PROOF IT GETS BETTER! BEYOND NORMAL: The Birth of Gay Pride, Now an iBOOK, eBOOK, and a PAPERBACK! Groundbreaking Memoir by Gale Chester Whittington: TRUE BEGINNING OF GAY LIBERATION SAN FRANCISCO 1969.
January 12, 2011I am proud to announce that my historical, triumphant, and humorous memoir BEYOND NORMAL: The Birth of Gay Pride is finally available as an iBook, a paperback, and an eBook! It can be purchased online at Booklocker.com (where three sample chapters can be previewed for free), Amazon, and Barnes and Noble, and it has been uploaded to the iBookstore. It can also be ordered from any brick and mortar store where books are sold via ISBN #978-1-60910-597-6. Ten years in the works, my autobiography about the true beginning of the militant Gay Liberation movement in 1969 San Francisco, contains over forty-five vintage photographs of brave activists fighting for equal rights at a time when homosexuality was still considered a mental illness by most of the world!
(UPDATE: Excellent news! My memoir BEYOND NORMAL: The Birth of Gay Pride has been named as a finalist for the prestigious 23rd Annual Lambda Literary Awards! http://www.lambdaliterary.org/awards/2011-finalists/ Results in New York City on May 26, 2011: http://www.lambdaliterary.org/awards/
And check it out! The San Francisco Examiner recommended my book in their Sunday Edition on January 16, 2011!
"Something to read
Beyond Normal
By Gale Chester Whittington ($17.95)
Subtitled 'The Birth of Gay Pride,' the memoir by an activist and journalist brings to light details of the militant, pre-Stonewall gay liberation movement in San Francisco in 1969.")
Image of author Gale Chester Whittington from the back cover of the book BEYOND NORMAL: The Birth of Gay Pride. Taken at the business he later owned for 28 years, the popular Colorado Seed and Pet, 8 Broadway, Denver, Colorado, circa 1998
Pre-Stonewall, Gale Chester Whittington’s historical memoir traces the 1969 gay civil rights movement as it unfolds through the eyes of an idealistic and romantic young man fresh from Denver. His group’s groundbreaking openly gay philosophy—coming out en masse as a way to enlighten and change the world—leads his comrades to crown him the “Rosa Parks of Gay Liberation” and “Gale the Liberator.”
“In late March (1969), States Line fired a young man named Gale Whittington simply because he was gay. This act spawned the first gay liberation organization in San Francisco, the Committee for Homosexual Freedom”—Charles Thorpe Archival Collections at the GLBT (Gay Lesbian Bisexual and Transgender) Historical Society of San Francisco in California
“(B)esides holding indisputable claim to the foundation of the old American homophile movement, the West Coast can with some justification date gay lib from the creation of its CHF (Committee for Homosexual Freedom), spring 1969, not from the Stonewall riots in June.”—The GAY MILITANTS by Donn Teal
“In the (picketing) process, the first...and...most productive...gay liberation group in the (San Francisco) Bay Area, the Committee for Homosexual Freedom (CHF) began to grasp what it might be like to live openly homosexual lives and to sense the tremendous potential for social change their new movement had begun to tap.”—Gay by the Bay, A History of Queer Culture in the San Francisco Bay Area by Susan Stryker and Jim Van Buskirk
"By far the most valuable aspect of BEYOND NORMAL and the one that drew me in as a reader was the personal account...Mr. Whittington had the good luck of living through interesting times and his perspective as a participant observer makes for a fun and fascinating read...Lots of material!"—Terence Kissack, Executive Director of the GLBT Historical Society in San Francisco
“I think BEYOND NORMAL is a good book and will add to the history of the gay movement.”—Vern Bullough, author of Before Stonewall: Activists for Gay and Lesbian Rights in Historical Context
"Something to read
Beyond Normal
By Gale Chester Whittington ($17.95)
Subtitled 'The Birth of Gay Pride,' the memoir by an activist and journalist brings to light details of the militant, pre-Stonewall gay liberation movement in San Francisco in 1969.")
Photo of the April 1969 Vector magazine showing author Gale Chester Whittington on the cover. Vector was the official mouthpiece of the Society for Individual Rights (SIR) and this revolutionary issue contained articles written by Leo E. Laurence and Gale. Just one of many historical images in BEYOND NORMAL: The Birth of Gay Pride.
I wrote this book to set the record straight, because little about the pre-Stonewall militant gay movement in the San Francisco Bay Area has been detailed in print. While many brave activists have contributed to the cause before and since, a close look shows how the militant side of Gay Liberation actually began within the bowels of San Francisco a few months before the New York Stonewall uprising.
