The Hidden History of Gay Washington

Washington, D.C., has always been a city of secrets. Few have been more dramatic than the ones revealed in this lecture, by James Kirchick, author of Secret City, The Hidden History of Gay Washington.

For decades, the specter of homosexuality haunted Washington. As America entered the Second World War and assumed the responsibilities of a global superpower, a culture of secrecy descended over the nation’s capital and with it, a fear of those who harbored the most dangerous secret of all. In the Cold War that followed, what one powerful senator referred to as the “offense too loathsome to mention” paradoxically assumed an enormous, terrifying power, triggering a wholesale purge of gay men and lesbians from the federal government. Nothing posed a more potent risk to a political career or exerted a more fearsome grip over the city’s psyche — not even the threat of communism — than “sexual deviancy.”

In this wide-ranging talk, author James Kirchick explains the many fascinating ways in which fear of gay people impacted American politics over the course of the 20th century. From the corridors of power in the White House to Washington’s hidden sites of forbidden sex, from the glittering Georgetown social circuit to the devastation wrought by AIDS, and from the first political “outing” in 1942 to the election of openly gay men and women to Congress, Kirchick weaves political, social and cultural history together into an illuminating presentation that opens our nation’s closet door.

Purchase Secret City, The Hidden History of Gay Washington

This course will take place on Tuesday, June 28 from 7-8 pm ET. Class will take place live online with an opportunity to interact with the instructor and be recorded for later viewing by patrons.