Surprised by Activism: The Effects of

One Oral History on Its Queer Steel-

Working Narrators
Anne Balay

Abstract: Historians turn to the archive to understand what happened and why
it matters. They thus depend on archivists and donors for their material. Oral his-

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torians instead can identify gaps in the archive and take steps to fill them. Often
this process leads to activism, since the stories of silenced, invisible populations
both raise problems of social justice and demand remedies. My oral history of
LGBTsteelworkers led to one such change in the lives of blue-collar queers.

Keywords: blue-collar queers, ethnography of workers, LGBT social justice, oral

history methodology, union organizing

Oral history is scholarship that takes risks, making it potentially both scary and
joyous. Oral history about gay people is even more so, since we gay people are
still in the process of finding voice and shaping the narrative of our lives. Gay
people are therefore vulnerable—the stories we tell may place us in physical or
emotional danger—and also plastic—our personal and cultural selves are shaped
by the process of relating our stories. The link between oral history and activism
is well established, both in the scholarship and in my own recent experience of
gathering queer stories. Specifically, the audience and the subject matter of oral
history often overlap. As an oral historian I have felt answerable to my narrators,
challenged by them, and inspired by them. I argue here that this accountability
is, to some extent, the nature of the beast; that by giving voice to people and
making them visible, oral history, especially queer oral history, generates a
responsibility that pushes and shapes its author and its world.

My thanks to Jan Gentry, the steelworker who took my book to her union representative, thereby getting this
ball rolling, and then went with me to Vegas, providing advocacy, support, and entertainment. Also, thanks to
Miriam Frank and Desma Holcomb, whose union connections fed me and whose friendship upheld me through
all this.

doi:10.1093/ohr/ohv078. Advance Access publication 27 January 2016

The Oral History Review 2016, Vol. 43, No. 1, pp. 69–80
C The Author 2016. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Oral History Association.
V
All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com
70 | BALAY

I conducted oral histories with forty gay, lesbian, and transgender steel-
workers; these oral histories form the backbone of my book, Steel Closets:
Voices of Gay, Lesbian, and Transgender Steelworkers.1 The book is a static ob-
ject, but oral history, as it intersects with structures of queer visibility, creates a
dynamic ripple effect, which this article will discuss and analyze. Because Steel
Closets exists, lives and laws have changed. The book did something in the
world, and my goal is to understand how that happened and what it means.
I came to oral history through an interest in stories and in people. I have
loved and studied literature all my life, and the habit people have of constructing
their lives as narrative fascinates me. But the narratives of oral history, unlike the
narratives related in even the most contemporary literary text, are still attached
to people. When I teach or write about, say, Nicola Griffith’s Slow River, my anal-

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ysis is of a book and its characters and strategies of meaning.2 Though Griffith
is very much alive and can visit my class as part of our investigation, or Skype
with me as part of my research, the text exists outside of her, as a static, aes-
thetic object. This is not so with the narratives I collected to write Steel Closets.
Those narrators are still in the world—in many cases, they are now my friends
and neighbors. They still wield authority over their own experiences and can
thus critique the book if they choose to. While writing this oral history, I was al-
ways conscious that its narrators could talk back.
Further, because my narrators are gay people who have been repeatedly
and harshly silenced by their culture, or at least by their work environment,
I particularly did not want my book to steal their voices again. Liz Kennedy links
queer folks and oral history by noting that, “not born and raised in a public les-
bian and gay culture, each gay and lesbian person has to construct his or her
own life in oppressive contexts, a process that oral history is uniquely situated to
reveal.”3 My narrators were so surprised and charmed that someone like me
wanted to hear about their lives, and so incredulous that a wide audience would
possibly buy and read their stories in the form of my book, that I felt I had been
given a trust; I felt extra pressure not to misrepresent what they told me. Now
that the book is out, the narrators’ continued existence motivates me to make
the book do something—to bring about actual change in their often-
challenging world. Queer oral history, by its very nature, generates activism.
The point of “coming out”—the argument in favor of disclosure—is that if
you take the risk of making yourself visible, other (potentially hostile) people
will see your humanity because they know you personally and will therefore
cede humanity to more of your tribe. Stigma will diminish. This potential exists
1
Anne Balay, Steel Closets: Voices of Gay, Lesbian, and Transgender Steelworkers (Chapel Hill: University of
North Carolina Press, 2014).
2
Nicola Griffith, Slow River (New York: Ballantine Books, 1995).
3
Elizabeth Lapovsky Kennedy, “Telling Tales: Oral History and the Construction of Post-Stonewall Lesbian
Identity,” in The Oral History Reader, ed. Robert Perks and Alistair Thompson (London: Routledge, 1998), 345.
 Surprised by Activism | 71

