Photo courtesy of Gary Rissman
In honor of LGBTQ+ Pride 2023, Fordham University Lincoln Center’s Quinn Library and NYPL Belmont Branch, in partnership with the Bronx County Historical Society, opened Have a Heart, an exhibit that celebrates Bronx-born Puerto Rican activist Jesús Lebrón and his central role in struggles for LGBTQ+ rights, including marriage equality.
Twenty years ago, in 2003, Jesús, with fellow activist and close friend, Brendan Fay, co-founded The Civil Marriage Trail Project, an organization that helped bring same-sex couples across borders for legal marriage. Among the couples were Edie Windsor (1929–2017) and Thea Spyer (1931–2009) who married in Toronto on May 22, 2007.
Pioneer Justice Harvey Brownstone, Canada’s first openly gay Judge, officiated. The Supreme Court case United States v. Windsor (2013) led to the overturning of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which authorized individual states to reject the legal status of same-sex marriages conducted elsewhere.
On June 20, 2023, Windsor and Syyer’s historic wedding (2003) and United States v. Windsor (2013) were commemorated as the City of New York honored the lesbian couple with a co-naming of the intersection of Fifth Avenue and Washington Square North as “Edie Windsor and Thea Spyer Way.”
Photo courtesy of Ray Hegarty
In eight panels as well as a display of posters, buttons, letters, and news clippings, the “Have a Heart” exhibit traces the life of Lebrón from his South Bronx childhood to his coming out experience, his living with HIV/AIDS, and his years of friendship and activism with Irish human rights advocate and filmmaker, Fay.
One of the panels on the movement for marriage equality includes the tribute by Windsor. “In 2003, [Brendan Fay] co- founded with his friend Jesús Lebron, The Civil Marriage Trail Project, bringing couples across borders for legal marriage. This incredibly enriched my life with Thea and ultimately enriched the lives of thousands of LGBT couples now and millions into the future,” Windsor wrote in 2014.
“Have a Heart” opened originally at Bronx Community College on National Coming Out Day, October 11, 2022, and consists of a selection from the Jesús Lebrón collection, donated last June to the Bronx County Historical Society. The papers document the important ways in which Jesús and his upbringing in the South Bronx inspired his spirit of activism and leadership within the marriage equality movement.
“Nothing can be more rewarding than having your community activism acknowledged and celebrated,” said Lebrón. “Steven Payne and The Bronx County Historical Society have made this possible with their generosity of spirit, sensitivity, and welcome in preserving my collection. The Bronx may have once been burning, but our determination to tell our stories in their rich and varied complexities are alive and well.”
Lebrón added, “Generations of LGBTQ+ and Boricua youth may find pride and comfort in knowing that, despite the hurdles brought on by poverty and discrimination, we can fight not only for ourselves but for our fellow brothers and sisters. I welcome this exhibit . . . with gratitude for family and for Brendan Fay who helped shape and share my life.”
Fay, who first met Lebrón at the historic Greenwich Village Oscar Wilde Memorial Bookshop in 1987, said the exhibit was viewed with keen interest by LGBTQ Catholic advocates participating in the Outreach 2023 International Conference at the Fordham Lincoln Center held June 16–18.
Photo courtesy of Brendan Fay
Fay, from Drogheda, Ireland, said, “The exhibit acknowledges the dedicated leadership of Jesús Lebrón in the grassroots movement for marriage equality and as these hard-won rights are threatened, awakens a call to action to make a difference for LGBTQ+ civil rights here and across the world.”
In a recent interview, Professor Karina Hogan, professor of theology, who arranged to bring the exhibit to the Lincoln Center campus said, “We owe a lot to these two guys, especially to Jesús Lebrón who was this kid who came out of poverty in the South Bronx. They had such a huge impact on American history, and nobody even knows about it.”
Meanwhile, Bronx County Historical Society director Dr. Steven Payne said of the exhibit, “With the Jesús Lebrón papers, the Bronx County Historical Society has acquired an archival treasure trove of tremendous relevance to scholars, activists, and community members interested in LGBTQ+ movements, marriage equality, Bronx activism, and much more. We look forward to collaborating further with the local community in highlighting Bronx LGBTQ+ history.”
Fay added, “The exhibit title “Have a Heart” gets it right by highlighting Jesús’s friendship and activism. With Jesús Lebrón, I found a friendship that became a transformative tenderness, sustaining our activism through the years. In the midst of the AIDS crisis and anti-LGBT violence and prejudice, with Jesús, I found a friendship that was an emotional bonding of solidarity in shared resisting and rising from our silences and our second-class status.”
William Lebron, Sr., photographer, from the Jesús Lebrón papers, The Bronx County Archives
He continued, “Ours was a journey in recovering dignity denied to us and finding for ourselves and our LGBTQ community a liberation from shame and a freedom to live and to love. I hope that the “Have a Heart” exhibit, telling Jesús’s story of survival, activism, resistance, and hope, inspires a new generation of LGBTQ+ youth in The Bronx and across the city, to live their lives out loud and become passionate and engaged makers of history.”
Payne concluded, “This exhibit is not just a moving story of a Bronx Puerto Rican gay activist. It holds resonance today, when a multitude of hard-won human rights, including marriage equality, are threatened or outright discarded in the U.S.”
EXHIBIT INFORMATION
Title: “Have a Heart: Friendship & Activism of Jesús Lebrón”
On display at the following locations:
New York Public Library, Belmont Branch
Fordham University, Quinn Library, Lincoln Center
admin
Welcome to the Norwood News, a bi-weekly community newspaper that primarily serves the northwest Bronx communities of Norwood, Bedford Park, Fordham and University Heights. Through our Breaking Bronx blog, we focus on news and information for those neighborhoods, but aim to cover as much Bronx-related news as possible. Founded in 1988 by Mosholu Preservation Corporation, a not-for-profit affiliate of Montefiore Medical Center, the Norwood News began as a monthly and grew to a bi-weekly in 1994. In September 2003 the paper expanded to cover University Heights and now covers all the neighborhoods of Community District 7. The Norwood News exists to foster communication among citizens and organizations and to be a tool for neighborhood development efforts. The Norwood News runs the Bronx Youth Journalism Heard, a journalism training program for Bronx high school students. As you navigate this website, please let us know if you discover any glitches or if you have any suggestions. We’d love to hear from you. You can send e-mails to norwoodnews@norwoodnews.org or call us anytime (718) 324-4998.
English
Arabic
Bengali
Chinese (Simplified)
French
Spanish