August 3, 1926 – December 26, 2013
Detroit native Neva Weidig graduated from Denby High School in 1944 and earned her Bachelor’s from Heidelberg University in 1949. She was a Girl Scout troop leader and was employed with Kmart corporate headquarters. Weidig shared a home in Royal Oak with her partner of 45 years Dianne Chapman.
January 16, 1927 – March 31, 2002
Born in Royston, Georgia, Sally Mae McCoy moved to Detroit following World War II and attended Fleming Beauty School in the 1950s. In addition to teaching cosmetology and operating a hair care business, she worked for 20 years as a custodian with the Detroit Public Schools. Rev. Renee McCoy was among her five children.
November 13, 1943 – August 15, 2003
Flat Rock High School graduate Dianne Hasty was a founding member of Lesbian-A-Sisters, past president of the Detroit Cocker Spaniel Club, and served on the board for the Metropolitan Community Church of Detroit. Before her retirement in 1987, she was systems manager of radiology at Oakwood Heritage Hospital. She and her partner Tina Gorzenski relocated to Pellston in 2000.
Detroit News, September 3, 2003
Between The Lines, September 25, 2003
Lesbian Connection, January/February 2004
October 9, 1955 – October 13, 1992
Alvin Keith Foster grew up in Taylor and Romulus, attending Christian schools before landing a job as an upholsterer for General Motors. After taking classes in floral design, he began working for Flowers by Sandino in Redford Township. In 1989, with Sandino Ciccarelli, Foster opened the Timesquare dance club in downtown Detroit. He died from AIDS-related complications at age 37.
January 27, 1958 – June 16, 2015
A Lincoln Park resident and New Jersey native, Grace McClelland worked for two decades in the non-profit sector before being tapped, in 2003, as first executive director of Ruth Ellis Center for LGBT youth in Metro Detroit. Following her departure from REC in 2009, she began her own consulting firm, Liberation Consulting.
March 10, 1962 – July 11, 2006
Douglas McIntosh earned a B.S. in architecture from the University of Michigan in 1984 and a Masters from Yale in 1990. Three years later, he co-founded McIntosh Poris Associates in Birmingham and soon became a central voice for historic preservation. McIntosh served as president of Preservation Wayne and, with his life partner Scotty James, restored the 1896 Julius Melchers home in Detroit’s West Village.
April 22, 1925 – January 27, 2002
A native of Pennsylvania, Mabel “Billie” Hill moved to Detroit in her youth and discovered Detroit’s gay bar scene while working in an auto factory during World War II. She later owned an antiques business with her then-partner Rose Bonham. A longtime member of the Metropolitan Church of Detroit, Hill tended the door at the Underground and, as a lesbian senior, was profiled in the Detroit News.
October 12, 1961 – November 19, 2013
Madison Heights High School grad Cheri Jo Fiebig performed for more than 30 years as a male impersonator, appearing at the State Bar in Flint, Silent Legacy in Inkster, and other bars in Metro Detroit in the 1980s and ‘90s. She was featured on such local TV shows as Good Morning Detroit and Kelly & Company. Fiebig later relocated to Nashville, Tennessee and died from lung cancer at age 52.
September 2, 1943 – November 24, 2015
Born in Pontiac, Randell “Randy” French served in the U.S. Army during the Vietnam War, worked at the GM V-8 Engine Plant in Flint, and belonged to the Masonic Lodge in Ortonville. For a time, he also tended bar at the Interchange and other Detroit gay nightspots.
August 15, 1914 – December 23, 1985
A native of Charleston, South Carolina, Leon Alfred DeMeunier grew up in Detroit and earned a degree in business administration from the University of Detroit, after which he operated his own tax and accounting service. He chaired the Detroit Congress of Racial Equality in the early 1960s and was active in the early gay organization ONE in Detroit.
No known obituary
Michigan LGBTQ Remember 