Local
Longtime gov’t speechwriter Shelbia Lengel dies at 81
Played lead role in organizing first national AIDS hotline
(Washington Blade file photo by Michael Key)
Shelbia “Shellie” Lengel, who served as a public affairs spokesperson and writer, including speechwriter, for several U.S. government agencies in Washington beginning in the late 1950s and played a lead role in organizing the government’s first national AIDS hotline in the early 1980s, died Aug. 27 of cancer at her home in Charlottesville, Va. She was 81.
A native of West Virginia, Lengel graduated second in her high school class in Charleston, W.Va., and was accepted at Duke University in North Carolina on a full scholarship, according to her son, Eric Lengel. Eric Lengel said his mother graduated from Duke in 1958 with a bachelor’s degree in English.
He said his mother began her professional career in the federal government in 1958 at the Department of Agriculture as a public information writer and speechwriter.
She continued her role as a writer and speech writer in subsequent years at the then Department of Health, Education, and Welfare from 1962 to 1968; and at the Environmental Protection Agency from 1969 to 1971. While at EPA she helped organize the agency’s first Earth Day activities, Eric Lengel said.
He said she took a hiatus from government service from 1971 to 1976 when she served as executive director of the United Cerebral Palsy Association of Pennsylvania at the organization’s office in Reading, Pa.
She resumed her career in the federal government in 1976, her son said, when she became a public affairs spokesperson for the Department of Health and Human Services in Washington, where she remained until her retirement in 1988.
Eric Lengel said his mother became actively involved in HHS’s efforts to address the AIDS epidemic in the early 1980s, among other things, by playing a key role in getting the agency’s AIDS hotline up and running.
He said she also worked on AIDS related projects with then U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Everett Koop at a time when AIDS was little understood. President Ronald Reagan appointed Koop, who was known then as a conservative fundamentalist Christian who was strongly opposed for the Surgeon General’s position by LGBT and AIDS activists.
But in the midst of Shellie Lengel’s role as a spokesperson for HHS, Koop riled his once conservative supporters and pleased many AIDS activists by calling for widespread distribution of condoms, including in schools, as part of the nation’s AIDS prevention effort.
Eric Lengel said his mother became involved as a volunteer for AIDS causes upon her retirement in 1988. Among other things, she worked as a volunteer for D.C.’s Food and Friends, the first large-scale organization in the D.C. area that delivered meals for homebound people with HIV/AIDS.
Her longtime support for the LGBT community and its struggle with AIDS hit home in a profound way in 1994, Eric Lengel said, when his brother, one of her three sons, Andy Lengel, who was gay, died of AIDS.
Shellie Lengel is survived by her husband, Alan Lengel; her sons Eric and Ed Lengel; and grandchildren Megan Lengel, Stephen Lengel, Mike Lengel, Thomas Lengel, and Laura Lengel.
She was scheduled to be buried at the National Memorial Park in Falls Church, Va., next to her son Andy in an upcoming private ceremony.
Photos
PHOTOS: Helen Hayes Awards
Gay Men’s Chorus, local drag artists have featured performance at ceremony
The 41st Helen Hayes Awards were held at The Anthem on Monday, May 19. Felicia Curry and Mike Millan served as the hosts.
A performance featuring members of the Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington and local drag artists was held at the end of the first act of the program to celebrate WorldPride 2025.
The annual awards ceremony honors achievement in D.C.-area theater productions and is produced by Theatre Washington.
(Washington Blade photos by Michael Key)
District of Columbia
Laverne Cox, Reneé Rapp, Deacon Maccubbin named WorldPride grand marshals
Three LGBTQ icons to lead parade
WorldPride organizers announced Thursday that actress and trans activist Laverne Cox, powerhouse performer Reneé Rapp, and LGBTQ trailblazer Deacon Maccubbin will serve as grand marshals for this year’s WorldPride parade.
The Capital Pride Alliance, which is organizing WorldPride 2025 in Washington, D.C., revealed the honorees in a press release, noting that each has made a unique contribution to the fabric of the LGBTQ community.
Cox made history in 2014 as the first openly transgender person nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award in an acting category for her role in Netflix’s “Orange Is the New Black.” She went on to win a Daytime Emmy in 2015 for her documentary “Laverne Cox Presents: The T Word,” which followed seven young trans people as they navigated coming out.
Rapp, a singer and actress who identifies as a lesbian, rose to prominence as Regina George in the Broadway musical “Mean Girls.” She reprised the role in the 2024 film adaptation and also stars in Max’s “The Sex Lives of College Girls,” portraying a character coming to terms with her sexuality. Rapp has released an EP, “Everything to Everyone,” and an album, “Snow Angel.” She announced her sophomore album, “Bite Me,” on May 21 and is slated to perform at the WorldPride Music Festival at the RFK Festival Grounds.
Deacon Maccubbin, widely regarded as a cornerstone of Washington’s LGBTQ+ history, helped organize D.C.’s first Gay Pride Party in 1975. The event took place outside Lambda Rising, one of the first LGBTQ bookstores in the nation, which Maccubbin founded. For his decades of advocacy and activism, he is often referred to as “the patriarch of D.C. Pride.”
“I am so honored to serve as one of the grand marshals for WorldPride this year. This has been one of the most difficult times in recent history for queer and trans people globally,” Cox said. “But in the face of all the rhetorical, legislative and physical attacks, we continue to have the courage to embrace who we truly are, to celebrate our beauty, resilience and bravery as a community. We refuse to allow fear to keep us from ourselves and each other. We remain out loud and proud.”
“Pride is everything. It is protection, it is visibility, it is intersectional. But most importantly, it is a celebration of existence and protest,” Rapp said.
The three will march down 14th Street for the WorldPride Parade in Washington on June 7.
2025 D.C. Trans Pride was held at Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial Library on Saturday, May 17. The day was filled with panel discussions, art, social events, speakers, a resource fair and the Engendered Spirit Awards. Awardees included Lyra McMillan, Pip Baitinger, Steph Niaupari and Hayden Gise. The keynote address was delivered by athlete and advocate Schuyler Bailar.
(Washington Blade photos by Michael Key)
PHOTOS: Helen Hayes Awards
Laverne Cox, Reneé Rapp, Deacon Maccubbin named WorldPride grand marshals
House passes reconciliation with gender-affirming care funding ban
PHOTOS: D.C. Trans Pride
Men convicted of murdering two men in NYC gay bar drugging scheme sentenced
Looking back at 50 years of Pride in D.C
WorldPride events round-up
Pope Leo XIV: Family based on ‘stable union between a man and a woman’
Wes Moore signs HIV decriminalization bill
