Local
Cliff Witt, early D.C. gay rights strategist, dies at 77
Co-founder of GAA was manager at Ziegfeld’s-Secrets
Clifton R. Witt was one of six founders of D.C.’s Gay Activists Alliance in 1971. He died Sept. 9.
Clifton R. “Cliff” Witt, who was one of six founders of D.C.’s Gay Activists Alliance in 1971 and worked for more than 20 years as a director of film and video for a company that makes industrial training movies before becoming a manager at the D.C. gay nightclub Ziegfeld’s-Secrets, died Sept. 9 at George Washington University Hospital. He was 77.
Friends and co-workers at Ziegfeld’s-Secrets said he lost consciousness at the club just after its 3 a.m. closing time on Saturday and was taken by ambulance to the hospital where he died later that morning. His brother, Clyde Witt, said the D.C. Medical Examiner’s office informed him the cause of death was chronic pulmonary lung disease.
His friend and former roommate Glenn Berkheimer said Witt had been suffering from a lung ailment in recent years due to his long history as a heavy smoker.
Clyde Witt said Cliff Witt began his career as a Peace Corps volunteer in the early 1960s in Latin America, where he served for at least two years in Columbia and became fluent in Spanish.
He entered the Peace Corps shortly after receiving a bachelor’s and master’s degree in film production and direction at Northwestern University in Illinois, according to Clyde Witt. Clyde Witt said his brother was born in Cleveland and raised in nearby Maple Heights, Ohio. He graduated from Maple Heights High School in 1958.
Clyde Witt and others who knew Cliff Witt said he devoted most of his working career as a filmmaker for the communications division of the Bureau of National Affairs, or BNA, a D.C.-based news organization that specializes in business-related news and produces educational and training movies.
A BNA official said Witt worked for the company as Director of Film & Video from January 1973 until December 1995.
Roberta Hantgun and Mark Daniels were hired by Witt in the late 1970s as freelance camera operators and worked on many of the film projects directed by Witt.
“We did safety training films,” Daniels told the Washington Blade. “Some showed industrial accidents. We did a sexual harassment training series about sexual harassment in the workplace,” he said. “They were very creative.”
Hantgun said Witt had a “great sense of humor” as he led his production crew on locations throughout the country, including industrial waste sites.
“Cliff was a good man and great to work with,” Daniels said. “He always pushed himself and his crew to do better in a very compassionate way.”
Longtime D.C. gay activist Paul Kuntzler said Witt played an active role in the groundbreaking 1971 election campaign of gay rights pioneer Frank Kameny, who became a candidate for the newly created D.C. Congressional Delegate seat in Congress. It was the first time an openly gay person had run for a federal office.
Kuntzler, who served as manager of the Kameny campaign, said Witt served as assistant manager. Among other things, Witt used what Kuntzler said was his “remarkable” organizational skills to arrange for several busloads of volunteer campaign workers to travel from New York City to D.C. to help gather several thousand signatures needed to get Kameny’s name on the ballot.
Kameny finished in fourth place in a six-candidate race, receiving just under 1,900 votes, a few hundred more than a candidate who expressed anti-gay views during the campaign. Although Kuntzler, Witt and the others working on Kameny’s campaign didn’t expect Kameny to win, they considered the effort a success in achieving their goal of drawing attention to the gay issues that Kameny raised during the campaign.
Shortly after the campaign ended Witt joined Kuntzler and four others involved in the campaign in launching the D.C. Gay Activists Alliance, which they modeled after a group by the same name in New York City.
Witt has been credited with playing a key role in one of the group’s first major protest actions – a “zap” or “invasion” of the annual national conference of the American Psychiatric Association, which took place at D.C.’s then Shoreham Hotel.
Details of Witt’s role in the action appear in the 1999 book “Out for Good: The Struggle to Build a Gay Rights Movement in America” by New York Times writers Dudley Clendinen and Adam Nagourney.
The book notes that GAA targeted the psychiatrists because of their refusal at that time to remove homosexuality from the APA’s official manual listing it as a mental disorder. Kameny, who held a Ph.D. in astronomy from Harvard University and had been a practicing scientist, was among the first to speak out against the APA listing of gays as “sick,” saying it was based on “junk” science.
With advance planning and direction by Witt, a group of mostly GAA members along with members of the then-D.C. Gay Liberation Front stormed the stage in a large ballroom at the hotel where more than 1,000 of the psychiatrists were assembled, the book reports. Kameny, who was already on stage as a panelist, grabbed a microphone from one of the speakers and “lectured” the psychiatrists on their wrongful beliefs on homosexuality, according to Kameny’s own account in later writings.
In December 1973, about two years after the GAA zap, the APA announced that its board of trustees had voted to remove homosexuality from its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual as a mental disorder. It was a development considered a stunning victory for the newly emerging modern gay rights movement.
Gay activist Richard Maulsby credits Witt with getting him involved in gay activism in D.C. shortly after the two became roommates. Maulsby, who went on to become one of the founders and the first president of the D.C. Gertrude Stein Democratic Club, said Witt also became involved in the 1970s as an avid bird collector and breeder as a hobby.
