July 3rd

07-03-1901 – 12-10-1970 Thelma Ellen Wood – Born in Kansas and raised in St. Louis Missouri. She was an American sculptor. Although she always considered herself a sculptor, she is better known for her lesbian relationships with other famous women of her time. Her drawings were exhibited at least once, at Milch Galleries in NYC in 1931. Her sketchbook from a trip to Berlin is at the Univ. of Maryland, College Park. Women she had affairs with include Berenice Abbott, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Djuna Barnes, Henriette McCrea Metcalf, and Margaret Behrens (a wealthy realtor and antique dealer).

07-03-1931 – 09-18-2002 Andreas Burnier (born Catharina Dessaur) – Born in Den Haag, Netherlands. She was a Dutch writer. Much of her poetry, lectures, books, and articles address homosexuality. She also was a feminist and addressed women’s problems in a male-dominated society. She was Jewish and like many Jewish children in Europe, she went into hiding during WWII and was separated from her parents for three years (1942-1945). She hid under the alias of Ronnie van Dijk and became aware of the lack of women’s rights. She also felt like she was a boy trapped in a girl’s body. She did marry and had two children. After the war, she received her Ph.D. in criminology. During the time she was getting her Ph.D., she met her first female romantic partner; they were together for seventeen years. Burnier was a criminology professor at the University of Nijmegen from 1973 to 1988. In 1965, she published her first novel, A Contented Laugh. In it, she wrote about her lesbianism, a first in Dutch literature. In 1983, she had a relationship with Ineke van Mourik. Burnier was an outspoken defender of gay rights. She died in Amsterdam at the age of seventy-one.

07-03-1974   Taiga Ishikawa – Born in Toshima, Tokyo, Japan. He is a Japanese politician and LGBT activist. In April 2011, he was one of two openly gay men to win an election. It was a first in Japanese history. Ishikawa came out in 2002 through his memoir, Where is My Boyfriend? (Boku no kareshi wa doko ni iru?). He has also participated in the Toyko Pride Parade. 

07-03-1948 Rich Gordon – Born in San Mateo County, California. He is a member of the California State Assembly from the 24th district. Gordon is openly gay. His spouse of more than 26 years is Dr. Dennis McShane. The couple was married on August 16, 2008, during the brief window of legal same-sex marriage in California that ended with the passage of Proposition 8 on November 2008. He is one of eight members of the California Legislative LGBT Caucus, which he chairs.