Houston Gay Political Caucus
aka: Gay & Lesbian Political Caucus (1987)
GLBT Political Caucus (July 1999)

GPC logos, 1979 & February 1982

1982

Click for this excellent 1982 article from the Montrose Voice,
telling of the workings of the GPC mailing list
Montrose Voice-022682

part of GPC Pride float, 1982
and, below, photo by Joe Watts

Towards the end of 1982 there was unrest among some members of the Gay Policital Caucus,
that lasted a couple years. Enough unrest so that a coalition was formed to try to change the
direction of the Caucus, seeminly spearheaded by Neil Isbin and Gregg Russell. Both were not
strangers to controversy, being frequent writers of letters to the editor of TWT and Houston gay
publications. Russell was even expelled from the Caucus in September 1985.

As for Isbin, he was a tireless activist and writer, and after graduating from Rice University
(Electrical Engineering) he moved to New Mexico to work for Sperry Flight Systems, and
continued his activism in NM. His extensive papers (21 boxes) are on file at the New Mexico
History Museum in Santa Fe. A search on this site's search engine of both of their names
would provide more background.

From a file at the Botts Collection are 58 pages of correspondence of the Ad Hoc Committee.
All this activity was fairly behind the scenes, though they had their own stationary. Also, for
example, there was no mention at the time in the local press. This was by design. It seems a
major goal was to influence the upcoming February 1982 Caucus Board elections. There was
no clear recap document to gauge how well the committee did with their goals.

Download the File

This is the membership card for Scott Tillinghast, and actually,
I do not know its year, only that it had to be prior to 1988,
when GPC became GLPC. Scott was a long-time member
and was on the Board in 1978 and at one time also was Treasurer.