UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MADISON ARCHIVES
ORAL HISTORY PROGRAM
MADISON’S LGBT COMMUNITY, 1960s-PRESENT

Interview #943
NICHOLS, KATHLEEN

Kathleen Nichols (1957 - )
Campaign Worker/Activist, Founder of The United, Dane County elected official, Wisconsin State employee
						
Interviewed: 2009 (3/26 & 4/30)	
Length:  173 minutes 
Interviewer: Jason Orne 
Index by: Jason Orne

Abstract (all sessions):  In her interview with Jason Orne, Kathleen Nichols provides an extensive timeline and history of her involvement personally, professionally and politically in the Madison community, including the state and national effects of these actions. This interview was conducted for Madison’s LGBT Community, 1960s-Present and included in the oral history collection at the UW—Madison’s Archives and Records Management Services.

Keywords (all sessions): University of Wisconsin—Madison; 1960s/1970s student activism; Dane County politics; Democratic/Progressive Politics; Gay Rights/Activism; Madison lesbian and gay community internal relations; Becker, Jonathan; Clarenbach, David; Constance, Barbara; Devinski, Carla;  Dillabough, Rev. Wayne;  Dungan, Nancy; Earl, Gov. Tony; Greenspan, Judy; Lydner, Barbara; Martin, “Biddy”; McCormick, Scott; Milk, Harvey; Scheill, Rodney; Wagner, Richard “Dick”; Wright, Rev. Jim; Lesbian Switchboard; The United (Madison Progressive group);  The Back Door; Liz Estrada (sp?); International Network of Gay and Lesbian Elected Officials; AIDS crisis; 1983 Governor’s Commission on Gay and Lesbian Rights; 1979 National Gay Rights March on Washington; The Windows demonstration; First and Second Harvest Ball for Human Rights; Digitized Materials; Feminist anti-pornography movement.
							
First Interview Session (March 26, 2009): Digital File

00:00:00	 Start of interview/introduction KN Int 1 Tape 1
Question: Introduce yourself Answer: First out lesbian elected to public office, lesbian activist since early 70s. Found early organizations. Served on first and only governor's council for LGBT issues. Has 19 year old son currently studying at UC Berkeley

00:00:21	Problems with Recorder and discussion about dinner

00:01:08	 Question: How did you come to Madison Answer: Grew up in upper wisconsin. Mother from Ireland. Father's heritage a mystery. Father a post-war spy. Story about finding father's spy kit as a child. Grew up in a working class family. Father invented something and family moved to Madison so her father could go to UW. However, Kathleen's parents were unhappy with the radical liberal politics of Madison and Kathleen was emancipated at age 17. Went back to upper Wisconsin. 

00:05:57	Life during that time. Got married to her best friend David "a classic hippy wedding" "A time of wonderful polymorphous perversity" Discussion of first woman Kathleen was involved with. This woman moved out and Kathleen describes her husband's reaction. The town found out. Subsequently they moved to Madison.

00:09:49	 "Stop me at any point" Question: Coming out or "outed"? Guess it was outed, but didn't feel that way. People's reaction was just that it was "so uncool" Didn't feel as though it said anything about her identity because "we had lots of fun orgies in those days" Some comments on the 60s. 

00:11:30	Begins talking about a teacher who was formative in Madison
		Moved to Madison and lived in a co-op. Describes time in Madison just living 'the 60s life'. 

00:13:04	 Fell in love with a girl in the co-op. Thought she should stay away from her because of previous woman's reaction. Describes flirting with this girl. "My first delightful sexual experience with a girl in a...station wagon in the cemetery here in Madison...in January"  Girl caught ill and Kathleen took care of her. Husband began dating Pablo. 

00:16:25	 More comments on 60s. Discussion of breaking up with her husband.  Very amicable on both sides. Still very good friends to this day.

00:18:44	 Working in a nursing home now. Gets fired for being a lesbian. Someone had accused Kathleen of hitting on her after Kathleen had turned her down. 

00:21:48	 Due to her union strike experience, her sense of unfairness at this situation leads her to join 'The Equal Rights Commission' Talks about meeting Rev. Jim Wright. "may his name be blessed" Joins group of people that had been fired due to their sexual orientation. This leads to passage of first 'sexual preference' ordinance.Question: Story of the passage of this ordinance? Answer: No, 'I was just a kid' Was not involved in the political process. Refers to Jim Yeadon to answer that question. Describes Jim Yeadon. 

