March 5, 1951 – April 17, 1996
Native Detroiter Floyd Dunn was a playwright, civil rights activist, and leader in the 1980s of the Detroit Coalition of Black Lesbians and Gays. Dunn later served as the founding director of the Black AIDS non-profit organization Project Survival and advocated for the inclusion of men and women of color in clinical trials. He died from AIDS-related complications at age 45.
No known obituary
October 2, 1956 – June 6, 1998
Timothy John Warady was born in Detroit and attended Lincoln Park High School. Diagnosed as HIV+ in the late 1980s, Warady became a tireless AIDS activist, volunteering and working with Friends Alliance, the NAMES Project, Wellness House, and other groups. He and his partner Robert Whitney shared a home in Lincoln Park. He died from AIDS-related complications at age 41.
April 5, 1934 – September 25, 2012
Mancelona resident Therese Marie Bluhm attended Detroit parochial schools, received her Bachelor’s at Marygrove College, and earned her Masters at the University of Detroit. After teaching public school she moved to Massachusetts in the early 1960s and had a 33-year career with the Silver Burdett Ginn textbook company. Bluhm was preceded in death by her beloved partner Elizabeth Houston.
February 2, 1944 – April 3, 1995
David John Zechel of Farmington Hills was born in Detroit and graduated from Edwin Denby High School in 1962. He went on to work as a noted local interior decorator. In the early 1970s, along with his then partner, Rev. Robert Cullinan, Zechel was an early member of the Metropolitan Community Church of Detroit. He died from AIDS-related complications at age 51.
Detroit Free Press, April 5, 1995
March 19, 1929 – February 17, 2020
Detroit native Susan Reeder Breuer graduated from Birmingham High School, studied at Northwestern University, was married, raised three children, and earned her Ph.D. in psychology before divorcing in the late 1970s. At her 40th high school reunion, Breuer became reacquainted Nancy Kasperzak and the two became life partners, settling In Benzie County. Kasperzak survived her by four days.
September 16, 1955 – April 19, 1993
Dallas Skeet Williams Jr., from Detroit, moved to San Francisco to live a more openly gay life. He worked as a nurse and a massage therapist and became involved in modeling, bodybuilding, doing drag, photography, and performing in adult videos. As a revolutionary HIV+ union activist, he protested with ACT UP and fought police brutality. Williams lost his life to diabetes.
April 22, 1955 – September 12, 1989
Kenneth John Kammann grew up on Detroit’s East Side and graduated in 1973 from Bishop Gallagher High School in Harper Woods. After attending Macomb Community College, Kallmann moved to San Francisco where he had a successful career in sales and co-founded the San Francisco Gay and Lesbian Chorus. He died from AIDS-related complications at age 34.
Detroit Free Press, September 16, 1989
October 28, 1941 – June 15, 2001
Sylvia Robinson moved to Detroit at age 10, attended Northwestern High School, and earned her MSW from Wayne State. In 1977, she was appointed liaison to the gay community for the city’s Human Rights Department. Robinson also co-founded the Detroit Coalition of Black Gays in 1979, served as education officer for the Michigan Organization for Human Rights, and later attended Full Truth Fellowship Church.
No known obituary
January 6, 1958 – August 16, 1993
Ernie Lee was born and grew up in Flint. He later moved to Dearborn, tended bar at the Hayloft Saloon and the Crystal Peacock in Detroit, and sang with the Detroit Together Men’s Chorus. With the death of his lover Jerry in 1989, Lee moved to Chicago, where he became active with the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power and lived with his companion Gregg. He died from AIDS-related complications at age 35.
March 13, 1931 – April 20, 2015
Marvin Phillip Marks of Southfield started his own accounting firm in the early 1960s. In the 1970s and 1980s, he held leadership positions in numerous local gay organizations, including Dignity/Detroit, the Motor City Business Forum, the Detroit Area Gay/Lesbian Council, the Forum Foundation, and Wellness Networks. Marks received the Lifetime Achievement Award at the annual Pride Banquet in 2009.
Michigan LGBTQ Remember 