with published oral history as well. A document that exists in the world in cold,
inescapable print can embody the experience of previously invisible people and
thereby lead to action. Change such as this has begun to occur because of my
book, while other change is still pending. As the author of this oral history, I feel
responsible both backwards, to the people who contributed their lives in the
form of narratives, and forwards, to the people who will benefit as the book
leads to change in the union contracts that shape so many people’s lives. I feel
this responsibility—this power—because the book can do things in the world,
to people and to structures. I will describe here some of the effects the book
has had, and may soon have, and then explore what this dynamic means in
terms of queer oral history.
People living on America’s coasts, in university towns or big cities, or in ar-

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tistic or liberal enclaves, sometimes have a hard time believing how unchanged
the lives of rural, working-class, Midwestern queers are—how invisibility is still
the best option. Certainly, some gay folks are now quite visible—joyously so—
and embraced by the media and much of the public. But that these queers are
so visible, so outspoken, and so confident, renders others even less visible.
Culture sometimes does not see them even when they are out because they are
not what we expect to see; their gayness is rendered invisible both by their own
self-protective choice and by the co-opting of the category of gay by just one
segment of the gay population.
As I interviewed the steelworkers, I learned that most of them thought they
were the only LGBT person working out there in the mills. In addressing this is-
sue of invisibility, one narrator, “Erin,” suggested that once the book was done,
I should have a party and invite the narrators.4 That way, they would get to
meet each other, share stories, and feel solidarity.
In April of 2014, one month after publication, I had that party. Some narra-
tors could not make it because of distance or ill health. “Lisa,” a “dresser” who
presents as female, had been planning to drive down from Canada, but she
called from the hospital to cancel, reporting that she had been beaten up leav-
ing a bar and suffered damage to four vertebrae in her neck. She had been
punched so hard she got whiplash. The price of being blue-collar queer was
brought home once again on the very bodies I write about. In spite of such for-
midable obstacles, about twelve narrators showed up, some with their partners.
I had decided to hold the party at my house rather than a public space so
narrators would be more likely to feel comfortable and safe about coming. This
meant that I was cooking and cleaning until the last minute and did not have
time to stress about the social or scholarly implications of what I was doing; this

4
Balay, 52. The narrators asked to remain anonymous, so I chose an alias for each, and those are the names I
use in this article. The full transcripts of my interviews are housed in the Human Sexuality Archives at Cornell
University.
72 | BALAY

was fortunate, since the first few moments were awkward. The guests looked at
each other, smiled wanly, met my partner and my daughter, focused on food
and drink, and only then did the words start flowing. “Where do you work?” “I
know someone who works over there.” “How long you been at that mill?”
“What’s that like?” The floodgates opened. One narrator was standing near the
refrigerator in the kitchen, just talking, when another narrator with whom she
had worked about thirty years before came in. They looked at each other, said
“You?” “Yeah. You?” And the stories poured out.
At one point, the doorbell rang. It was “Bernard,” whom I had invited by
mail, since the phone number I had was disconnected. He showed me the enve-
lope on which I had misremembered his last name and used an old address; in
spite of all, he had made it to the gathering. When I showed him the book, he