00:23:34	 Kathleen describes her 'minor' role. But this ordinance leads her to become more involved in city politics. Briefly mentions hetero- involvement with Jeff Golden. 

00:26:43	 Loses bet to Jeff and goes to UW for a semester. Becomes President of Madison Committee for Gay Rights. Lesbian Switchboard Opens. Discussion of lesbian Switchboard and those involved. Mentions Barbara Constance and Barbara Lydner (sp?) "whom I loathed" Went with them to National Lesbian Feminist Conference. Attempted to form national coalition of lesbian organizations, but was too far ahead of it's time. No technology to support constant discussion. Discusses generational differences between older lesbians and her generation that was attending the conference. 

00:30:56	 Gift to conference comes from anonymous lesbian donor "Hours of Processing!"

00:32:05	 Mentions Paul Branchet. Mentions Judy Greenspan. West High School students want to hold a panel, but principle blocks under the morals provision. Kids refused. Mentions Carla Devinski. Judy, Carla, and Kathleen decide to put Judy for school board so they could give the panel. 

00:35:43	 Alice in Academia. Mentions Biddy Martin and Ruth Blyer. Formation of the proto women studies program. Mentions Judith Levet, Aron Torton Beck (Sp?) and Jane Piliavan (sp?). 

00:37:50	Formation of first Harvest Ball which eventually turns into the Ten Percent Society. Discussion of speakers who came to campus: Shel Silverstein, out leatherman
Shows interviewer the Harvest Ball poster. We discuss. Harvey Firestein performs in Madison.

00:40:51	 "Billy" and Steve Seyphan (sp?) work with dorms to form coming out support groups and programing. Chuck worked with RAs. Next year, their success gets them more money for programming. We discuss Olga Bermant, a poet. Kathleen discusses the success of the different UW programming. 

00:45:15	 Kathleen talks about the passage of the UW anti-discrimination. Refers to the Purges. Story about a fraternity stealing one of the gay rights group's banner on the union. More discussion of their UW programming. 

00:48:43	 Places this in context of the anti-war movement on campus, the TAA Strike and the lesbian influence in these events. Story about 'the lesbian liberation of the Red Gym' which was a gay cruising spot, but women were not allowed into the pool. They invade.

00:51:52	 Anita Bryant, her work nationally. Katheen is 25 at the time. Discusses division between lesbian separatists feminists and gay men.

00:54:39	 Barbara Constance, Barbara Lydner, Arthur Gridhall and Kathleen hold a meeting to combine the lesbian and gay communities. Form The United, which becomes OutReach. United's original mission to fight Rev. Wayne Dillabaugh who wanted to bring Anita Bryant to Madison. 

00:58:20	 Not sure of success until Rev. Dillabaugh had a scandal over beating a child. Kathleen has original documents about these events [Scanned by Oral History Project] Kathleen looks over the newspaper clippings and narrates her thoughts on reading them. Mentions winning an award for television show The Gay Response. Discusses importance of newspapers on activism and gay and lesbian culture. 

01:04:33	 Discusses Yaedon and David Clarenbach, not out at time. Mentions The Magic Picnic.  Question: Tell me more about The Magic Picnic Answer: Bar picnic. Lots of scantly clothed men. Leads to talking about Rodney Scheill whose lover's financing leads to opening The Back Door, first gay-owned gay bar. Mentions The Pirate Ship, another bar. It was deaf bar by day. Gay bar by night. Description of The Pirate Ship and The Back Door. 

01:08:42	 Kathleen narrates looking at a pile of photographs. Describes The Liz Estrada (sp?) and it's role in the lesbian community. Was burned down. Leads to discussion of The Hotel Washington, which was also burned down. Reads news article relating to picture of Carla holding orange juice cans, effort to defeat Anita Bryant's efforts. 

01:11:13	 Picture of David Clarenbach at signing of gay rights law. Praises Clarenbach and how much the entire gay rights community owes him. 

01:13:49	 Starts Story of national gay rights march on Washington. 

01:14:51	 Aside on poster of Second Gay Rights of Spring. We discuss digitizing her materials. Requests we talk to Jim Stakely (sp?), emeritus professor. Discusses him at length.
Shows interviewer the program of the national march on washington. Kathleen and Barbara Constance are Madison coordinators. Judy Greenspan was coordinator in Milwaukee. Story about busing to Washington and her emotional reaction to seeing so many people at the March. 