Photo used for the cover of BEYOND NORMAL: The Birth of Gay Pride, showing author Gale Chester Whittington and members of the Committee for Homosexual Freedom (CHF) picketing States Steamship Company (a.k.a. States Line), the San Francisco firm that fired Gale for being openly gay, in early April of 1969, three months before Stonewall. One of over forty-five historical images in the book. Picture courtesy of Marsha-Ann Woof Sebay-Hill.
The concept of coming out en masse as a way to enlighten and change the world was born in the hilly streets of the City by the Bay and championed by Gale Whittington and Leo E. Laurence, co-founders of the Committee for Homosexual Freedom (CHF). Indeed, the facts in this book show how a handful of fiery West Coast gay guerillas fanned the sparks that helped inspire participants at Stonewall to stand and fight openly for their rights, thereby passing along a torch that would ignite the movement to liberate gays and enlighten heterosexuals in countries everywhere!
Image of the back cover of the book BEYOND NORMAL: The Birth of Gay Pride by Gale Chester Whittington
My triumphant memoir chronicles my teenage suicide attempt and then moves on to the real beginning of the Gay Liberation movement, pre-Stonewall, in 1969 San Francisco, where I was fired for being openly gay. It’s creative non-fiction, written like a novel, with a conservative alter-ego’s thoughts inserted to keep it lively. CHF’s groundbreaking openly gay philosophy—coming out en masse as a way to enlighten and change the world—lead my comrades to crown me “Gale the Liberator.”
Image of author Gale Chester Whittington from the back cover of the book BEYOND NORMAL: The Birth of Gay Pride. Taken at the business he later owned for 28 years, the popular Colorado Seed and Pet, 8 Broadway, Denver, Colorado, circa 1998Quotes related to BEYOND NORMAL: The Birth of Gay Pride
Pre-Stonewall, Gale Chester Whittington’s historical memoir traces the 1969 gay civil rights movement as it unfolds through the eyes of an idealistic and romantic young man fresh from Denver. His group’s groundbreaking openly gay philosophy—coming out en masse as a way to enlighten and change the world—leads his comrades to crown him the “Rosa Parks of Gay Liberation” and “Gale the Liberator.”
“In late March (1969), States Line fired a young man named Gale Whittington simply because he was gay. This act spawned the first gay liberation organization in San Francisco, the Committee for Homosexual Freedom”—Charles Thorpe Archival Collections at the GLBT (Gay Lesbian Bisexual and Transgender) Historical Society of San Francisco in California
“(B)esides holding indisputable claim to the foundation of the old American homophile movement, the West Coast can with some justification date gay lib from the creation of its CHF (Committee for Homosexual Freedom), spring 1969, not from the Stonewall riots in June.”—The GAY MILITANTS by Donn Teal
“In the (picketing) process, the first...and...most productive...gay liberation group in the (San Francisco) Bay Area, the Committee for Homosexual Freedom (CHF) began to grasp what it might be like to live openly homosexual lives and to sense the tremendous potential for social change their new movement had begun to tap.”—Gay by the Bay, A History of Queer Culture in the San Francisco Bay Area by Susan Stryker and Jim Van Buskirk
"By far the most valuable aspect of BEYOND NORMAL and the one that drew me in as a reader was the personal account...Mr. Whittington had the good luck of living through interesting times and his perspective as a participant observer makes for a fun and fascinating read...Lots of material!"—Terence Kissack, Executive Director of the GLBT Historical Society in San Francisco
“I think BEYOND NORMAL is a good book and will add to the history of the gay movement.”—Vern Bullough, author of Before Stonewall: Activists for Gay and Lesbian Rights in Historical Context
The author is available for questions and/or interviews 24/7. If you are a legitimate journalist who wants to review the book, please contact me here for more information and a complimentary copy to review.
As a footnote, I wrote for underground newspapers, including the Berkeley Barb and the Berkeley Tribe, as well as San Francisco's Vector Magazine in the late sixties during my fight for gay rights. Before that, I was Feature Editor of my high school newspaper, The Ramrod, three years in a row. After owning a popular Denver pet store (Colorado Seed & Pet) for 28 years, I returned to writing full time in 2000. I have since received numerous awards for my novels, memoirs, poems, short stories, and essays, including six from the prestigious Oklahoma Writer’s Federation, Inc. (OWFI) and one from Writers Digest. Visit my Official Author Website at http://www.galechesterwhittington.com for more info and photos.
Photo of Crimson Cascade Weeping Ornamental Peach Tree blossom growing in Oklahoma's Zone 7 from the author's free flower photo website http://www.freefishcaretips.com/
Also visit http://www.galechesterwhittington.com for free humor, short stories, poems, and book excerpts from the award-winning gay author
==copyright 2011==
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