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hugged it to his chest and breathed. He smiled, sighed, and then he talked to
people. He never put the book down, even while eating. He talked for a long
time to Susan, who is recently out and engaged to my friend Melissa. Susan
later told me that she had no idea until then what it meant to be gay—the
struggles and the toughness—or why and how my work mattered.
I wandered out to the back deck to tell the narrator “Harriet” why I had
named her after my mother, who died during my last round of edits, and why it
meant so much to me to have her there, in my house, in this world. Like my
mother, she had been raped and, also like my mother, she had a raspy, sardonic
tone of voice and a storytelling style which turned that incident, and the rest of
life’s struggle, into an escapade of which she was the hero, though relentlessly
self-mockingly so.
When I walked back into the living room, “Wanda” and “Nate” were deep
in conversation. A fifty-something involuntarily retired white bear and a twenty-
something black stud still in the mill were sharing stories and sharing tears.
Hours went by. I could not shut these people up. “Gail” told my daughter
(young, queer, eminently flirt-worthy) stories she had not told even me; for ex-
ample, she told about how she welded together the toes of her supervisor’s
work boots because, although he let his own boots deteriorate, he forced la-
borers to get new boots if their steel toes protruded at all.
Several of my students showed up: queer ones, straight ones, one with a
queer steelworker parent, all greatly moved by the stories, the pain, and the
laughter. Neighbors and friends came to show support and stayed to meet each
other, and the air was electric with solidarity and joy. Everybody exchanged con-
tact information, promised to stay in touch, and said they left feeling lighter and
less fearful, not just about work, but about the future.
These results extend beyond the party. One narrator who could not be
there wrote to me: “I have to start by thanking you for making me realize I am
not as alone on the world as I thought I was two and a half hours ago. I just
 Surprised by Activism | 73

finished your book in one quasi-marathon sitting and it was moving and enlight-
ening. Thank you for doing it!” He has since run for union steward and won.
Several party attendees have used their newfound solidarity to approach
the United Steel Workers (USW), arguing for contract amendments that protect
queers, thus turning their moment of personal liberation into a political shift for
all steelworkers. When narrators approached their union representatives, holding
my book and arguing for change, responses varied. Local 6787 agreed to debate
the issue at their next meeting, and when I heard this, I contacted Pride at Work
(a branch of the AFL-CIO). I knew from Miriam Frank’s book, Out in the Union:
A Labor History of Queer America, that Pride at Work has often helped unions
write contract language that includes and protects gay workers.5 They agreed to
help with this and asked me what the steelworkers wanted in a resolution. I am

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not a steelworker or even a union member, but I suddenly found myself serving
as intermediary between the queer workers, their union, and Pride at Work. I set
up ways to get feedback from my narrators and other queer USW members who
had contacted me after my book came out to share their stories. I asked what
they would like to see their union do, and I passed their responses on to Pride
at Work, which drafted resolutions that I then revised and submitted to the
union. Local 6787 tweaked my language, then approved the resolution, which
went forward to the International Constitutional Committee. Pride at Work, hear-
ing this, began pressuring other locals to consider the measure. It was ultimately
approved and submitted by four other locals.6
The United Steelworkers International Constitutional Convention took place
in August of 2014 in Las Vegas. What had seemed impossible actually hap-
pened; how, where, and why is the story that I will tell next. With support from
the national leadership, the delegates passed a constitutional amendment and a
resolution spelling out how to implement it. The union made good on its prom-
ise to workers, and they made this political change in response to an oral history
and the activism to which it led. As recently as three months earlier, none of the
steelworkers I spoke to dared to hope that such a resolution would be seriously
considered during their lifetimes. According to one longtime union member, this
was the first time in the history of the USW that LGBT issues were part of the
floor debate at a convention.
Why is this seismic change happening now, and what does it imply about
working conditions for queer blue-collar workers in general? Once a very top-
down organization representing only workers in large steel mills, the USW in the