01:23:05	 Story about their housing during the march. Police try to remove them, but the Christian ministers block the door to protect them. 

01:25:05	Story about Texas queer marching band that was there, because interviewer is from Texas. 
Narrates looking through her program from the March. Again refers to context of other events. Question: How did other organizations react to visible lesbian and gay presence in their support? Answer: "A little bit of lavender menace crap" Discusses Nancy Dungan. Shows picture of Barbara Lydner. 

01:29:14	 Moves up timeline to 80s, right before AIDS crisis. Looks at framed picture of her demonstration of the movie, Windows. Mentions Steven Sayforth's (sp?) Equality Rides because David Carter is in photo. "Boys get rowdy" and Kathleen bails them out. 

01:32:16	 Kathleen arranges another demonstration the next day to get more people arrested. Photo is of Kathleen in second demonstration.

01:36:37	 Discusses Barbara Constance's role once arrested. Continues story of being arrested and getting out of it, including presence of political friends. 

01:40:28	 Discusses news reaction to the story, including a funny story about Kathleen's decision to have them all wear daffodils and the reporters trying to figure out how daffodils were a symbol of gay rights. Resolution of story: charges are dropped. Dick Wagner asks Kathleen to run for County Board. Kathleen ends up in district primary over the position. No one assumes that 'out leftist lesbian' will win. 

01:44:28	 Meatpackers Union endorses Kathleen. 

01:47:22	 Describes how a flyer by her opponent attempted to slander her by re-outing her. Great story about a working class man called her and supported her. 

01:49:20	 Kathleen gets elected. Tony Earl gets elected governor. Makes commitment to the gay community. Hires gay press aide. Attempts to make gay and lesbian desk. Instead forms Governor's Council on Gay and Lesbian Rights. Task: explain gay rights law to state constituency. 

01:53:12	 Dick Wagner and Kathleen become co-chairs. Meet all over the state. Describes impact these meetings had on local people. Wagner declines a second term as co-chair. Will Handy and Chaz Pote (sp?) form Madison AIDS support network. Will becomes co-chair of Council. AIDS comes to Madison. Council changes policy mission to protecting privacy of AIDS diagnoses. Helps setup drug trials. Clarenbach passes privacy law. 

01:58:14	 Democratic party convention this year (1985). Form International Network of Gay and Lesbian Elected Officials. Discusses Chris Smith, out shadow Minister for Economics in UK, including story of Kathleen and Chris going dancing after the meeting. Chris is now Lord Smith of Finley. 

02:01:02	 Discusses Harvey Milk and how she met him when she was brought in to San Francisco to help protect against it's rezoning. Describes his hatred of women. "He was not a very nice man, politically effective, but not a very nice man" His political successor Harry Brit (sp?) "was a lovely man" 

02:06:14	 Interview begins to close because of length of interview. Kathleen describes additional topics she has not gotten to: 1983/1987 Gay Rights March, Kissing Cesar Chavez. Interviewer describes need to have followup interview. 

02:07:08	 Discussion and description of materials that could be digitized. Describes picture of George Siegel's statue that was in Orton Park. Madison loved that the statue. Question: What happened to the statue? Answer: Siegel's estate recalled the statue.Narrates looking at more materials that could be digitized. Scott McCormick who was also out gay man on Dane County Board of Supervisors. Currently President of Union Cab Collective. Describes people in these photos. 

02:14:05	More description and narration of digitized materials. Harvest Ball poster. Gay and Lesbian Elected Officials materials. Including some members and where they are now. Description of photo in 1986 with Kathleen, Tammy Baldwin and Jody Byran after doing some lobbying in washington. Describes photo and her meeting Jesse Jackson. Talks about article founding the original gay center on campus. More discussion of extensive Dillabough articles. Article about 1979 march on washington. 

02:22:22	 Continues narration of various articles and photos to be digitized. Topic switches frequently. Includes description of some members of gay and lesbian national democratic party members 

02:28:17	 Recites list of people that should be interviewed.

02:31:17	 Harvey Goldburg. Jerry lynn Philips, first person to challenge Wisconsin's domestic partner benefits. 

Interview ends. 

