LGBTQ+ lending library containing more than 14,000 books and DVDs.
The class further explored the queer history of the city when touring the Gayborhood, which is located in Midtown Village and spans Pine Street to Chestnut Street as well as 11th Street to Broad. They walked past places that may have changed but still hold significance.
Giovanni’s Room, for instance, the country’s oldest LGBTQ+ and feminist bookstore, opened in 1973. Students enjoyed perusing the books and thrift shop in what is now Philly AIDS Thrift @ Giovanni’s Room. According to Gaida, the bookstore was designed to be a welcoming space that was not a bar and was unapologetically visible. The open windows indicated that queer people had nothing to hide and allowed employees to watch as passersby worked up the courage to come inside.
The class also encountered sites reflecting modern-day LGBTQ+ culture.
Staring up at the Finally on 13th mural celebrating Philadelphia ballroom culture and Black queer culture, students shared that they could see the progress made but also recognized there’s still more to be done.
Mapping out research
When Gaida arrived at Temple through an exchange program with the University of Cologne in Germany, he planned to research sexuality in cities. Ultimately, he decided to focus on Philadelphia. “The more I read about Philadelphia, the more I realized how much queer history it has,” he said.
As part of Gaida’s own dissertation, he developed a map pinpointing landmarks and gatherings in LGBTQ+ history throughout the 20th century in the Greater Philadelphia region. The map identifies various businesses, celebrations, organizations, arts and cultural centers, activism efforts and protests, hubs of educational discourse, and other aspects of queer life.
Some of these historical happenings and places include the Gay Softball World Series at Edgley and Dairy Fields, cruising spots in Fairmont Park, an all-day picnic and festival called Queerstock at Schuylkill River Park—known as Judy Garland Park to the community at the time—and a 1963 homophile rights conference in the Drake, among others.
“When I came to Philadelphia, I realized that the Gayborhood is an official name on the map and that it’s right in the heart of the city,” explained Gaida. “Often LGBTQ+ neighborhoods are found on the periphery or outskirts of a city, suggesting these marginalized groups are settling in marginalized areas where they can find home and community. I wanted to find out how the Philadelphia queer community managed to stake a claim in this neighborhood in a central, wealthy part of town.”
Taking a deeper look
In the Honors Huddle at the Tuttleman Learning Center on Main Campus, Ryan Gephart presented his final project on the role of queerness in the Mummers Parade to a captive audience of his classmates and faculty and staff. Gephart, a psychology and neuroscience double major, examined how LGBTQ+ individuals became involved in categories such as “Best Female Impersonator,” for example.
“For much of the Mummers history, the only queer participation had been from white cis gay men,” explained Gephart, Class of 2026, and a native of Pottstown, Pennsylvania. “Even though there are more drag queens involved now, the Mummers lack diverse representation. It’s important to note how the Mummers present their narrative about including people of different backgrounds.”
Gephart’s project was one of several original research presentations on LGBTQ+ history in Philadelphia. Students selected topics based on their individual interests.
For Rawa, finding a project that bridged her passion for psychology and social work felt important. She decided to research the Gay and Lesbian Switchboard of Philadelphia, a volunteer-run service providing information, counseling and referrals to the LGBTQ+ community through a call-in phone line.
“As a clinic coordinator at Temple’s Child and Adolescent Anxiety Disorders Clinic, I am responsible for intake in which people call me for advice about what resources are available and where they can go for assistance, so I found a connection between my role here and what I would do if I were a queer person in the 1970s,” said Rawa. “I could totally see myself as a volunteer for the Gay and Lesbian Switchboard.”
Meanwhile, Schaper’s experience in choir, including the Singing Owls at Temple, led her to explore the history of LGBTQ+ chorus groups in the city. “As a movement, I found through my research that it was a reaction to the AIDS crisis so that these individuals could create community, memorialize others and provide support,” she explained. “When you’re in a choir, there’s strength in numbers.”
Other topics of final projects included the marginalization of LGBTQ+ communities in Pride parades in the 1970s, lesbian history documented through zines, the lack of archival sources on the transmasculine and trans male community, the history of the Philadelphia Gay News, Philadelphia’s role in housing Cuban refugees during the Mariel boatlift, grief among elders following the AIDS crisis, and Black LGBTQ+ communities in the 20th century.
“I was so impressed by the students’ work and blown away by their dedication and ability to find things they were deeply interested in,” said Gaida. “I’m happy that students got an appreciation not just for history at large but specifically for the city they’re in and its queer community.”
Finding Temple connections
When alum Tommi Avicolli Mecca, CLA ’74, visited the class, he emphasized passing the torch on to the students. Mecca—a writer, performer and activist—played a pivotal role in the gay liberation movement, helping organize the first gay pride march in Philadelphia in 1972. He noted parallel problems and similar experiences the LGBTQ+ community has faced then and now as he spoke to students.
“Tommi showed them the people behind these stories. At the heart of history is the people,” said Gaida.
Over the course of the semester, Gaida and the students discovered that numerous members of the Temple community were directly involved in the queer history of Philadelphia.
“We see this long history of the university allowing this kind of freedom,” said Gaida. “I learned about Dennis Rubini, an out faculty member in Temple’s History Department in the 1970s who was among the first in the country to create and teach courses on gay history and gay liberation. I feel like I’m taking up his work and following in his footsteps.”
“I came out of this class with a lot of pride for being a Temple student because the university has been a leader in fighting for queer rights. I’m honored to be part of that legacy of activism,” added Rawa.
Additionally, the class instilled a sense of community and hope.
“I really appreciated having this space to feel comfortable as a queer person,” said Gephart. “And I learned so much about people who identify as other parts of the LGBTQ+ community. It’s also particularly comforting to understand that difficult points in history like the Stonewall riots and AIDS epidemic bring us together as a community in response. We’ve seen that queer people continue to exist past these trying times. We’re queer and we’re here, and we’re not going anywhere.”
Built with Shorthand