5
Miriam Frank, Out in the Union: A Labor History of Queer America (Philadelphia, PA: Temple University
Press, 2014), 100.
6
For the full text of the amended resolution, as approved at the USW International Constitutional
Convention, see “Resolution No. 7—Civil and Human Rights,” 2014 USW Constitutional Convention Resolution,
accessed March 1, 2015, http://www.usw.org/convention-2014/resolutions/Resolution-No.-7-Civil-and-
Human-Rights.pdf.
74 | BALAY

late twentieth century merged with smaller and weaker industrial unions. These
mergers have become increasingly aggressive, with several indigenous American
industrial unions coming in as well as a few international ones, making the USW
the largest industrial union in North America, with 840,000 members. Rubber
workers, glass workers, and bus drivers, just to name a few, all now have locals
in the USW. This transforms the old, monolithic USW into a multi-industry and
multi-organizational culture, making it more susceptible to the kinds of reform
that the queer resolutions represent.
Unions such as the Service Employees International Union (SEIU; the presi-
dent of this union is an out lesbian) gain members and bargaining power these
days by approaching varied workplaces and doing grassroots, worker-based
organizing. These unions cannot count on one industry, or one viewpoint, to

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prevail. Diversity—a multiplicity of perspectives, workers, needs, and agendas—
opens the door to a different type of queer politics.
Of course, not all blue-collar workers are in unions. I have worked as a car
mechanic and as an over-the-road trucker, and many workers in these populous
occupations are not represented by unions. A disproportionate percentage of
these workers are queer.7 Among the assumptions culture often makes about
gay people is that we are white-collar; in fact, we are often portrayed as white,
wealthy, educated, urban, and male. My own work experience falls on both sides
of this divide, and I identify, at different times and in different ways, with both
white- and blue-collar workers. Blue-collar gay workers, however, experience a
much different work culture from that of white-collar workers. Although we
know we have skills, encounter dangers, and serve crucial needs, our supervisors
often treat us as though we are easily replaced and as though our time is not es-
pecially valuable. Some blue-collar workers spend significant work time waiting
either for instructions or for work to materialize, many are pushed by the
rhythms of the assembly line, and all need resilience in the face of verbal abuse.
Some of this abusive language targets sexual orientation and gender identity.
Pride—such a keystone of gay identity—thus has limited meaning in this con-
text. Much blue-collar work relies on the sacrifice of the worker’s body and its
ability to take a beating, such as on the seat of an eighteen-wheeler or standing
up all day long at a constantly vibrating machine. In this context, learning to
value and fight for your needs and those of others like you is powerful and
transformative.
Although I have had a varied career path, wandering away from the acad-
emy for extended periods of blue-collar work, I had never been to a large indus-
trial union’s international convention before. Although it was set in a conference
hotel, the similarity to academic conferences ended there. First, almost

7
Amber Hollibaugh and Margot Weisss, “Queer Precarity and the Myth of Gay Affluence,” New Labor Forum
24, no. 3 (2015):24.
 Surprised by Activism | 75

everybody came “in uniform”; USW T-shirts, overalls, and work boots were ubiq-
uitous. This made it very easy for members to spot each other, and there was a
store on site where more USW wear was available for purchase if needed.
Second, everybody attended the entire conference. I remember an instance
when Leo Gerard, the president and emcee, looked out over the crowd and saw
a section too empty for his liking. He scolded: “I hope all of you are in the bath-
room right around now; all I’m saying, I want to see butts in all those seats.”
The delegates sat for hours, listening to speeches, watching propagandistic vid-
eos, participating in debate, or simply waiting.
These patterns matter because of what they imply about class, expecta-
tions, and time. One of the things that white-collar workers control is their own
time. As with any privilege, this often goes unnoticed by those who enjoy it,

