Love and death: The legacy of Congressional Cemetery's 'Gay Corner'

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Magazine

Love and death: The legacy of Congressional Cemetery’s ‘Gay Corner’



Leonard Matlovich’s headstone at Congressional Cemetery in Washington. His headstone reads: “When I was in the military they gave me a medal for killing two men and a discharge for loving one.” (Ricky Carioti/The Washington Post)

By Andrew L. Yarrow
August 16, 2021 at 9:00 a.m. EDT

CORRECTION

An earlier version of this story stated that Tip O’Neill was buried at Congressional Cemetery. That reference has since been deleted. He has a cenotaph at Congressional, but he is buried at Mount Pleasant Cemetery in Harwich Port on Cape Cod, Mass.

In a quiet neighborhood of Southeast Washington, Leonard Matlovich has been a persistent advocate for gay rights since the 1980s. Over the years, he has attracted dozens of followers who have gathered nearby. You won’t hear him on talk shows or see his byline on op-eds, though, because Matlovich passed away in 1988. Instead, he — or rather his tombstone — can be found in Congressional Cemetery, which claims to be the world’s only graveyard with an LGBTQ section.

So, why is Matlovich buried here — in a bucolic, 35-acre stretch of land near the Anacostia River and RFK Stadium — and why did “Gay Corner,” as some refer to it, develop under the cherry trees near his 6-by-8-foot granite grave marker? Part of the answer is a 10-second walk away: the fenced-in grave of the country’s most notorious homophobe, J. Edgar Hoover, and the pink granite gravestone of the longtime FBI director’s deputy, Clyde Tolson. “It was kind of a middle finger to Hoover,” says Paul Williams, the cemetery’s president.

For much of the mid-20th century, Hoover’s FBI bugged, harassed and attacked gays with the same vitriolic virulence that the agency used to go after civil rights leaders, antiwar activists, alleged communists and others deemed “deviant” threats to the nation. Hoover himself was, of course, believed to be gay — and Tolson was thought (though never proved) to have been his romantic partner — but don’t expect to hear about that if you visit the cemetery. “We got a cease-and-desist order” — from the now-defunct J. Edgar Hoover Foundation — “to stop our tour guides from suggesting this,” Williams says. Instead, guides simply tell visitors that the pair lived together, though they did have separate houses for the sake of appearances.

{snip}

The story behind Matlovich’s after-death protest has its roots in the mid-1970s, when he met the early gay rights activist Franklin Kameny — who in 1957 had been fired from the Army Map Service for being gay. Matlovich was a decorated Vietnam War veteran who had served in the Air Force for 12 years. A 1974 Air Force Times story reported that Kameny wanted to challenge the legality of the military’s ban on openly gay men. He was looking for “someone with a flawless record who the military doesn’t already know is gay, and who is ready to fight as a test case,” recalls Michael Bedwell, a friend of Matlovich’s and adviser to a project on gay history. “Leonard got Frank’s number and told him he fit his criteria.”

Matlovich came out with a flourish, appearing on the cover of Time magazine in September 1975, and five years of legal battles ensued. “Leonard loved the Air Force, but he felt that facts should prevail,” Bedwell says. That fall, Matlovich moved to G Street SE, across from the then-rundown cemetery, and he discovered that Walt Whitman’s lover, Peter Doyle, was buried there.

{snip}

Every June, up to 3,000 people gather at Gay Corner for the beginning of the Pride Run 5K; in the fall, the cemetery hosts a Veterans Day commemoration of gay service members. There has been talk of creating a national LGBTQ veterans monument at Congressional, where, for those dying to get in, a burial plot now runs up to $10,000. A much less financially and existentially costly option: free weekend walking tours where you can see for yourself that political activism in Washington never dies.

Andrew L. Yarrow — whose sixth book, “Look: How a Highly Influential Magazine Helped Define Mid-Twentieth-Century America,” will be published in the fall — is a former New York Times reporter and teaches at George Mason University.

[montanacowboy]

1. When I lived in DC

I walked my dogs at Congressional Cemetery. You paid a small fee and you could use it to let your dogs run. I always let my dogs pee on Hoover's grave. I remember those headstones. Used to hang out around John Phillip Sousa's grave, it was a nice spot.

[70sEraVet]

2. Thanks for the interesting story.

My hat's off to anyone who tried to stand up to the military homophobes in that era. I know that anyone who was perceived to be gay went through hell on a Navy ship in the 70's.