Second Interview Session (April 30th, 2009)

00:00:00

 Initial Discussion of Dinner

00:00:54	 Lesbian Feminist effort to change the legal status around pornography. Andrea Dworkin works with Catharine MacKinnon to develop an apriori definition of pornography. Kathleen sees article about it and wants to help through her elected official status. Puts together a conference with Anne Lord Gaylor to bring them to Madison. 

00:05:04: 	discussion of how it separated gay and lesbian community. Dick Wagner was against it. Nightline puts together a piece, emphases Kathleen rather than Dworkin or MacKinnon.

00:07:36:	 One night, during the Nightline piece, while Dick Wagner is over, she gets a call from someone at Cambridge. "For the next 3 months, my life was Alice down the rabbit hole" People would call and pretend to be important people they were not. Sets up meeting with a lot of important Madison individuals to meet this Cambridge person. She never showed.

00:10:27	Next her mail started to go missing. Police assign a FBI agent to Kathleen. Agent frightens Kathleen by talking about the possibility of having her car bombed. Kathleen's political career is damaged.

00:12:32	 Her house is broken into and all of her work is laid along a path in her house to make it clear they could break into her house.In context, Feminist Legal Clinic is fired upon after St. Paul passes this same ordinance. Was invited to speak on women and the law conference, but she never received word because of her stolen mail. This results in damage to her reputation after she doesn't show up and they have to rearrange the conference

00:14:36	 The Cambridge professor turns out to have never been interested. Reporter shows up with a box of purported pornography and tries to get her to read it. Someone references Carla Levinski to try to get her to talk to them. 

00:16:27	 Circuit court rules that a similar Indianapolis law is unconstitutional. That combined with Kathleen's fear made her abandon it. Kathleen suspects Red Letter News. Says people can confirm parts of her story with Dick Wagner and Rebecca Burns. Question: Did it stop when you stopped pursuing this? Answer: No, still received letters telling her to never take it up again. Emphasizes that this is the short version, plenty of additional details. Example: story about being sent to speak and no one being there as a car speeds past to frighten her. 

00:20:52  	Discusses personal life, single because her girlfriend at the time thought she didn't have enough time for her. Suspects that her high level of lesbian visibility is an issue with some women she dates. Jonathan Becker, Wagner tells Kathleen to take Becker under her wing. Becomes good friends with Becker. Story about offering to have sex with him and his reaction. 

00:24:17	 Suddenly, reporters being thinking they are having sex together and start staking out their house. Connects story to earlier story of being fired as a nurse for being a lesbian. "only in Madison could it be a scandal for a single man and a single woman to see each other" They decide to have a child. She tells Wagner: "He dropped me like a rock" Suspects that it's because she became involved with a man as a lesbian. 

00:29:12	 Marries Becker to set up a legal structure for the child. Reporters are all over them. Started getting vile messages. People accuse her of "never being a real lesbian" She went to Marv Belosik (sp?) and gave him an exclusive to keep everyone else off of them so there would be no reporters at the wedding. 6 months pregnant at the wedding. Cute/Funny story about her son's conception, knows that it was on July 14th at 6pm. Talks about how one of them would need to move and since Kathleen's base was mad since there was "evidence I [Kathleen] had had at least one instance of intercourse with a man" Later they separate and Kathleen attempts to figure out the best time for them to divorce developmentally for their son. Kathleen is the president of the PTA. 

00:33:40	 Kathleen is asked back into politics to work for a school board campaign since she is the president of the PTA. After the campaign is over, she gets together with Melissa, the official's sister. "Passionate but extraordinary rocky relationship" Melissa now runs Kathleen Falks campaigns. They break up.

00:36:36	 "Then I went back into hiding" describes herself as a political junkie. Alex Olson, requests an interview for Alex and Martha Olson. Kathleen is called into to run her campaign. They lose against a closeted lesbian. This event bring Kathleen back into politics. Kathleen is approached to talk for the OutReach anniversary. Describes being touched by the event and the people that were there. 

00:41:51	 We discuss the possibility of including a tape of that night in the archives. No longer on Outreach board. 

00:43:22	 Interview concludes... discussion of the interviews. Discussion of domestic partners insurance. Reference to The Isthmus of that day with same picture of the Siegel statue that was discuss last interview. 

00:46:06	 Discusses differences between midwest and the coasts in their perception of gay rights laws. 

Interview ends