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and if it were pointed out, the response would be denial or indignation. I do not
mean to claim that intellectuals and academics are not busy, but just that there
is a received sense that one’s time matters and that one retains some right to
dispose of it. Blue-collar workers rush, or wait, or both, according to someone
else’s needs; they get the message that their time—and their lives—are not
their own. This reality gets harsher with further distance from the middle class.
The unemployment office or the sliding-scale health clinic will keep clients wait-
ing for hours with nary an apology.
Sitting in the assembly hall listening to the steelworkers conduct their busi-
ness, including debate arising out of my book and subsequent activism, was an
intense experience. To me as a scholar it felt surprising and revolutionary to wit-
ness how words I wrote were doing things to actual people in the world.
Recently I attended a drag show at a seedy bar in Northwest Indiana. As I sat
there drinking beer with my partner and friends, the host announced that I was
“in the house” and described my book and its consequences. People—
strangers—cheered. That does not happen to many intellectuals, and it was
thrilling. This thin line between the subject of my work and my social scene
means I frequently experience overlaps like this one, which emphasize the effect
my book is having on the community it describes. On the other hand, at the
USW convention, I was clearly not a steelworker. I had a guest badge rather
than a delegate one, I did not know what to wear, and I had a hard time ap-
proaching people and initiating conversation. Many women there looked gay. I
felt confident that I could identify them, but no conversational gambits felt safe.
Not unexpectedly, gay men, if they were present, were less identifiable. This ex-
perience of being invisible, though clearly identifiable, resonates with the lives
of my narrators in mills, where they felt at home but only to the extent that a
large part of their lives was not acknowledged or allowed.
Interdisciplinary, impactful research is valued in theory more than in prac-
tice, and queer foci exaggerate these effects. Esther Newton wryly observes, in
her essay “Too Queer for College: Notes on Homophobia,” that it is unwise to
76 | BALAY

publish queer research until after receiving tenure.8 Activism is often not re-
warded by the academy, and oral history writing styles are often not academic
ones. Feeling keenly the accountability with which oral history is invested, I
worked hard to write something the steelworkers would find to be true and
would enjoy reading. They did not need to understand every word or point, but
I did not want them to feel put off or isolated. Since the book was because of
them and about them, it needed to honor them by not seeming to be written
for someone else. These people have been pushed to the margins by virtue of
class, sexuality, and often gender or race. I was determined not to write a book
about them that only exacerbated their alienation from a life to which they were
denied access. This meant no footnotes, no jargon, no convoluted sentences,
and limited, accessible conversations with other scholars.

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That strategy worked. People (both my forty narrators and countless
strangers who have sent me fan e-mails) feel that the book is about them and
describes their experiences. Typically, these people have finished high school,
and some have some college education. One of the book’s narrators gave a
copy to Fred Redmon, the USW’s international vice president for civil rights.
I called Fred to hear his reaction, and he reported that he recognized the sto-
ries—the people and situations that the narrators described rang true for him
and inspired him to get these issues on the agenda. This conversation occurred
two weeks before the international USW convention, and Fred mentioned that
he had given his copy of my book to Leo Gerard.
Two weeks later, I sat in the convention audience listening to rousing
speeches by Nancy Pelosi and Rev. William Barber, each carefully mentioning
LGBT people as among those in the union who deserve protection. But these
speakers were imported, left-leaning political leaders, not union insiders. There
were no caucuses or lunches organized around LGBT people, and none of the
visibly queer people I passed at the meeting met my eye, so I was nervous about
what was to come. In spite of this, the convention was affirming and emotional.
Both speakers and audience acknowledged the blue-collar work experience pow-
erfully: the cultural and political shifts that contribute to our instability, the in-
dignities, the danger, and the dirt. Hearing this as part of a collective body is
very moving, and the spirit and atmosphere were inclusive and generous. After a
full day of speeches, discussion, motivation, and excitement, just as we were
about to file out for dinner, Gerard took the microphone and reported that
a union brother in the paper industry had been killed earlier that day, leaving
a wife and small children. He reminded the audience that this is a feature of our
jobs and that preventing it is one of our main missions. I was not the only audi-
ence member who cried. Yet simultaneously, my critical side reminded me that

8
Esther Newton, “Too Queer for College: Notes on Homophobia,” in Margaret Mead Made Me Gay:
Personal Essays, Public Ideas (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2000), 220.
 Surprised by Activism | 77

this solidarity, although beautiful, depends on leaving certain things, such as

queerness, at the door.
The first direct engagement with LGBT issues by the USW occurred in a del-
egates-only session concerning procedures, specifically three modifications to
the international constitution. The third of these “Constitution Committee
Recommendations” proposed a modification of Article XII, Section 2, and read:

The Constitution Committee concurs in the resolution submitted by Local

Unions 675, 6787, and 10-1 to change Article XII, Section 2 as it appears
on page 58, lines 19-23 by adding the words “gender identity” between
the words “sexual orientation” and “age” so that Article XII, Section 2 will
read: “It is an offense under this Constitution to harass a member at a

