Page 8 - Fyne winter 2014

Every February, more and more schools,
libraries, art galleries and museums are
celebrating the contribution LGBT people
have made to science, arts and culture over
the centuries. The launch for next year’s
events will be held on Tuesday November
18th 2014 at the Museum of the Order of St
John, Clerkenwell.
As always, the launch will take place over a
full day; the morning given over to teaching
sessions with local school children, and an
evening showcase of speakers and performers
from 6.30 to 9pm. For the third year
running, History Month will have a ‘Face’ –
four Faces in fact, each representing the real
success of someone lesbian, gay, bisexual or
Trans. And there is a linking theme – ‘coded
lives’:
Anne Lister was Georgian landowner, who
kept coded diaries of her lesbian love-life. So
scandalous was the content that they were
hidden, bricked up and not discovered until
the 1930s.
Hugh Paddick and Kenneth Williams, two
gay actors, were household names in the
1960s, when they played the outrageously
camp out of work actors Julian and Sandy in
the radio show Round The Horne. Together
they gave away the secrets of Polari, a slang
dialect popular with gay men before ’67,
to the nation. And we loved them. 2015 is
both the 50th anniversary of Round The
Horne, and the centenary of Hugh Paddick.
Bona!
Mexican painter Frida Kahlo used her art to
illustrate the tortures of her mind and body
to the world. Throughout a stifling marriage
to fellow artist Diego Rivera she identified
sexually with women.
The fifth Face, is 18th century diplomat, spy
and swords-person The Chevalier d’Eon de
Beaumont, who worked for both the English
and French governments and who achieved
fame in both countries while spending the
latter half of his life dressed as a woman.
Fascinating lives. Fascinating stories. Stories
LGBT History Month believe children
should hear but currently do not. So LGBT
History Month has fully resourced inclusive
lesson plans available for free.
Every year has had a curriculum theme, be
it Music, the STEM subjects, or sport, so for
their anniversary year, what better area than
History? Our history as LGBT people – the
same-sex desire and gender variance that has
always existed, in all times and in all places,
but which has been suppressed, denied and
altered for just as long. We have a history
too!
LGBT History Month is an initiative set
up as part of their aim of making all schools
and other places of learning in the UK, safer
spaces for LGBT people, because despite the
February 2015 is the 10th
anniversary of Lesbian,
Gay, Bisexual and Trans
History Month
WINTER 2014
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