Local

Peter Bartis, folk life specialist, dies at 68

Spent 40 years at Library of Congress

Published

8 years ago

May 31, 2018

Lou Chibbaro Jr.

Peter Bartis, gay news, Washington Blade

Peter Bartis (Photo courtesy American Folklife Center)

Peter Bartis, a nationally recognized expert in American folklore who is credited with playing a lead role in the development of the Library of Congress’s American Folklife Center during his more than 40 years of working there as a folklife specialist, died Dec. 25, 2017 of complications associated with lung cancer. He was 68.

A write-up on Bartis’ career at the Folklife Center published in Folklife Today, an in-house blog, says that at the time of his retirement last fall Bartis was the “longest-serving employee in the American Folklife Center’s history, a record that will probably go unchallenged for a long time.”

The write-up, written by Stephen Winick, one of Bartis’ colleagues, adds, “In many ways, Peter’s presence and diligent work has defined the Center for over 40 years. All of us at the AFC, in addition to his colleagues throughout the Library, will miss him profoundly.”

Bartis was a longtime resident of D.C.’s Capitol Hill neighborhood. He was born and raised in Pawtucket, R.I., in a multi-ethnic neighborhood that he told friends and colleagues provided him with an appreciation for his home state’s and the nation’s cultural diversity that remained with him throughout his life, according to the Folklife Today write-up.

He received his bachelor’s degree in 1972 from Boston University and in 1974 received a master’s in arts degree in folklore at the University of North Carolina.

He began course work for his Ph.D. in folklore and folklife at the University of Pennsylvania shortly before the American Folklife Center was founded in 1976. While continuing his studies, Bartis applied for and was hired for a temporary job related to a Folklife Center project in 1977 to document traditional arts in diverse ethnic communities in Chicago.

The Folklife Today write-up says that when the project ended in 1977 he applied for a permanent job at the American Folklife Center and began work there on June 22, 1977. Among his first projects as an employee was his role as co-curator of an exhibit he helped put together that included the voluminous folklife related archives that had been collected by the Library of Congress’s Music Division since 1928 and which was transferred to the American Folklife Center.

“Peter earned his Ph.D. in 1982 with a dissertation about the American Folklife Center’s archive,” Folklife Today states in its write-up on Bartis. “It’s a crucial account of the archive’s first 50 years, and AFC keeps a copy in the Folklife Reading Room so that researchers can have easy access to Peter’s scholarship,” it says.

In his more than 40 years at the Folklife Center, Bartis coordinated numerous projects in several different roles. Among them were the roles of field worker and project manager; author of many resource guides and manuals for the Center, including its widely read Folklife Sourcebook and Folklife and Fieldwork; involvement in the Center’s educational and training programs; and his role as senior program officer for the Center’s highly acclaimed Veterans History Project.

Folklife Today’s write-up says that upon his retirement from the Center last year Bartis continued to support the Center’s work by making a “generous gift to establish the American Folklife Center Internship Fund,” which will provide educational opportunities for emerging scholars who are both undergraduate and graduate college students.

Bartis is survived by his husband, George Benjamin “Ben” Zuras; his brother Jim Bartis and sister Elizabeth Ann Goyer and their families; and by many friends and colleagues throughout the Library of Congress, the Folklife Today write-up says.

“He’ll be missed particularly here at the American Folklife Center, where we have never before had to operate without his guidance, his cooperation, and his friendship,” it says.

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Gay Cameroonian immigrant will be freed from ICE detention — for now

Ludovic Mbock’s homeland criminalizes homosexuality

Published

8 hours ago

March 13, 2026

Baltimore Banner

Competitive gamer Ludovic Mbock, left, with his sister, Diane Sohna. (Photo courtesy of Diane Sohna)

By ANTONIO PLANAS | An immigration judge on Friday issued a $4,000 bond for a Cameroonian immigrant and regional gaming champion held in federal immigration detention for the past three weeks.

The ruling will allow Ludovic Mbock, of Oxon Hill, to return to Maryland from a Georgia facility this weekend, his family and attorney said.

“Realistically, by tomorrow. Hopefully, by today,” said Mbock’s attorney, Edward Neufville. “We are one step closer to getting Ludovic justice.”

The rest of this article can be found on the Baltimore Banner’s website.

District of Columbia

Bowser appoints first nonbinary person to Cabinet-level position

Peter Stephan named Office of Disability Rights interim director

Published

1 day ago

March 12, 2026

Lou Chibbaro Jr.

The Wilson Building (Bigstock photo by Leonid Andronov)

D.C. Mayor Muriel Bower has named longtime disability rights advocate Peter L. Stephan, who identifies as nonbinary, as interim director of the D.C. Office of Disability Rights.

