The Pink and the Blue: Lesbian and Gay Life at Yale and in Connecticut, 1642-2004, by Jonathan Ned Katz

Moving chronologically from early colonial laws to twentieth-century movement activism, this exhibit addresses LGBTQ+ people and politics in Connecticut, focusing especially on Yale University. The exhibit was originally presented in May 2004 with the sponsorship of the Larry Kramer Initiative for Lesbian and Gay Studies at Yale; it is now reproduced on OutHistory with no adjustments made to the original contents and only minimal adjustments made to the original design. The original exhibit was curated by Jonathan Ned Katz, with the research assistance of Brad Walkers and the website design work of Andrew Sloat. Republished with the assistance of Zach Greenberg on OutHistory in August 2026.

The Pink and the Blue: Table of Contents

Introduction
1. Colony of Connecticut Sodomy Law
2. William Plaine
3. New Haven Colony Sodomy Law
4. Albert Dodd
5. Addie Brown and Rebecca Primus
6. John Safford Fiske
7. John William Sterling and James Orville Bloss
8. "Smashing"
9. Earl Lind
10. Oscar Wilde
11. Mascolo V. Montesanto
12. Edgar Montillion (Monty) Woolley
13. Cole Porter
14. Female Impersonators at Yale
15. Ethel Dunham and Martha Eliot
16. Francis Otto Matthiessen and Russell Cheney
17. Thomas Painter
18. Harry Burnett, Richard Brandon, and Forman Brown
19. Donald Vining
20. Eric Bentley
21. Gertrude Stein
22. Alan Hart
23. Martin Duberman
24. Larry Kramer
25. Robert Giard
26. Paul Monette
27. Angela Joan Rubineau
28. Connecticut Repeals Sodomy Law
29. Yale Daily News
30. Women's Liberation Conference
31. Stuart Kellogg
32. First Yale Courses on Homosexuality
33. Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick
34. David W. Dunlap
35. Yale Women's Studies Initiated
36. John Boswell
37. Yale's First Gay and Lesbian Co-Op
38. First Gay/Lesbian Awareness Days
39. David Leavitt
40. Judith Butler
41. Yale Gay and Lesbian Alumni/ae
42. Bayard Rustin Arrested While Supporting Yale Strikers
43. Kris Franklin and Sarah Chinn
44. Lesbian and Gay Studies at Yale
45. Gay Male History in the Yale Daily News Magazine
46. The Yale Sexual Orientation Survey
47. The Wayne Dick Controversy
48. Wall Street Journal
49. Gay/Lesbian Studies Conference
50. Carl Van Vechten
51. New Haven Prohibits Discrimination Based on Sexual Orientation
52. AIDS Activists Protest on Yale Campus
53. Connecticut Passes Gay Rights Bill
54. The House of Safari Absolut
55. Cathy J. Cohen
56. The Murder of Matthew Shepard
57. Jewish LGBT Conference
58. Queer People of Color Conference
59. Derek Dorn
60. Founding the Larry Kramer Initiative
Acknowledgments