“But in that early period of time, especially during the Kameny campaign, he was very instrumental in the gay movement,” Maulsby said. “He made substantial contributions early on in a very important period and that provided the foundation for everything that’s happened since then.”
Witt’s brother Clyde said he believes Witt retired from his filmmaking career at the BNA, which later became known as Bloomberg BNA, in the late 1990s. “And then after that he just sort of did whatever he wanted to do,” Clyde Witt said.
According to friends and co-workers at Ziegfeld’s-Secrets, it was around that time that Witt redirected his energy in “retirement” into a new career as a manager at Secrets, where, among other things, he supervised and arranged the scheduling of the club’s nude male dance performers. He also served as the graphic designer for the club’s promotional advertising.
His fluency in Spanish became especially helpful, friends said, in supervising and mentoring the club’s many immigrant Latino dancers whose English speaking abilities were limited before becoming themselves fluent in English.
“He made us feel like we were part of a team,” one of the Secrets dancers told the Blade on Sunday. “He treated us with respect.”
Those familiar with the club said Witt often performed his scheduling duties, with his laptop or iPad in his hands, while sitting on a stool reserved for him at Secrets’ front bar and while sipping black coffee from a beer mug.
“I’ll always remember him sitting on that stool talking to customers and fellow staff members,” said one of the club’s regular customers.
On Sunday night, just one day after Witt passed away, employees placed a beer mug filled with coffee on the bar in front of the empty stool where Witt used to sit. They placed a small vase with flowers next to the mug and a cookie on a napkin along with a note that said, “For Cliff: May you always have hot coffee.”
Clyde Witt said plans for a memorial service would be announced at a later date. Ziegfeld’s-Secrets co-owner Steven Delurba said the club plans to organize its own memorial gathering for Witt in the near future.
By JOHN-JOHN WILLIAMS IV | Those legendary heavy-handed pours, spirited karaoke and trivia nights, and groan-worthy wall-to-wall patrons on packed nights are back!
Leon’s will live to see another day.
Baltimore’s oldest gay bar, which opened in the 1950s, closed in July following the death of its owner, Ron Singer.
The rest of this article can be read on the Baltimore Banner’s website.
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 Leigh Miles Jackson, Ph.D., named executive director of The Institute for Health Research & Policy at Whitman-Walker, and Angel Earle, Ph.D. named as chief operating officer, Whitman-Walker Health System.
Upon her appointment Dr. Jackson said, “Under my leadership, I would love for The Institute for Health Research & Policy at Whitman-Walker to be known as a trusted, forward-looking research organization that shapes policies, strengthens practices and creates measurable change for the community.” Dr. Jackson spent 12 years with the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, leading national initiatives on minority-serving institutions and economic evidence for investments in children, youth and families. Dr. Jackson holds an extensive educational background, including postdoctoral fellowships in developmental Psychology and Neurogenomics from Vanderbilt University, a Ph.D. in molecular and systems pharmacology from Emory University and a bachelor’s degree in chemistry from Wake Forest University.
Upon her appointment Dr. Earle said, “When we talk about parity and inequities and research, it’s never just about the dollars that are out there. It’s about making sure that we’re cultivating a change that embraces equity at the heart of everything that it does. As the COO for Whitman-Walker Health System I will be working closely to support The Institute for Health Research & Policy at Whitman-Walker and the Whitman-Walker Foundation to drive advancement in research and support the strategic goals of all of the Whitman-Walker Heath System entities.”
Dr. Earle is a genetic epidemiologist and senior executive. She brings a background from the London School of Economics and the University of South Carolina, with expertise in global health, corporate strategy and socioeconomic policy. She has co-authored peer-reviewed research on cancer genetics, nephrology biomarkers and reproductive genomes.
Dr. Heather Aaron, CEO of Whitman-Walker Health System said, “both leaders bring research-driven expertise and operational strength to the organization as it continues expanding research, health care access, and health outcomes for residents across the Washington, D.C., region, including the LGBTQ+ community, people living with and at risk for HIV, and communities experiencing persistent health disparities.”
The Institute for Health Research & Policy at Whitman-Walker is also expanding its research agenda beyond HIV to address the complex health conditions affecting people living with and at risk for HIV, as well as the broader communities The Institute for Health Research & Policy at Whitman-Walker serves.
District of Columbia
Former Capital Pride board member reiterates sexual harassment allegation
Trans activist says resignation of board chair won’t change org’s culture
Taylor Lianne Chandler, who earlier this year resigned from the Capital Pride Alliance Board of Directors after expressing concern that the board failed to address instances of “sexual misconduct” within the Capital Pride organization, said this week she doesn’t believe her concerns will be addressed following the resignation of the board’s current chairperson.
Capital Pride Alliance serves as the lead organizer of D.C.’s annual LGBTQ Pride events.
Anna Jinkerson, who has served as chair of the Capital Pride board for only 10 months and has served on the board for the past four years, confirmed she is resigning from the board effective Sept. 30.
In a statement to the Washington Blade commenting on the possible impact of Jinkerson’s resignation, Chandler said Capital Pride board member Natalie Thompson would be replacing Jinkerson as board chair, and she didn’t expect that change to impact what she called Capital Pride’s problematic “culture.”
