Local
Gay Men’s Chorus performer Mark Hennen dies at 58
Worked for Phil Collins, other notables
Mark Steven Hennen, a singer and dancer with the Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington for more than 10 years who has worked as a touring director for internationally known entertainers, died June 15 at a hospice in Arlington, Va., following a six-year battle with pancreatic cancer. He was 58.
According to information provided by his friend Rick Davis, Hennen was born and raised in West Branch, Mich., where he worked on his family’s dairy farm through his high school years. He graduated in 1980 from the University of Detroit Mercy, a Jesuit school, where he received a bachelor’s degree with a major in theater.
While pursuing a life-long career in the entertainment industry, Hennen lived and worked in Minnesota, Rhode Island and California, among many other places, Davis said in a biographical write-up.
Along the way he worked as an actor and model before becoming a tour director for many big-name acts, Davis said. Among them was his role in handling the logistics operations for a European tour of British singer-songwriter Phil Collins and Collins’ rock group Genesis.
Hennen also toured with U.S. country music singer, songwriter and actress Reba McEntire and with famed Beatles singer Ringo Star.
Most recently, Henning served for 11 years as a booking director for Feld Entertainment, which produces the Ringling Brothers & Barnum and Bailey Circus and Disney on Ice, among other entertainment acts.
“To those in the entertainment industry, Mark was known as ‘Radar,’ a moniker he received from Phil Collins, who felt Mark’s work habits matched the dutifully efficient character from the television show M*A*S*H,” Davis said in his write-up.
Among other things, Hennen was a “very active” member of the Washington National Cathedral Episcopal parish, Davis said.
The Gay Men’s Chorus honored Hennen with its prestigious Harmony Award recognizing his leadership and devotion to The Care Corps, a chorus project that supports chorus members in times of illness and other personal hardships.
Hennen is survived by his two sisters and their spouses, Maurene and Larry Hennen Schumann of Whitehall, Mich.; Lois and John Hennen Wheeler of Poway, Calif.; a nephew, Paul, and his spouse Jenny Schuman of Spring, Tex.; and a grandnephew and a number of grandnieces.
He was preceded in death by his parents, Maurice and Marilyn Hennen of West Branch, Mich. Hennen is also survived by his life-long friend Drew Bell and a large loving family of friends.
A “Celebration of Life” service is scheduled for 10 a.m. Saturday, Aug. 16, at the National City Christian Church in Washington, D.C. Davis said Hennen’s remains were cremated “for scattering on the old Hennen farm” near West Branch, Mich.
Hennen has requested that any memorial contributions be made to the Federal City Performing Arts Association, Inc., the organization that operates the Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington, at 2000 P St., N.W., Suite 730, Washington, D.C. 20036.
The Comings & Goings column is about sharing the professional successes of our community. We want to recognize those landing new jobs, new clients for their business, joining boards of organizations and other achievements. Please share your successes with us at [email protected].
Congratulations to Charles Roth on his appointment to the board of directors of the Pride Bands Alliance, the national and international organization for LGBTQ bands. On his appointment Roth said, “I am beyond humbled, and excited, to join the Board of Directors of Pride Bands Alliance at the national / international level for LGBTQ+ band organizations. The mission of promoting diversity, inclusivity, community, and pride through music is something I have always held very close to my heart. I very much look forward to working with this amazing organization and team, to keep that visibility alive and well, and to help foster and expand it even more across our country.”
Roth is the 2025 Guest Drum Major for The Queer Big Apple Corps, and former Marching Band Artistic Director for D.C.’s Different Drummers. Under his leadership, DCDD expanded its presence in and around our nation’s capital, featuring high-profile performances including at the National Cherry Blossom Festival Parade, Smithsonian Institute, World Pride 2019, and two special appearances at the Naval Observatory, home of Vice President Kamala Harris. He is the Team DC LGBTQ Student Athlete Scholarship Chair, and board member. He is a band director in Alexandria City Public Schools, and teaches middle school band at a Title I, International Baccalaureate School, where he built an award-winning program.
Congratulations also to Amira McKee and Chinanu Okoli, named by The Association of LGBTQ+ Journalists as recipients of the 2024 Phillips-Green Family Scholarship. These scholarships provide financial assistance to two CONNECT participants to support their participation in the CONNECT Student Journalism Training Project, and help launch their careers as young journalists.
