Introduction
Richard Lamar Schlegel was born in 1927 in the humble borough of Berrysburg, located near Harrisburg, the state capital of Pennsylvania. He was the only child of Roy Schlegel, who was a construction worker, prison guard, and steelworker, and Margaret Deibler Schlegel, who was a schoolteacher and homemaker. A native of central Pennsylvania, he bounced around several small towns in that region during his youth and stayed local for his undergraduate degree at Penn State University in the nearby borough of State College. Two years into his undergraduate career, Schlegel was drafted into the Army Air Corps, where he served for eighteen months until 1949. After returning from military service and completing an undergraduate degree in Political Science at Penn State and a graduate degree in Political Science and Public Administration at American University, Schlegel returned to the military, serving as a civil servant for the U.S. Federal Civil Aeronautics Administration (FCAA) from 1951 to 1955 in Washington D.C.
From 1955 to 1958, Schlegel worked as a civil servant in the Federal Civil Defense Administration (FCDA) in Battle Creek, Michigan. He later took a civilian position with the Department of the Army based in Honolulu, Hawaii. U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy’s campaign of terror against gays and lesbians in the federal government, now labeled the Lavender Scare, meant that federal employees suspected of participating in gay activities were subject to intense scrutiny. Even as the government ruthlessly removed gays and lesbians from their positions, Schlegel earned several promotions and received progressively higher levels of security clearances along the way. In 1959, a failed attempt to remove Schlegel for alleged involvement with another man rattled him and foreshadowed the professional consequences that his sexuality would bring. When he sought top-secret security clearance in 1961, Army investigators uncovered three male soldiers who confessed to having had sexual relations with Schlegel, along with allegations that he had gay friends and had attended a gay party in Hawaii. This evidence proved too much for the Army, and Schlegel was removed from the civil service for “immoral and indecent conduct” in 1961.
With limited legal protections for people identified as gay, Schlegel exhausted federal administrative appeals before filing a wrongful termination suit with the United States Court of Federal Claims in 1963. He sought reinstatement and backpay, declaring that the charge of "immoral and indecent conduct" was unconstitutionally vague and asserting that his private life did not impact his ability to serve. Despite his willful journey through the federal courts, a panel of seven judges ruled against him, deciding that Schlegel’s “immoral” private life compromised his government position. In 1969, with the help of American Civil Liberties Union lawyers, Schlegel petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to hear his appeal, casting it as a pivotal civil rights lawsuit and only the second of its kind to be attempted. While the Court unanimously refused to hear his case and he failed to regain his position, Schlegel v. The United States is considered an early landmark case in the American gay rights movement.
Effectively barred from federal government jobs after 1961, Schlegel became the finance director of the Pennsylvania Department of Highways from 1963 to 1965. Unfortunately, the government’s witch hunt followed him in this role, and when his superiors learned that he was gay and active in the homophile movement, Schlegel was forced to resign.
As he faced setbacks in his professional career, his involvement as a gay activist and in early homophile organizations was just beginning. In 1963, Schlegel became an active member of the Janus Society, an early homophile group based in Philadelphia, subsequently founding the first Janus Society chapter in central Pennsylvania. He also became involved with several gay publications and publishers, including Guild Press, Potomac News, Drum, and Trojan Book Service. Founded in the late 1950s by H. Lynn Womack, Potomac News and Guild Press published pioneering physique magazines, featuring campy gay literature and erotic images. Inspired by Potomac News and Guild Press, Clark Polak developed both Trojan Book Service, a pornographic publishing company, and Drum, a radically pro-sex homophile publication produced by the Janus Society from 1964 to 1969.
In 1970, after Drum ceased publication, Schlegel served as the editor and publisher of FastPACE!, a short-lived, two issue magazine published by the Philadelphia Action Committee for Equality. These publications were oriented to the gay community and connected countless people to resources, entertainment, and networks of support when the gay movement was in its infancy. In the years that followed, he worked as an accountant. Upon his retirement in 1979, he became a successful financial investor, ultimately becoming a millionaire.
Preparing for his end of life legacy, in 1999 Schlegel established the Schlegel-Deibler Memorial Endowment at Bucknell University, which continues to support staffing, programming, and activities that foster a supportive and inclusive environment for LGBTQ+ students. His connection to Bucknell was related to his long-time residence in Lewisburg, where the university is located. His will also posthumously established the Richard L. Schlegel National Legion of Honor Award for an Emerging Activist at American University, which recognizes an individual who has made outstanding contributions to the LGBTQ community. Schlegel's correspondence and other papers are held in the Human Sexuality Collection at Cornell University, the ONE National Gay & Lesbian Archives at the University of Southern California, and the William Way LGBT Community Center in Philadelphia.
As a vehemently outspoken, admirably determined, and at times raunchy and demanding individual, Schlegel has been both celebrated and vilified in his home state following his death in 2006. In October 2021, the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission installed a historical marker outside Schlegel's house at 205 State Street in Harrisburg. The commemoration honored his early advocacy for gay rights and was the first of its kind to address LGBT history in central Pennsylvania. Soon after the marker was installed, State Senator John DiSanto called for the marker's removal, citing Marc Stein’s 1993 oral history interview with Schlegel, a transcript of which had been published on OutHistory. In the interview, Schlegel recalled some of his first erotic experiences, including a sexual experience with a neighbor when Schlegel was sixteen and the neighbor was eleven or twelve. DiSanto accused Schlegel of grooming and pedophilia, and the PHMC board voted unanimously to remove the marker, which was taken down in June 2022.
The following exhibit features letters, photographs, and personal records from Schlegel, courtesy of Marc Stein (with whom Schlegel maintained a lively correspondence) and the John J. Wilcox, Jr. Archives at the William Way LGBT Community Center in Philadelphia. This project was funded by the Schlegel Deibler Charitable Foundation grant. Organized according to Schlegel’s life events, the exhibit pages highlight his army involvement and investigation, homophile organizing, legacy and estate funding, and the afterlife controversy. As an archival collection, the exhibit allows glimpses into Schlegel’s life and access to the forthright, uncompromising, unfiltered, and resolute personality of an early homophile activist who helped forge a path for future generations.