But Ryan Bos, the Capital Pride president and CEO, told the Blade that Thompson had not been selected as the new board chair and that a new chair would not be selected until the board holds an election scheduled for October.
Chandler, who identifies as transgender, said it was a Capital Pride board member who told her that Natalie Thompson had been or would be selected as the new Capital Pride board chair. She didn’t identify the board member.
“My concerns about how Capital Pride has handled serious allegations of sexual misconduct have not disappeared with a change in leadership,” she told the Blade in her statement. “When leadership continues to socialize, smile for photographs, and share spaces with someone facing serious allegations, what message does that send to the people who say they were harmed,” she said.
Chandler has told the Blade a Capital Pride investigation identified an individual implicated in a “pattern” of sexual harassment-related behavior but said she was bound by a Non-Disclosure Agreement that applied to all board members and she could not provide further details.
When asked by the Blade to comment on Chandler’s allegations at the time she resigned from the board in February of this year, board chair Jinkerson said Capital Pride acts “quickly and appropriately” to address concerns such as those raised by Chandler. But she and other Capital Pride officials did not at that time or since then specifically acknowledge whether someone associated with the organization engaged in sexual harassment.
“The community deserves transparency, accountability, and leadership willing to make difficult decisions,” Chandler said in her statement to the Blade this week. “Changing the chair doesn’t change the culture,” she added. “Actions do.”
In response to a request from the Blade for an update on its response to Chandler’s allegations about alleged sexual misconduct within the Capital Pride organization, Bos sent the Blade a statement on behalf of Capital Pride.
“The Capital Pride Alliance takes allegations of harassment, misconduct, and unsafe behavior seriously,” the statement says. “The organization follows standard procedures and engages appropriate resources to support a thorough, confidential, and impartial review, when information is reported.”
The statement adds, ”Because these matters require maintaining confidentiality and protecting the privacy of personnel, volunteers, and governance processes, we will not comment on specific individuals, allegations, investigative findings or communications involving law enforcement.”
It concludes by stating, “We remain committed to fostering a safe, respectful, and inclusive environment, appropriately addressing concerns raised, and continuing to strengthen our policies, governance practices, and organizational culture.”
Although the statement refers to “communications involving law enforcement,” Capital Pride has not disclosed whether instances of alleged sexual harassment or, as stated by Chandler, a possible instance of sexual assault, have been reported to D.C. police.
A D.C. police spokesperson, in response to a Blade inquiry, said they have no record of a sexual harassment or sexual assault complaint surfacing from the Capital Pride office, which is located in the D.C. LGBTQ+ Community Center building at 1827 Wiltberger Street, N.W.
But the Blade has obtained a D.C. police incident report that appears to confirm Capital Pride COO June Crenshaw’s claim in a recent Facebook post that she reported at least one incident of sexual harassment related to Capital Pride to D.C. police.
The report, which was filed on Oct. 11, 2025, states that Crenshaw told a police officer who prepared the report that another person told her “that a board member of Capital Pride Alliance groped his genitals at a Capital Pride event.” The report says Crenshaw told the officer the person who reported being groped “did not want to speak to the police at this time.”
The incident report, which is a public document, says the person who reported the groping told Crenshaw about it on Oct. 8, 2025. It concludes by saying Crenshaw was given “resource information” to provide to the person who said he was groped. It does not identify that person or the board member who allegedly committed the groping.
Officials at Capital Pride recently exchanged testy public Facebook posts with Chandler. Crenshaw criticized Chandler for her social media posts on the matter.
“It is remarkable to watch people publicly accuse others of failing to create safe spaces when, during the time they themselves held positions of leadership and significant volunteer responsibility, they claim to have witnessed deeply troubling behavior, yet never reported what they allegedly witnessed to fellow leaders, law enforcement, the Office of the Attorney General, legal counsel, or staff responsible for addressing such concerns,” Crenshaw wrote. “When I became aware of allegations or personally witnessed conduct that required intervention, I reported what I knew through the appropriate channels, including to law enforcement and other relevant authorities. Investigations were conducted. Those processes created records, documentation, correspondence, timelines, and conclusions.”
Chandler responded, “I was NOT in organizational leadership or fully informed about the scope of these allegations when much of what you reference occurred. I was read into the situation after becoming an executive officer. By that point, the investigation had already concluded, and we were awaiting the final report. … Once that report became available to me, and once I understood the seriousness and scope of what was being alleged, my position was anything but ambiguous: I did not believe this individual should be welcomed at, participate in, or have access to official Pride events.”
Capital Pride’s attorney Nick Harrison then joined the exchange, accusing Chandler of violating confidentiality rules.
“You served on the Board for years. You cannot now present yourself as an outsider with no responsibility for what occurred during your tenure,” Harrison wrote. “When the situation became difficult, you resigned, provided your resignation letter to the media, disclosed confidential organizational matters, and recast yourself as the victim.”
Again, no one has publicly identified the person Chandler references as being welcome at Pride events and photographed with Capital Pride leadership.
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