Title: The Trouble with Harry Hay - Founder of the Modern Gay Movement Author: Stuart Timmons Published by: Alyson Publications, 1990 ISBN: 1-55583-175-3 [hardcover, 305 pages]
He is known as the father of gay liberation. Harry Hay's complete biography sweeps through forty years of the gay movement and nearly eighty years of an uncompromising and original American life:1912: Harry Hay was born into an affluent family and began a childhood of privilege and adventure in England, Chile, and California.
1933: A bohemian Hollywood stage-acting career introduced Hay to the avant-garde art world and the shadowy gay life that surrounded it. His intimate relationship with actor Will Geer radicalized Hay and introduced him to agitprop theater.
1938: Dedicating his life to politics, Hay joined the Communist Party and married. He remained active in the Party throughout the 1940s and was eventually called before the House UnAmerican Activities Committee.
1950: With his lover Rudi Gernreich (who later achieved fame as the designer of the unisex look), Hay founded the Mattachine Society, the forerunner of today's gay movement. His marriage and party membership ended, but his life's work began.
1978: Dismayed by the assimilation of the gay movement, Hay helped found the Radical Faeries, a gay spiritual movement that seeks to "reject hetero-imitation" and redefine gay identity.
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