Lige Clarke

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Lige Clarke
Lige Clarke.jpg
Clarke in 1972
BornFebruary 22, 1942
DiedFebruary 10, 1975
Veracruz, Mexico
OccupationActivist, author
Spouse(s)Jack Nichols (partner)

Elijah Hadyn "Lige" Clarke (February 22, 1942 − February 10, 1975) was an American LGBT activist, journalist and author. He was the author of two books with his lover, Jack Nichols.

Early life[]

Clarke was born on February 22, 1942, in Knott County, Kentucky.[1]

Career[]

By the early 1960s, Clarke worked for the United States Department of Defense in Washington, D.C.[2] He held "a host of security clearances."[3]

Clarke and Nichols created and wrote "The Homosexual Citizen" as a continuation to their original column written for The Mattachine Review beginning around 1965. It was published in Screw magazine.[2] It was the first regular LGBT-interest column printed in a non-LGBT publication. By 1972, they edited "Gay",[2] the first weekly national homosexual magazine.

Clarke and Nichols authored two books about same-sex attraction.

Personal life and death[]

Clarke met Jack Nichols in the early 1960s in Washington, D.C.[2] They became lovers.[2]

Clarke died on February 10, 1975 in Veracruz. For Nichols, Clarke was "murdered" in "a hail of gunfire at a mysterious roadblock."[4]

He is buried in Hindman, Kentucky.[5]

Selected works[]

  • Clarke, Lige; Nichols, Jack (1972). I Have More Fun With You Than Anybody. New York: St Martin's Press. ISBN 9780900997907. OCLC 993400702.
  • Clarke, Lige; Nichols, Jack (1974). Roommates Can't Always Be Lovers: An Intimate Guide to Male-male Relationships. New York: St. Martin's Press. OCLC 1054028.

References[]

  1. ^ "Elijah Hadyn "Lige" Clarke". findagrave.com. Retrieved 2019-03-02.
  2. ^ a b c d e Byrnes, Ronald (August 6, 1972). "The 'gay' world in sunshine and in shadow". Star Tribune. Minneapolis, Minnesota. p. 62. Retrieved July 31, 2018 – via Newspapers.com.
  3. ^ Johnson, David K. (Fall 1994). ""Homosexual Citizens": Washington's Gay Community Confronts the Civil Service". Washington History. 6 (2): 58. JSTOR 40073414.
  4. ^ Nichols, Jack (1996). The Gay Agenda: Talking Back to the Fundamentalists. Amherst, New York: Prometheus Books. p. 191. ISBN 9781573921039. OCLC 260011378.
  5. ^ "Find a grave".

Coleman, Jonathan. "'Old Kentucky Homo': Lige Clarke's Gay Liberation." The Register of the Kentucky Historical Society, Vol. 118, No. 1 (Winter 2020). https://muse.jhu.edu/article/772266

Further reading[]

  • Bullough, Vern L. (2002). Before Stonewall: Activists for Gay and Lesbian Rights in Historical Context. Routledge. ISBN 1-56023-193-9.
  • Coleman, Jonathan. "'Old Kentucky Homo': Lige Clarke's Gay Liberation." The Register of the Kentucky Historical Society, Vol. 118, No. 1 (Winter 2020). https://muse.jhu.edu/article/772266

External links[]

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