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union or workplace-related location or activity on the basis of race, creed,
color, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, disability, nationality,
or other legally protected status.”9

This was where the rubber met the road. There was debate, mostly on reli-
gious grounds. When a Southern delegate took the mic and said he could not
support the measure because it went against his religious convictions, Gerard re-
sponded. He stated—some say he yelled—that there is no room for discrimina-
tion in the USW and that every member is entitled to the full support of the
organization and of all its members. Although several other delegates spoke, de-
bate ended there, and the resolution passed unanimously. Gerard had been
handed my book two weeks before. Do I know that he read it and based his re-
sponse on my research? I cannot be sure, but a central thesis of my book is that
transgender workers experience the lion’s share of hate speech, harassment, and
violence at work simply because they are identifiable; they cannot hide. The
USW’s official convention newsletter describes this event: “Members stood,
cheered and applauded as Leo Gerard shouted, ‘We are all human beings in this
union and, as long as I am president, we will not tolerate any form of discrimina-
tion against any human being for any reason.’”10
After the resolutions passed and again after the USW newsletter column
appeared, queers and allies used social media to contact me in droves to express
gratitude and support. I now count a cluster of copper miners from Tucson
among my supporters, although a month ago I did not even know such people

9
Each nominating union then reported back after the convention. Their meeting minutes convey ownership of
this advance by listing it specifically, though debate is not discussed. See, for example, “Minutes—Membership
Meeting,” USW Locals 2010 and 2010-01, September 24, 2014, accessed October 31, 2014, http://usw2010.ca/
wp-content/uploads/2014/02/Minutes-Membership-Meeting-September-24-14-APPROVED-Web-version.pdf
10
“Delegates Demand Gender Identity Equality,” 2014 USW Constitutional Convention: Convention
Coverage, Day 2, accessed November 1, 2014, http://www.usw.org/convention-2014/daily-newsletter/USW-
Update-tuesday.pdf.
78 | BALAY

existed. John D’Emilio, reflecting on the career of Allan Bérubé, mourns the loss
of community history, even though he applauds the inclusion of queers within
academic history. “But academic history is written differently from community
history. It has to pass muster with a different audience; it has to frame its con-
cerns in ways that speak to the professional literature; it has to impress an audi-
ence of peers with its mastery of a scholarly apparatus.”11 Community history,
by contrast, offers “a recourse for self-affirmation as well as its power as a tool
for constructing community.”12
D’Emilio’s defense of community history raises points crucial to understand-
ing what queer oral history can do, and how. Again and again in the months fol-
lowing the release of Steel Closets, I was reminded of how hard gay community
is to establish. Racial minorities and women faced widespread discrimination in

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the mills, each in their turn. But they could identify each other and thus politi-
cize, strategize, and fight back. Queers in the mills, by contrast, are trying to
hide as a means to avoid daily harassment and violence or the threat of it and
to embrace meaningful work community. Several lesbian narrators were embar-
rassed to admit that they had dated and married male coworkers. Explaining
why she did not want our interview recorded, one narrator said she regretted
marrying a man, but at the time, she had felt that straight male coworkers un-
derstood her experiences and choices in ways that fostered a loving relationship.
She was nervous to confess this, presumably thinking I would dismiss her as a
sloppy lesbian, but my point here is about story. My narrators constructed stories
that made sense of their lives to themselves and to others. Usually invisible and
silent, they could not risk being seen, but they could be heard—they could
name their experiences and thus bring them into the public sphere. Speaking,
analyzing, writing, and reading these stories is how queers—deliberately, inten-
tionally invisible queers—become embodied and move into the realm of
activism. George Takei’s popular Facebook news feed recently featured a heart-
warming story by a blogger who happened to sit near two scruffy, blue-collar
guys on the subway. He taped their conversation because he was surprised to
hear them calmly revealing their children’s gayness to each other.13 This story is
effective because readers expect people who look like that to condemn their
gay children and their behaviors.
These past months and years have seen so much progress in attitudes
about—and in public policy concerning—gay folks, yet this progress is not com-
prehensive and many people do not experience its benefits. D’Emilio points out

