By Gretchen Webster

WESTPORT — When Westport Pride holds its third annual celebration on Sunday, June 4, the event will mark how far acceptance of the lesbian, gay, transgender, bisexual and queer community has come, where it is going and what remains to be done, according to Brian McGunagle, the group’s founder.

“We hope to see our community continue to gather in solidarity as well as in support of our LGBTQ residents, young adults and those within our greater community,” he said.

The celebration will feature speeches, performances, vendors and proclamations from town and state officials, attracting a diverse crowd from Westport and area communities. The event, open to the community, is scheduled from noon to 4 p.m. Sunday on Jesup Green downtown.

Westport Pride was born during the COVID-19 pandemic, McGunagle said, when most of the country was in lockdown. After asking himself, “What does the Westport LGBTQ community look like? What would we need as a group to identify needs for LGBTQ people?” he started organizing with others to help find answers to those questions.

The first Westport Pride meeting was held in January 2021 — on Zoom. Fifty people attended, and by the time the first Pride event was held in Westport the following June, a crowd of about 500 people turned out to celebrate on Jesup Green.

The organization may be relatively new, but Westport’s role as a gathering place for the gay community is not. 

For more than 70 years, ending in 2010, one of the nation’s oldest continuously operating gay bars — the Cedar Brook Café — attracted patrons from all over the area. “The Brook,” as it was known, stood at 919 Post Road East, now the location of Patio Inc.

Owned by Clem Bellairs during in its final years, the Brook closed after the landlord died and the property’s new owner doubled the rent, making it impossible for Bellairs to continue operations, according to reports in the Westport News at the time.

Four years later, the Westport Unitarian congregation produced a film of how it “became a welcoming congregation of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people,” news reports said.

Not much more is recorded about the history of Westport’s gay community. The Westport Museum for History and Culture and Westport Pride hope to remedy that by collaborating on  an oral history project called “LGBTQIA Stories.”

“We have virtually nothing” in historical records about the LGBTQ community in Westport, said Ramin Ganeshram, executive director of the museum.

“Historically … there are not a lot of archival records — written or oral — because of the history of criminality that was placed on the LGBTQ community,” she said. “In the past, homosexuality was illegal,” and people who were public about their sexual orientation could face discrimination and dangers.

The museum will collect personal LGBTQ stories during Pride month from individuals, couples and families. The stories will be transcribed and added to the museum’s digital collection. People interested in sharing their stories can sign up for a slot on the museum’s website.

“The goal is to create a public record,” Ganeshram said.

Even in recent years in Westport, the LGBTQ community has been targeted.

In 2021, rainbow balloons placed on lights along the Ruth Steinkraus Cohen Memorial Bridge over the Saugatuck River were vandalized, and some lights broken during observance of Westport’s first Pride week. Although a suspect was identified, no charges were filed, according to news reports.

But “the community came back in solidarity after the balloon vandalism,” McGunagle said.

Recent controversy about banning books with LGBTQ themes at the Staples High School library, as well as local incidents of racist vandalism, are described by McGunagle as partly the result of “the political scene on the national level … We see the same rhetoric as seen on TV in Florida, and other states — some of the national movements have come to town.”

This year, rainbow crosswalks have been installed temporarily at the intersection of Jesup Road and Taylor Place, with a plan to install them permanently in the future, if possible. Installation of the crosswalks, donated by Dr. Nikki Gorman, a Westport pediatrician, and her partner Galia Gichon, is an exciting project for Westport Pride, McGunagle said.

Dan Woog, a lifelong Westport resident who runs the “06880” blog and is a founding member of Westport Pride, agreed that the rainbow crosswalks are an important step for the group.

“It sends several messages — to kids out there who may be LGBTQ or questioning, that there are many people who are like them around and many people who support them.

“It sends that same message to those that may have two dads or two moms or a queer brother, friend or sister — it sends a broader message to the community that Westport is a diverse place,” he said.

McGunagle said he hopes the excitement and community connection forged with events such as Sunday’s Pride celebration, as well as related events during Pride month, the rainbow crosswalk and other activities, will help Westport be a town that accepts not just the LGBTQ community, but all people.

“I hope that people in town will really speak out … from the selectwomen’s office on down, we have to speak out about hate, otherwise Westport will be a town that proclaims those values but isn’t going to be behind those values,” he said. 

“We can show that we are a community that doesn’t tolerate hate and discrimination.”

The Westport Pride Celebration will take place Sunday, June 4, noon to 4 p.m., on Jesup Green. Rain location is Staples High School, 70 North Ave. For more information, visit the Westport Pride website.

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Freelance writer Gretchen Webster, a Fairfield County journalist and journalism teacher for many years, was editor of the Fairfield Minuteman newspaper for 10 years and teaches journalism at Southern Connecticut State University.