Local
LGBTQ rights advocate John Burlison dies at 69
Served as co-chair of Maryland’s Free State Justice
John S. Burlison, a resident of North Bethesda, Md. who worked as a technical editor and writer and later as a software products manager and who served in the 1990s as a board member and co-chair of the Maryland LGBTQ rights group Free State Justice Campaign, died March 18 at his home of complications associated with abdominal cancer. He was 69.
Burlison was born in Moscow, Idaho, and attended high school in Potlach, Idaho before graduating from the University of Idaho with a bachelor’s degree in Speech Communication, according to a write-up released by his husband, Ron Dagani.
He studied at Illinois State University before beginning his professional career as a technical editor and writer at Battelle-Northwest Laboratories in Richland, Wash. He moved to Washington, D.C. in 1983 where he met Dagani, and the two have resided together in Maryland since 1984, the write-up says. Burlison and Dagani were married in 2013 on the 30th anniversary of their meeting each other.
According to Dagani, Burlison worked for several companies in the D.C. area that provide contract work for the federal government as a usability consultant and later as a software product manager. Among the firms he worked for were Computer Sciences Corporation and General Sciences Corporation.
He worked for the Federal National Mortgage Association known as Fannie Mae from 1997 until his retirement in 2007, Dagani’s write-up says.
The write-up, which Dagani said was prepared mostly by Burlison, notes that Burlison served for a number of years in the 1990s on the board of the Free State Justice Campaign and served for two years as the then Maryland gay rights organization’s co-chair as it advocated for LGBTQ rights legislation before the Maryland General Assembly. The organization later became Equality Maryland.
In the early 2000s Burlison took up square dancing with the D.C. Lambda Squares, an LGBTQ square dancing club for which he served on its board for nine years, the write-up says. He was an avid cyclist and traveled with friends on extended bicycle trips along the U.S. East Coast and throughout central Europe.
Dagani said religion and faith were an important part of Burlison’s life and that presented a conflict with his status as a proud gay man. According to Dagani, Burlison grew up in a religious Methodist home in Idaho but converted to the Mormon faith in the early 1970s shortly before he married a Mormon woman in 1973 who had been his childhood sweetheart, Susan Comstock.
The couple, who had four children, divorced while living in Washington State around the time Burlison was working for Battelle-Northwest Laboratories. Dagani said Mormon Church officials had earlier told Burlison, who loved his wife and told her he was gay before they married, that getting married would solve his “gay problem.” But church officials later excommunicated Burlison for homosexuality and “apostasy,” Dagani said.
When his wife remarried she and her new husband took legal action to arrange for the husband to adopt the children and deny parental rights for Burlison, Dagani said. But despite this trying experience, years later while living in Maryland in a fulfilling relationship with Dagani, Burlison returned to the Mormon Church in what turned out to be a supportive Kensington Ward congregation in Maryland near his and Dagani’s home.
“At first it was awkward and surreal – people who are rejected by a church do not normally re-enter the good graces of that community,” Dagani wrote in a draft obituary he plans to deliver when the coronavirus epidemic subsides and a memorial service for Burlison can be held. “But with time he found a place in the Kensington Ward, which he found to be warm, loving, and accepting of both of us,” Dagani wrote. “As one ward member told me recently, ‘John has touched the lives of so many current and past ward members,’” Dagani recounted.
Burlison also became involved with the LGBTQ Mormon group Affirmation, Dagani said.
“John was a sweet, gentle, loving, soft-spoken man with a whimsical sense of humor,” Dagani told the Washington Blade. “He was modest, often referring to himself as ‘an Idaho country farm boy.’ That he was, but he was also intelligent, smart, well-read, and curious about the world.”
Dagani, who noted that Burlison’s close friends addressed him by the nickname Happy, said he will miss his husband for his many talents, including his cooking and his “wacky, whimsical sense of humor…Most of all, though, I will miss his love. He was truly the love of my life,” said Dagani. “Thank you, Happy.”
Burlison was predeceased by his brother, Vernon Burlison Jr. In addition to his husband Ron Dagani, Burlison is survived by his siblings Grace Burlison Wallace, Frank Burlison, Katherine Clancy, Stephen Burlison, Patricia Finn, and John Michael Finn; his four children, Timothy Mauery, Sarah Mauery Foutz, Vernon Mauery, and Mary Mauery Haeberle; 23 grandchildren; and many friends.
Dagani said a celebration of Burlison’s life will be scheduled at a later date.
District of Columbia
Imperial Court of Washington drag group has ‘dissolved’
Board president cites declining support since pandemic
The Imperial Court of Washington, a D.C.-based organization of drag performers that has raised at least $250,000 or more for local LGBTQ and non-LGBTQ charitable groups since its founding in 2010, announced on Jan. 5 that it has ended its operations by dissolving its corporate status.
In a Jan. 5 statement posted on Facebook, Robert Amos, president of the group’s board of directors, said the board voted that day to formally dissolve the organization in accordance with its bylaws.
“This decision was made after careful consideration and was based on several factors, including ongoing challenges in adhering to the bylaws, maintaining compliance with 501(c)(3) requirements, continued lack of member interest and attendance, and a lack of community involvement and support as well,” Amos said in his statement.
He told the Washington Blade in a Jan. 6 telephone interview that the group was no longer in compliance with its bylaws, which require at least six board members, when the number of board members declined to just four. He noted that the lack of compliance with its bylaws also violated the requirements of its IRS status as a nonprofit, tax-exempt 501(c) (3) organization.
According to Amos, the inability to recruit additional board members came at a time when the organization was continuing to encounter a sharp drop in support from the community since the start of the COVID pandemic around 2020 and 2021.
