Dates of birth and death uncertain
Stephen Franklin held retail jobs at Silverman’s and National T-Shirt. As manager of Bonnie and Clyde’s disco, he testified before the Lansing City Council in 1980 about police harassment of gay men at the nightclub. He later migrated to Texas. He died of complications from AIDS.
No known obituary.
July 10, 1961 – December 13, 1985
Raised in the small town of Ossineke, Roy Reinholz graduated from Alpena High School in 1980, earned his B.A. from James Madison College at Michigan State University in 1983, and later attended Hunter City College in New York. He died of complications from AIDS at age 24.
Alpena News, December 14, 1985
January 3, 1957 – January 15, 1986
James G. Dawson earned a B.A. in English in 1979 from Michigan State University, where his poetry was published in the Red Cedar Review. He died of complications from AIDS at age 29.
Chicago Tribune, January 17, 1986
February 25, 1954 – May 4, 1985
Rick Rapaport worked as a janitor, gas station attendant, cab driver, waiter, cook, bus driver, and for two years as wrestling coach at the Michigan School for the Blind. After dropping out of the University of Michigan in 1974, he visited 45 states and crossed the U.S. fifteen times, returning to school to finish his B.A. at Michigan State University in 1982 with a degree in journalism. He died of complications from AIDS at age 31.
Lansing State Journal, May 6, 1985
April 21, 1958 – December 10, 2015
A Saginaw native, Melinda “Bones” Rea worked as a security guard for Courtland Center in Flint and with the Genesee County Department of Parks and Recreation. She later had am eleven-year career with the Genesee Schools.
January 18, 1954 – December 3, 2013
Born in Detroit, Janice Zygmontowicz moved to Mt. Pleasant in the 1970s to attend Central Michigan University, where she earned four varsity letters, and played for the championship field hockey team. She worked as an electrician at CMU and later earned a Master’s degree in counseling and became an outpatient therapist.
September 17, 1932 – June 23, 2010
A native of Ypsilanti, Donald Hazlett served in the U.S. Air Force in the early 1950s. Hazlett later operated Don’s Beef N Ale in Detroit and with Paul Espenscheid co-owned Menjo’s during the 1990s. He and Espenscheid shared the Lifetime Achievement Award presented at the 1994 Detroit area Pride Banquet.
July 24, 1967 – January 28, 1991
Michael LaGatella graduated from Lincoln High School in Warren and tended bar at the Woodward in Detroit while attending Wayne State University. After he took his own life, LaGatella’s friends established a scholarship in his name for gay and lesbian students at Wayne.
Wayne State Celebrates 20th Anniversary of LaGatella Scholarship
July 24, 1953 – July 18, 2010
Grosse Pointe resident Marcia Elise Baker earned her doctor of osteopathy at the University of Health Sciences in Kansas City, Missouri. Specializing in internal medicine, she was later on staff at Mt. Clemens Regional Medical Center. She was survived by Dr. Claudia Osborn, her life partner of 25 years.
Grosse Pointe News, July 29, 2010
September 11, 1957 – March 18, 2014
A native of the small town of Wakefield and a graduate of Gogebic Community College, Lucia Patritto served in the 1980s as executive director of DOVE, a domestic violence service agency. She later became Michigan State University extension director for the western counties of the Upper Peninsula.
Michigan LGBTQ Remember 