11
John D’Emilio, In a New Century: Essays of Queer History, Politics, and Community Life (Madison:
University of Wisconsin Press, 2014), 135.
12
D’Emilio, 135.
13
Rafi D’Angelo, “Overhead on the Subway: The Coolest Conversation Ever between Two Dads with Gay
Sons,” Queerty, accessed August 31, 2014, http://www.queerty.com/overheard-on-the-subway-the-coolest-
conversation-ever-between-two-dads-with-gay-sons-20130321.
 Surprised by Activism | 79

that “the benefits of identity movements are not equally distributed” because,
while everyone has whatever rights have been won, only those with privilege
can make them efficacious, can make them mean something concrete.14 One
reason for this uneven advance is the assumption that power and progress come
from urban centers, universities, artists, and intellectuals. We do not typically ex-
pect leadership to come from working-class dudes on subway cars, nor do we
see union halls in Midwestern industrial communities, or people whose jobs are
dirty and dangerous, as instigators of change.
Gay, lesbian, and transgender steelworkers had felt alone out there, but
now they know that there are others, and that the world cares that they exist,
so they have dared to stand up and fight for themselves and for others who re-
main invisible. Habits of hiding are hard to break, but these people certainly do

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not lack courage, and neither they nor their straight allies lack conviction that
“an injury to one is an injury to all.”15 If gay workers—even gay steelworkers in
Gary, Indiana—are protected and feel safe, everyone benefits. These workers,
who are the most vulnerable and the most at risk, are the leaders of a campaign
that will extend their basic rights at their workplaces and in their lives. Their
brave initiative restores my faith in the possibility of an LGBT movement that will
refuse to claim progress for some until it is assured for all.
Summarizing the history and scope of queer oral history, Horace N. Roque
Ramı́rez and Nan Alamilla Boyd begin by acknowledging that “an injustice has
occurred and that those seeking justice sometimes have to create new methods.
As such, queer oral histories have an overtly political function and a liberating
quality.”16 There is something naı̈ve and embarrassing about wanting one’s writ-
ing to do something, like didactic fiction for kids that hits readers over the head
with its moral message. We often value the obscure and experimental over the
political and utilitarian, if only because we do not like being told what to think
or do. Work that is political is often not seen as objective.17 That is, queer oral
historians expect to hear stories of struggle, and we intend to view our narrators
as heroes. We hope to participate through our scholarship in the liberation of
these victims. By buying into this neoliberal progress narrative, oral history may
seem old-fashioned or undertheorized.
I did not write Steel Closets with an activist goal, or any goal, in mind. I was
new to oral history and unaware of its disciplinary possibilities. But once the
book materialized, it instigated activism. And in another sense, I was deliberately

14
D’Emilio, 256.
15
“An injury to one is an injury to all” is a popular motto of the Industrial Workers of the World and other la-
bor organizations.
16
Nan Alamilla Boyd and Horace N. Roque Ramı́rez, eds., Bodies of Evidence: The Practice of Queer Oral
History (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012), 1.
17
Michael Frisch, A Shared Authority: Essays on the Craft and Meaning of Oral and Public History (Albany:
State University of New York Press, 1990), xxi and chapter 8.
80 | BALAY

writing a book to do something: I wanted to tell the stories of an otherwise si-

lent and invisible group. The more queer steelworkers I met, the more I loved
and respected them, and the better it felt that I could give them something.
I could give them an audience that extended well beyond me.
As any good feminist knows, personal change leads inevitably to political
transformation; in fact, it was already politically transformative all along. If you
tell someone’s story, they get uppity—they talk back, taking power for them-
selves. This is especially true if they are queer: perverts and trannies and dykes
and queens and studs and bears and feisty Latina vets. As a queer oral historian
I have a renewed understanding of a bumper sticker on my car, which boasts:
“There they go. . . . I must hurry after them, for I am their leader.”

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Anne Balay is a visiting assistant professor at Haverford College, a Penn Humanities Fellow, and
the 2015-16 Yale LGBT Research Fellow. She is working on a book about long-haul truckers,
technology, and sexuality. E-mail: annegbalay@gmail.com