“We are so excited to be partnering with the Phillips-Green Family Fund,” said NLGJA Executive Director Adam Pawlus. “Thanks to their generosity, we are thrilled to continue our support for young journalists whose work exemplifies our mission of creating a fairer and more diverse field of journalism.”
The CONNECT Student Journalism Training Project provides real-world, hands-on experience to students or recent graduates pursuing a career in journalism. The Phillips-Green Family Fund aims to provide organizations with financial assistance that work toward the education and well-being of women, children, and families. Their support helps make it possible for students in financial need to participate in our CONNECT program.
District of Columbia
A D.C. AIDS story: ‘I couldn’t have survived without you guys’
Old friends reunite as mystery of Kilbourne Place memorial stones is solved
‘Red Reminds Me’
Seven videos reflecting the spectrum of living with HIV
Sunday, Dec. 1, 4-9 p.m.
David Bethuel Jamieson Studio House at Walbridge
3229 Walbridge Place, N.W.
Washington, D.C.
Reserve free admission on Eventbrite
In the tradition of my family, funerals are not somber affairs cloaked in black garb. We call them “celebrations of life” where through our tears we laugh and reminisce about the dead. At the end, we all gather either in the basement of a church or a matriarch’s house where over a spread of rich, decadent food, we rejoice in the fact that our dead relative shed the chains of their flesh and transcended to the next phase. With bellies full, the kids run outside and play with each other and the adults would drink and trade stories. The repast is my fondest memories of childhood. It was a time when I could see family members separated by distance and eat collard greens simmered in smoked turkey and mac and cheese so cheesy that it solidified into a brick when cold.
Never would I have imagined that a repast would occur at Don Juan’s on the corner of Mt. Pleasant and Lamont. Instead of collard greens and mac and cheese, I dined on cheese pupusas with curtido. This occasion solidified the importance of a chosen family. While none of us were related by blood, we were related through one thread: AIDS. The story of the Kilbourne Memorial Stones is an AIDS story in which through unraveling the lives of Robert Rockershousen, Jakob Efsen, and Charles Winney, we received a glimpse into the impact of AIDS within D.C.’s gay community. A community that is often overshadowed by New York City and San Francisco when the early years of the epidemic are discussed.
When the Blade published my story “Unraveling mystery of the Kilbourne Place memorial stones” in August of 2023, Charles Winney’s story was still untold. What I did find out about him was through scouring public records but, no one stepped up to eulogize him. My friend, Peter Stebbins, knew of my struggles to locate a source for Charles and motivated me to continue fighting for him. In June of this year, I told Peter that I knew of Charles’s partner, Larry Martin, who lives in Provincetown, Mass. Between the years of 2022 and 2023, I reached out to Larry through multiple means, but I received no response. Peter being a Provincetown regular since the 1980s, was adamant that he knew someone who knew Larry and could get him in contact with me. I cautioned Peter that this might not have been a good idea. I interpreted Larry’s silence as not wanting to reopen an old wound.
Undeterred, Peter found a mutual friend on Facebook and reached out to Larry; 48 hours later, a relationship formed between Larry and me. Through phone conversations and in-person interviews, he brought me into the world of Larry & Chuck (Charles). From their beginnings as a young couple in Baltimore through their years on 1747 Kilbourne Place, they built an intricate and intimate web of community that reminded me of the communal affection I received from my family. There was this sense of “through thick and thin” that allowed them to stand in the gap for others within their community that were affected by AIDS. Larry told of how he and Chuck used to host dinners and care for those who were dying. They did it because they cared, and it was important to their identity as gay Christians to be of service of others.
In our many conversations, Larry alluded to the identity of who placed the stones. He hinted at the fact that it was a communal effort, and it wasn’t some lone solitary figure. Excitedly, I wanted to immediately put the story out, but he suggested for me to wait until he brought in his two friends, Mark Lambert and John Koran. Mark was Chuck and Larry’s roommate on Kilbourne Place. He was one quarter of the “Golden Girls,” which consisted of Mark, his friend Robbie, Larry, and Chuck. Together, they hosted large parties on the property that included parties for Pride. John was Robert’s best friend and roommate. Like Larry, I reached out to John through multiple avenues, but we did not connect.
