On the fifth floor of Alden Library, visitors passing by the Mahn Center for Archives and Special Collections see three glass cases containing old pamphlets, colorful flyers for events long passed and outdated newspaper articles. The torn-up pieces of a poster have been meticulously arranged for viewing. These documents are a small part of the history of the LGBTQIA+ rights movement in Athens.
The finalized “Out and Proud” exhibit will officially open on Feb. 18, OU’s annual Founders Day and the digital exhibit will be sent out in a newsletter. The digital exhibit can already be found on the Ohio University Libraries website.
Since 2009, OU Archives staff have made a Founders Day exhibit every year. Taylor Payne, a junior studying English, and Olivia Ondrik, a sophomore studying studio art, were interns last semester at the Mahn Center for Archives and Special Collections. They worked together to curate the 2025 Founders Day exhibit.
The exhibit was created out of collections donated by Rebecca Chmielewski, a 2018 graduate, Micah McCarey, the director of the Ohio University Pride Center and Mickey Hart, a former director of the center.
Payne and Ondrik said Miriam Intrator, the Head of the Mahn Center; Bill Kimok, the University Archivist; and Erin Wilson, the Digital Imaging Specialist & Lab Manager, were all a huge help in the curation of the exhibit.
A collage of posters is also displayed across from the cases; Kimok organized and hung them himself. The posters are a variety of textures, colors and content, which Kimok likes working with because of the story they tell and the simplicity of putting them together.
The team is still making small adjustments to the physical exhibit, such as matching blurbs to objects and adding a large visual timeline behind the cases. Kimok hopes the exhibit will be educational for students.
“They will walk away with a different appreciation of what’s happened here in the last 50 years,” he said.
There has been the presence of the LGBTQIA+ community in Athens since the 60s, though there are not many records from this time. Mickey Hart was the director of the Pride Center for decades, and he noticed a lack of Student Senate Lesbian Gay Bisexual Commission representation in the exhibit; the curators overlooked it due to the lack of documents about it.
There wasn’t an attempt to make support and acceptance widespread in Athens until the late 1970s. At the beginning of the movement, the United Campus Ministry did a lot to support the LGBTQ+ community, such as officially releasing a document stating their support in 1978. Later, in 1979, OU released an inter-office memo “affirming a policy of non-discrimination in regard to individual sexual orientation.”
Movements surrounding LGBTQIA+ rights are still prevalent today, and Ondrik and Payne have done archival research to analyze the contexts and history behind the modern movement.
“Based on everything we’ve seen from the late 90s/early 2000s, it doesn’t feel as radical,” Ondrik said. “Still so many rights are being threatened to be taken away from the LGBT community right now.”
Many LGBTQIA+ rights organizations have disbanded over the years, though the Swarm of Dykes and Lavender Menace still have a presence on campus.
“The cultural mindset that was changing is what allowed these groups to fizzle out, they didn’t feel the need to continue when you have this mask of safety around you,” Payne said. “Obviously, we’re seeing that being challenged right now.”
Although examining the history of these movements is vital to continuing advocacy, Kimok believes students must also look to the future.
“I think it’s up to younger generations to carry this on, and as long as they do, there’s always going to be a fight,” Kimok said.
