For alumni and friends
of the university
of the university
LGBTQIA+ @ Furman
Our new LGBTQIA+ @Furman timeline illustrates and celebrates the contributions, achievements and legacies our LGBTQIA+ community has made to enrich Furman’s institutional history. Browsers will find an assemblage of photographs, newspapers and periodical articles, and ephemeral materials by, for and about Furman’s queer community. It begins in the 1970s, when campus conversations and debates were taking place on the topic of homosexuality, and runs up to current events, such as last year’s May Experience Queer Histories (San Francisco) Study Away trip.
Through an interactive website, the Furman Libraries have documented important aspects of LGBTQIA+ lives and experiences on our campus. To capture the diversity of personal achievements and milestones, we arranged the timeline by using the resources in Special Collections and Archives and by consulting widely with faculty members in the Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies program.
We encourage our readers to think of this timeline as a loving space in which folks from all gender and sexual identities can celebrate the impact they have made and are presently making at Furman and in society at large. We hope this timeline will be a point to connect students and faculty, alumni, parents and friends with this part of Furman’s history and to help us all reflect on whose experiences are included and documented in our institutional memory – and whose experiences are still left out.
The launching of the site is timely, as we feel it is critical that we continue to support the present- day LGBTQIA+ community at Furman in the face of ongoing challenges to LGBTQIA+ rights, realities and representation.
Special thanks for the creation of this project go to Furman professors Nick Radel, Savita Nair and Scott Henderson, and the staff of the Digital Collections Center in the Libraries.
We recognize that this work is very much an ongoing project, and that alumni from many eras also have important stories to tell. If you have anecdotes, stories, documents or other points of interest that could add to this growing timeline, we welcome hearing from you. Please reach out and connect with us at nashieli.marcano@furman.edu or jeffrey.makala@furman.edu.
View the timeline at: BIT.LY/LGBTQIAtimeline
1970
Panelists at Furman Talk-A-Topic event discuss homosexuality.
“That homosexuality should be treated as an illness and not as a crime was the consensus expressed last Tuesday night in a Talk-A-Topic panel discussion on the general subject.”
(THE PALADIN, VOL. 55, NO. 19)
1974
1974
Robert McLane ’65 stars in ground-breaking film “A Very Natural Thing”
“A Very Natural Thing” was one of the first mainstream films to focus on same-sex relationships, centering on the lives and experiences of several gay men in New York and on Cape Cod in the post-Stonewall, pre-AIDS era.
1990
1990
Indigo Girls in concert at Furman
Sarah Worth ’92, far right, today a professor of philosophy at Furman, with the Indigo Girls
“We have been told that college is preparation for the ‘real world.’ But the real world is one where people have premarital sex, where people get sexually transmitted diseases and where people are dying from AIDS.”
EDITORIAL BOARD FOR THE PALADIN
1992
1992Professor Nick Radel, who serves as faculty advisor of Furman’s first gay group to form on campus, becomes the first openly gay faculty member.
1997
Friends of Lesbians and Gays group is excluded from Preview Day Fair.
“The admissions office decision not to allow student group Friends of Lesbians and Gays (FLAG) to participate in the prospective students’ activities fair . . . is seen by some as practical and by others as indicative of the university’s discrimination against the group.”
JODIE TILLMAN ’99 (THE PALADIN)
1998
1998Richard E. Prior, right, (d. 2010), an associate professor of classics (1994-2010), and Scott Henderson, left, a professor of education (1998-present), become the first openly gay couple to teach at Furman.
2001
Furman offers benefits to domestic partners.
“We want to ensure that all of our faculty and staff — and their families — have access to our benefits.”
PRESIDENT DAVID SHI (GREENVILLE NEWS ARTICLE)
2016
2016I AM FURMAN campaign launches.
“Relaunched in fall 2017, Furman’s Safe Zone Program helps ensure that there will be faculty and staff members across the university trained in providing non-judgmental support and guidance for students who want to explore issues about their sexuality or gender in a one-on-one environment.”
FURMAN’S SAFE ZONE
2018
Out at Furman is founded.
Furman’s LGBTQIA+ faculty and staff founded Out at Furman to represent a supportive community that celebrates the diversity of sexuality and gender expression found throughout campus.
2022
2022Furman awards first Bachelor of Arts degrees in Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies.
“My biggest approach to WGSS is recognizing that I don’t know everything and that things are far more complex than even I’ll understand.”
OLIVIA GLADD ’21 (FURMAN NEWS ARTICLE)
2023
2023Professors Nick Radel and Tuğçe Kayaal lead the Queer Histories (San Francisco) May Experience course.
2024
2024As of spring 2024, the Furman Pride Alliance has over 200 student members.