Within a week, we were sitting at Don Juan’s drinking and breaking bread. While it was my intention to keep the group interview as formal as possible, I became enraptured in the camaraderie and nostalgia that permeated the air. Among these men with their graying hair and wrinkles, I again felt like that kid at the repast listening in on the adults. Larry officiated in a manner that was reminiscent of a patriarch. He corralled us all together in a group chat and laid the foundation for us to gather. Although the initial goal was to find out more information about Chuck, that moment laid bare the reality that these men belonged to a fraternity where they were hazed by the devastation of the AIDS epidemic. They are AIDS survivors.
Allowing these men to convene and break bread in fellowship was a way to finally eulogize Chuck and also a way for them to have a repast for Jake and Robert. Their banter and inside jokes brought forth a youthfulness and exuberance that almost moved me to tears on a few occasions. They became the adults in my family who drank their liquor and slapped their knees in laughter as they reminisced about the good ol’ days. While the men gave their eulogies, it was revealed that Larry, John, and a few others decided to lay down the Kilbourne Memorial Stones. It was decided that now that these men were together, we should walk down to the stones and take photos.
The men stood in front of the stones and on the porch of 1747 Kilbourne Place and they continued to laugh and tell stories while I snapped photos. We eventually parted ways and as I waited on the corner for a car to pass, I turned around and looked at the men for what may be the very last time. They were walking with their arms wrapped around each other like brothers. The scene reminded me of a discussion that was had at the dinner table less than an hour before. I asked the men if they believed their lives as gay men would be different during the epidemic if they didn’t have the support of each other. They all agreed in unison that their friendship was instrumental in their survival and Larry said among the nodding of heads, “I couldn’t have survived without you guys.”
District of Columbia
D.C. Health Link insurance program makes care for people with HIV free
Deductible, co-payments eliminated under new policy
The executive board of the D.C. Health Benefit Exchange Authority, which arranges for D.C. residents and nonresidents employed in D.C. to obtain health insurance coverage, voted unanimously on Nov. 19 to make the treatment and long-term care of people with HIV free of charge if they are enrolled in one of the authority’s health insurance plans.
D.C. Health Link, an independent D.C. agency created by the Health Benefit Exchange Authority to carry out its health insurance program, announced the new HIV care policy in a Nov. 20 statement.
“Making HIV care free – meaning no deductibles, no co-insurance, no copays – will save lives,” said Diane C. Lewis, chair of the Health Benefit Exchange Authority’s board in the statement.
“Starting in Plan Year 2026, residents enrolled in a D.C. Health Link Essential Plan can get free primary care visits, free laboratory tests, and free generic HIV medication,” the statement says. “Visits that would otherwise cost up to $45 per visit and $55 per lab test will be free,” it says.
“Making primary care for HIV free will improve health outcomes,” the statement continues, noting that HIV disproportionately impacts communities of color. It points out that in D.C., 71 percent of people living with HIV are Black and 8 percent are Latino.
The statement also points out that nationwide at the end of 2022, “only 64 percent of the Black population with HIV was linked to care and 53 percent were virally suppressed, meaning their HIV was suppressed through treatment.”
In contrast, according to the statement, “70 percent of the white population with HIV was linked to care and 63 percent were virally suppressed.”
The statement also notes that Whitman-Walker Health, the D.C.-based LGBTQ supportive health care provider and research facility, played an important role in helping the D.C. Health Benefit Exchange Authority develop the free HIV care program.
Mila Kofman, executive director of the D.C. Health Benefit Exchange Authority, explained that the authority created D.C. Health Link as part of D.C.’s participation in the federal healthcare program established by the U.S. Affordable Care Act, which was approved by Congress during the administration of President Barack Obama.
Kofman noted that like programs established by states under the Affordable Care Act, D.C. Health Link arranges for D.C. residents or non-residents who work in D.C. to obtain health insurance plans from private health insurance companies. Among those participating in the D.C. program are United Healthcare, Blue Cross-Blue Shield, and Kaiser Permanente, Kofman said.
Like all private health insurance plans, Kofman said people participating in the plans arranged by D.C. Health Link must pay a monthly premium for their plan. She said the premiums vary based on the amount of coverage participants select in choosing a specific plan and reduced premiums are available for people depending on their income.
She said that due to the highly complex process for making policy changes for health insurance, which includes a review and approval by the D.C. Insurance Commissioner, the process takes a little over a year to complete. Thus, the new “free” HIV care coverage will begin Jan. 1, 2026.
According to Kofman, existing D.C. Health Link insurance plans already cover the HIV prevention medication known as PrEP.
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