UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MADISON ARCHIVES
ORAL HISTORY PROGRAM

Interview #1110
HORNING, KATHLEEN T. (K.T.)

Horning, Kathleen T. (K.T.) (1956-)
Occupation: Librarian
At UW: Undergraduate, Graduate, and Director of Cooperative Children’s Book Center

Interviewed: 	November 8, 2010
Interviewer: 	Kelly Rupp
Index by: 	Kelly Rupp
Length: 	1 hour 17 minutes
Series: 	Madison’s LGBT Community, 1960s to present

Abstract: In her 2010 interview with Kelly Rupp, Kathleen T. Horning details her life in Madison during the time period between the 1950s and present. She also discusses the following topics: lesbianism, librarianship, and community outreach. This interview was conducted for inclusion into the project, Madison’s LGBT Community, 1960s-Present, part of the UW-Madison Oral History Program’s general collection.

Key Words: Madison (WI), lesbianism, lesbian family values, Madison Public Library, Children’s Cooperative Book Center, LGBT children’s books, Harriet the Spy, Harry Potter, And Tango Makes Three, transgender books, Herstory.

First Interview Session (November 8, 2010): Digital File

Time	Keywords
00:00:00	Start of Interview/Interviewer’s Introduction

00:00:52	Question:  How did you feel about people of the same sex during your teen or pre-teen years. Answer: Horning grew up in Des Moines Iowa in 1956. As early as 3-years-old she felt different from her progressive, liberal family. She thought there was a third gender, both a boy and a girl. Horning was interested in people who performed activities outside typical gender roles. She was never attracted to boys. 

00:05:10	[No question.] At ten or eleven, Horning experimented with cross-dressing in other neighborhoods. She didn’t wear a shirt so no one would suspect she was a girl. 

00:07:30	[No question.] Horning chose to go to UW-Madison as an undergraduate because of a UW alumnus woman who worked with her father. She was independent, single, and a successful career woman. Horning later learned she was a lesbian.

00:08:42	Question:  Talk more about dressing as a boy named Rodney. Answer: Horning realized she could pass as a boy, so she would go to a different neighborhood where she didn’t know any of the kids and flirt with the girls. She was worried she would have to pretend to be a man all of her life in order to be herself. She stopped dressing as Rodney because of developing breasts and no longer looking like a boy. Her parents did not know she would do this. 

00:13:55	Question:  Did your parents know you felt different than others? Answer: Horning came out to her mother when she was about 17. Her mother was not surprised. Both were accepting.

00:16:20	Question:  Coming out experience? Answer: Finding the gay community in Madison was important. She found a group of friends in the Lakeshore dorms on campus with whom she had similar interests. There weren’t community service agencies for LGBT people at the time. 

00:19:55	Question:  Did that community help you come out or did you come out before then? Answer: Horning came out to herself and family before then. During this time it was not typical to come out to friends. A Room of One’s Own bookstore was influential for having open lesbians who worked there and had gay resources.

00:22:15	Question:  When were you able to be more open, not secretive? Answer: Horning was in graduate school at UW-Madison and had a relationship with a woman who was very out. There were women’s dances and women’s music concerts. This was the early 80s and people were more open. Horning worked on a Herstory project for the NY Archives. There was not much about gays or lesbians in the press until the AIDS crisis started. 

00:25:16	Question: How did your family and friends react to you being a lesbian? Answer: Horning had a small family. Both they and friends reacted well to her coming out, no one changed their feelings for her. She had no negative experiences.

00:28:35	Question:  Did the open Madison community encourage you to stay in Madison Answer: No, she stayed for other reasons, mainly because she had health insurance.

00:30:05	Question:  Talk about the LGBT community in Madison. Answer: Horning participated in a book discussion group that read gay and lesbian books. The group facilitated discussion to understand each other’s perspectives on being gay. Gay men didn’t understand what was attractive to lesbians in other women. Lesbians wanted to know about camp culture.

00:36:10	[No question.] Horning identified with kids she saw working at the Madison Public Library. Kids would stand off to the side of a group and watch the other kids, trying to learn how to behave and fit in. Children at an early age feel different and continually read between the lines in everything they do. 

00:39:13	 [No question.] Books were important to Horning. As a child she saw a subtext in Harriet the Spy. Harry Potter had a gay subtext about children who felt like they didn’t fit in. 

00:42:55	Question:  What’s the role of the library for gay people and how has that changed? Answer: Books about gay and lesbian teens started in 1969. Picture books for children in gay families started in the early 80s, but has grown slowly. In the mid-80s it was controversial to have books for children with gay topics. There is still some resistance today.

00:49:38	[No question.] Horning worked for Madison Public Library (MPL) from about 1989 to 1999. There weren’t many picture books for kids with gay parents. Horning helped create a list of books that didn’t exclude gay and lesbian families. Some libraries have had LGBT literature challenged by the community, including And Tango Makes Three. 

00:56:05	Question:  What are “lesbian family values”? Answer: Respect for cultural diversity and different kinds of families. Children are encouraged to be independent. 

01:00:10	Question:  Recommending literature to kids or families at MPL? Answer: Horning did provide books for gay families, sometimes discreetly. Parents complained that they didn’t see themselves in the books. However, some families did not want their actual family photos displayed on picture boards in the library. One mother would not bring her daughter to story hour if the book being read talked about dads. She didn’t want her daughter to know that their family was “unusual.”

01:08:15	[No question.] There was a huge gap in books featuring transgender characters. At MPL, an 11-year-old boy asked Horning for nonfiction books about 16-18th century Scottish warfare. The boy was interested in cross dressing and wanted to see himself reflected in books by men who wear skirts.

01:16:49	End of First Interview Session

End of Oral History #1110