The local transgender and nonbinary advocacy group Our Trans Capital and the LGBTQ group Capital Stonewall Democrats issued a joint statement calling Stephan’s appointment an historic development as the first-ever appointment of a nonbinary person to a Cabinet-level D.C. government position.

“This milestone appointment recognizes Stephan’s extensive expertise in disability rights advocacy and marks a historic advancement for transgender and nonbinary representation in District government leadership,” the statement says.

The statement notes that Stephan, an attorney, held the position of general counsel at the Office of Disability Rights immediately prior to the mayor’s decision to name him interim director.

The mayor’s office didn’t immediately respond to a question from the Washington Blade asking if Bowser plans to name Stephan as the permanent director of the Office of Disability Rights. John Fanning, a spokesperson for D.C. Council member Anita Bonds (D-At-Large), said the office’s director position requires confirmation by the Council.

Stephan couldn’t immediately be reached for comment.

“At a time when trans and nonbinary people ae under attack across the country, D.C. continues to lead by example,” said Stevie McCarty, president of Capital Stonewall Democrats. “This appointment reflects what we have always believed that our community is always strongest when every voice is represented in government,” he said.

“This is a historic step forward,” said Vida Rengel, founder of Our Trans Capital. “Interim Director Stephan’s career and accomplishments are a shining example of the positive impact that trans and nonbinary public servants can have on our communities,” according to Rangel.

District of Columbia

Capital Stonewall Democrats set to celebrate 50th anniversary

Mayor Bowser expected to attend March 20 event

Published

2 days ago

March 11, 2026

Lou Chibbaro Jr.

Mayor Bowser is expected to attend the Capital Stonewall Democrats 50th gala. (Blade file photo by Michael Key)

D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser, members of the D.C. Council, and local and national Democratic Party officials are expected to join more than 150 LGBTQ advocates and supporters on March 20 for the 50^th anniversary celebration of the city’s Capital Stonewall Democrats.

A statement released by the organization says the event is scheduled to be held at the Pepco Edison Place Gallery building at 702 8^th St., N.W. in D.C.

“The evening will honor the people who built Capital Stonewall Democrats across five decades – activists who fought for rights when the odds were against them, public servants who opened doors and refused to let them close, and a new generation of leaders ready to carry the work forward,” the statement says.

Founded in 1976 as the Gertrude Stein Democratic Club, the organization’s members voted in 2021 to change its name to the Capital Stonewall Democrats.

Among those planning to attend the anniversary event is longtime D.C. gay Democratic activist Paul Kuntzler, 84, who is one of the two co-founders of the then-Gertrude Stein Democratic Club. Kuntzler told the Washington Blade that he and co-founder Richard Maulsby were joined by about a dozen others in the living room of his Southwest D.C. home at the group’s founding meeting in January 1976.

He said that among the reasons for forming a local LGBTQ Democratic group at the time was to arrange for a then “gay” presence at the 1976 Democratic National Convention, at which Jimmy Carter won the Democratic nomination for U.S. president and later won election as president.

Maulsby, who served as the Stein Club president for its first three years and who now lives in Sarasota, Fla., said he would not be attending the March 20 anniversary event, but he fully supports the organization’s continuing work as an LGBTQ organization associated with the Democratic Party.

Steven McCarty, Capital Stonewall Democrats’ current president, said in the statement that the anniversary celebration will highlight the organization’s work since the time of its founding.

“Capital Stonewall Democrats has been fighting for LGBTQ+ political power in this city for 50 years, electing people, training organizers, holding this community together through some really hard moments,” he said. “And right now, with everything going on, that work has never mattered more. This gala is the first moment of our next chapter, and I want the community to be a part of it.”

The statement says among the special guests attending the event will be Democratic National Committee Vice Chair Malcolm Kenyatta, who became the first openly gay LGBTQ person of color to win election to the Pennsylvania General Assembly in 2018.

Other guests of honor, according to the statement, include Mayor Bowser; D.C. Council member Zachary Parker (D-Ward 5, the Council’s only gay member; D.C. Council member Anita Bonds (D-At-Large); Earl Fowlkes, founder of the International Federation of Black Prides; Vita Rangel, a transgender woman who serves as Deputy Director of the D.C. Mayor’s Office of Talent and Appointments; Heidi Ellis, director of the D.C. LGBTQ Budget Coalition; Rayceen Pendarvis, longtime D.C. LGBTQ civic activist; and Phillip Pannell, longtime D.C. LGBTQ Democratic activist and Ward 8 civic activist.

Information about ticket availability for the Capital Stonewall Democrats anniversary gala can be accessed here: capitalstonewalldemocrats.com/50th