May 22, 2009  |  By: Lou Chibbaro Jr.  | COMMENTS     

Capital Pride, the group organizing Washington’s annual LGBT Pride parade and festival set for June 13-14, announced its selection of six local Heroes and two Super Heroes to be recognized and honored at this year’s events.

Pride organizers named veteran D.C. gay activist Frank Kameny and veteran lesbian activist Lilli Vincenz as Super Heroes, a new designation that organizers created this year to recognize individuals “for their generations of support on the 40th anniversary of Stonewall.”

Kameny, a Harvard-educated astronomer, has been recognized as one of the key founders of the modern LGBT rights movement in the U.S. He co-founded the Mattachine Society of Washington in 1961 and has worked for more than 40 years to further LGBT rights.

Vincenz, who was an Army psychiatric technician before being discharged for being a lesbian, moved to D.C. in 1963, joined the Mattachine Society, and worked as a collaborator with Kameny in many of the group’s groundbreaking projects.

She also emerged as a filmmaker that chronicled gay rights efforts and created with her partner the Community for Creative Self-Development, a “holistic learning community to empower gay women and men” and gay supportive straights, according to a Capital Pride statement.

The other individuals named by Capital Pride for recognition as Heroes include:

• Andrew Abell, also known as Blair Michaels, a female impersonator and community services volunteer organizer for LGBT and AIDS causes for more than 25 years.

• David Lett, also known as Lena Lett, a female impersonator, popular D.C. entertainer, business owner and backer of LGBT and AIDS causes.

• Ellen Kahn, an advocate for LGBT families and gay adoptions, who is credited with paving the way for important advancements in this area as director of Whitman-Walker Clinic’s Lesbian Services Department and with the Human Rights Campaign.

• Margaret Murray, a leader in LGBT film endeavors, who served as executive director of the D.C. gay film festival group One In Ten, launched a children’s film festival in Florida, and founded an award-winning traveling film company called Movies That Move.

• Donna Payne, HRC’s associate director of diversity, who is credited with helping to build bridges between the LGBT community and communities of faith and color.

• Bob Witeck, co-founder of Witeck-Combs Communications, who has worked for more than 30 years to build a positive image for the LGBT community through corporate communications work and through volunteer services to numerous LGBT and AIDS organizations.