Amos and longtime Imperial Court of Washington member and organizer Richard Legg, who uses the drag name Destiny B. Childs, said in the years since its founding, the group’s drag show fundraising events have often been attended by 150 or more people. They said the events have been held in LGBTQ bars, including Freddie’s Beach Bar in Arlington, as well as in other venues such as theaters and ballrooms.
Among the organizations receiving financial support from Imperial Court of Washington have been SMYAL, PFLAG, Whitman-Walker Health’s Walk to End HIV, Capital Pride Alliance, the DC LGBT Community Center, and the LGBTQ Fallen Heroes Fund. Other groups receiving support included Pets with Disabilities, the Epilepsy Foundation of Washington, and Grandma’s House.
The Imperial Court of Washington’s website, which was still online as of Jan. 6, says the D.C. group has been a proud member of the International Court System, which was founded in San Francisco in 1965 as a drag performance organization that evolved into a charitable fundraising operation with dozens of affiliated “Imperial Court” groups like the one in D.C.
Amos, who uses the drag name Veronica Blake, said he has heard that Imperial Court groups in other cities including Richmond and New York City, have experienced similar drops in support and attendance in the past year or two. He said the D.C. group’s events in the latter part of 2025 attracted 12 or fewer people, a development that has prevented it from sustaining its operations financially.
He said the membership, which helped support it financially through membership dues, has declined in recent years from close to 100 to its current membership of 21.
“There’s a lot of good we have done for the groups we supported, for the charities, and the gay community here,” Amos said. “It is just sad that we’ve had to do this, mainly because of the lack of interest and everything going on in the world and the national scene.”
Virginia
LGBTQ groups to join Spanberger inaugural parade
Virginia Pride among more than 25 orgs to march in Jan.17 event
Virginia Gov.-Elect Abigail Spanberger’s inaugural committee announced on Jan. 2 that at least two LGBTQ organizations will be among more than 25 state-based organizations, including marching bands, that will participate in her inaugural parade on Jan. 17.
A statement released by the inaugural committee says the parade will take place immediately after Spanberger is sworn in as Virginia’s 75th governor and delivers her inaugural address in Richmond.
The statement lists the LGBTQ groups Virginia Pride and Diversity Richmond as two groups participating in the parade, although the two groups merged in 2021, with Virginia Pride becoming a project of Diversity Richmond. Among other things, Virginia Pride organizes Richmond’s annual LGBTQ Pride events.
“A display of the impressive talent and beauty of every corner of Virginia, our inaugural parade will be a celebration of all that makes our Commonwealth strong,” Spanberger said in the Jan. 2 statement. “I’m excited for attendees in the stands on Capitol Square and families watching together at home to see this incredible showing of Virginia pride,” she said.
James Millner, who serves as director of Virginia Pride, told the Washington Blade about 75 people are expected to join the Virginia Pride-Diversity Richmond contingent in the parade. He said among them will be members of other Virginia LGBTQ organizations.
“We’re going to invite our staff, our board, our volunteers, and our community partners to join us,” Millner said.
“We are thrilled and honored to have been invited to participate in Abigail Spanberger’s inauguration festivities,” he added. “I think this represents a marked change from the previous administration and demonstrates what she campaigned on – which is she sees the diversity of the Commonwealth as a strength that needs to be celebrated,” he said. “And we are very happy that she has invited us to represent the diversity of the commonwealth.”
Millner appeared to reflect on the sentiment of the large majority of Virginia’s LGBTQ community in its support for Democrat Spanberger over Republican Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears in the November 2025 Virginia election and the end of incumbent GOP Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s term in office on Jan. 17.
“After what we’ve been through with the Younkin administration, especially in its treatment of LGBTQ folks, especially transgender and nonconforming folks, I think we are all breathing easy and excited about what opportunities will exist in working with Abigail Spanberger,” he told the Blade.
District of Columbia
Two pioneering gay journalists to speak at Thursday event
Blade’s Chibbaro, Falls Church News-Press’s Benton talk long careers
Two local gay journalists will speak on a panel this week about their long, pioneering careers.
A celebration of the Falls Church News-Press’s Nicholas Benton and the Washington Blade’s Lou Chibbaro Jr., two trailblazing LGBTQ journalists who have spent decades reporting on the front lines of social, cultural, legal, and political change in America, will be held this Thursday, Jan. 8, at the Women’s National Democratic Club of Washington. D.C., 1526 New Hampshire Avenue, N.W., at 6 p.m., according to a statement from organizers.
The program will explore their journeys, the evolution of LGBTQ journalism, and the ongoing fight for equality and justice. Benton and Chibbaro will also examine the various factors causing many news outlets to cease print publication and their energetic efforts to continue publishing their work both in print and online.
EVENT DETAILS:
- Remarks and Q&A, in-person and via Zoom.
- 6 p.m. complimentary hors d’oeuvres and cash bar; 6:30–7:30 p.m. program followed by book signing.
- Zoom only: $10. In-person: members: $20, nonmembers: $30 plus tax.
Benton’s latest book, “Please Don’t Eat Your Children, Cult Century, and Other Essays,” will be available for purchase at the event.
Benton is a longtime local journalist and LGBTQ rights activist whose work has had a lasting impact on both community journalism and social justice. Author of the first-ever editorial in the pioneering Gay Sunshine newspaper in 1970, he is best known as the founder, owner, and editor of the Falls Church News-Press, an independent weekly newspaper he launched in 1991 and is the paper of record for the City of Falls Church, Virginia.
Chibbaro is the senior news reporter for the Washington Blade and a pioneering journalist in LGBTQ news coverage. He has reported on the LGBTQ rights movement and community continuously since 1976, first as a freelance writer and later as a staff reporter, joining the Blade in 1984.
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