It is inspiring to see the Smithsonian magazine describe gay civil rights pioneer Frank Kameny’s pair of handwritten notebooks held in the Archives Center of the National Museum of American History as a “National Treasure”.   In these times, a feature on Kameny’s notebooks is a wonderful sign of integrity and commitment by the Smithsonian to continue telling true stories of American history.  The Smithsonian headline nails it: “Frank Kameny Helped Chart a Path to Liberation for Millions of Gay Americans”.   Written by Brandon Tensley (September/October, 2025), the piece captures Dr. Kameny’s astronomer-like observations starting with his humiliating firing in 1957 by the US Army Map Service, to his detailed notebook entries identifying hotels, restaurants and bars across America (as if they were celestial objects) that were safe places, or not, for gay travelers living their lives as outsiders and sodomy outlaws.

The Smithsonian article includes a spectacular four-minute video that taps into the Library of Congress’ Frank Kameny Papers collection and the historic documentaries of lesbian pioneer Lilli Vincenz (1937-2023) held in the library’s moving image collections; documents from the National Archives, and the New York Public Library LGBTQ collections. Entitled National Treasures:  How Frank Kameny Became the Father of the Gay Rights Movement, the video was produced by the magazine and written and directed by Frank Carroll, who is also a producer in the department of Digital Media at WETA TV in Washington.  We and others were honored to have helped Frank Kameny and Lilli Vincenz organize and donate their materials to the Smithsonian National Museum of American History and the Library of Congress—for exactly this purpose in such a time.