§ Herland 20th Anniversary Retreat
October 28th-30th, Eufaula State Park
Don't miss out on Herland's 20th anniversary retreat on Halloween weekend at Eufaula State Park. Fall foliage should be in full bloom and this will be a great time of year to be out in nature and enjoy the companionship of the Herland community.We have lots of special activities planned to commemorate our 20 years of retreats, including the "ghosts of retreats past," a pumpkin-carving contest (bring your own pumpkin), a Halloween costume contest for people and/or pets, a silent auction for a sailboat (see description below), and Saturday brunch featuring made to order omelets. Activities during the day on Saturday will include tie-dyeing, a drumming circle, and outdoor and indoor game tournaments earning the winners points toward prizes from the raffle table. Sunday will feature brunch and the raffle. There will be special 20th anniversary t-shirts available at the retreat. (See article below.)
The sailboat donated to Herland for the silent auction is an O'Day Superswift that is 12'-9" long and weighs approximately 120 lbs. It fits easily into the back of a pickup, no trailer necessary, or it can be cartopped. Once you get to the shore, one person can easily rig her and be in the water in 15 minutes; launching from a boat ramp is not necessary. All rigging is intact and in good working order, sheet (rope) and sail are new, and dagger board is in good working order. The tag is paid through 2008.
Saturday night will be the potluck (always the best meal of the year) followed by the concert. Peggy Johnson will be our host and featured performer for the evening. All the past retreat performers that we were able to contact have been invited to jam in the second set of the concert. So far we have confirmation for Wende Allyn, Sharlene, and possibly Nancy Scott and Tuffy.
If you have any questions, please call Laura at 286-0079 or a leave a message at Herland at 521-9696.
At the Retreat
The retreats are held at state park group camps, separated from the rest of the park by a gate. There are about 10 cabins that hold about 12 people each. There are bunk beds with thin mattresses (no sheets) in the cabins or you may also pitch a tent. Bathrooms and showers are in one building near the center of the group camp.
Signup sheets for the cabins will tell you the type of activities allowed or not allowed in each cabin (e.g., smoking, drinking, dogs, children, partying late). Please sign up also for one shift of kitchen duty. We must be completely out of the park by noon on Sunday so we ask folks to have their cabins cleaned up by 10 am and then help us clean up the bathrooms, showers, and main dining hall.
There is a kitchen in the main dining hall with stoves and ovens and refrigerators and freezers for storing perishables. Herland has pop, water, snacks, chips, and fruit for sale all weekend.
The Retreats are Herland's only "womyn only" event held throughout the year. It is a place for women to feel safe and comfortable being in a womyn's space. In keeping with that, we ask that you do not bring male children over the age of 10 to the retreat. Pets are allowed but must remain on a leash at all times and are not allowed in the main dining hall (health regulations).
Directions to Eufaula State Park
From OKC go east on I-40 to exit 259. Go south on State Highway 150 to the entrance to Eufaula State Park. Look for "Group Camp" signs.
From Tulsa, go south on US 75 to I-40. Go east on I-40 to exit 259. Go south on State Highway 150 to the entrance to Eufaula State Park. Look for "Group Camp" signs.
§ Julie Loyd in Concert
Join us on Wednesday, October 5, at 7pm for an evening of "cool, crunchy guitar licks" as Julie Loyd "walks the narrow path between folk and energetic pop music."
On a national tour, Julie is stopping in OKC as she makes her way from West Virginia to California and back to Philly. With her third album, "The Waiting Room," just released, Julie writes from an "unflinchingly gay feminine perspective, but the musical presentation packs enough muscle to back up her sentiments."
Admission is $7.50 - $15 sliding scale.
§ National Coming Out Day is October 11, 2005
National Coming Out Day is a day for every single person who supports GLBT equality to speak openly about it. Maybe you're coming out for the first time ever, or maybe you're just talking with a neighbor, coworker, friend or acquaintance about GLBT issues for the first time. Regardless, coming out and being out is the most important thing you can do.
This year's theme for National Coming Out Day is "Talk About It." Human Rights Campaign is working to tell the stories of GLBT people to the nation every day, and we hope that you will do that too -- either one on one with someone in your life, or by planning a National Coming Out Day event.
Being brave doesn't mean that you're not scared. It means that you're scared, and that you do the thing that you're afraid of anyway.
Coming out as gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender or as a straight supportive person is an act of bravery, authenticity and openness. Whether it's for the first time ever, or for the first time today -- coming out is the most important thing you will do all day.
Talk about it.
Even after coming out to yourself and the important people in your life, you will find that coming out is a lifelong journey that requires that you make frequent decisions about whether to come out to someone new. For example, GLBT people must make coming-out decisions in the workplace, the military, with a health care provider and in a place of worship. Coming out truly is a never-ending journey.
§ T-shirt Design Winner
Congratulations to Chris Chrisstoffels for her winning design in our 20th Anniversary Retreat T-shirt Design Contest. Chris' design captures the spirit of anticipation we all have felt when heading out to a Herland Retreat. Many thanks to all who entered the contest. There were many great designs to choose from.
§ Oklahoma Holocaust Remembrance Exhibition
The Oklahoma Holocaust Remembrance Exhibition consists of two separate exhibits plus movies, workshops, lectures and other events. The Exhibition is located at Untitled [ArtSpace] in downtown Oklahoma City, at 1 NE 3rd Street, and will continue through October 23 of this year.
At the center of the space is Nazi Persecution of Homosexuals, 1933 - 1945; and around the perimeter is the exhibit Rescuers: Portraits of Moral Courage in the Holocaust.
Nazi Persecution of Homosexuals, 1933 - 1945 is one of several traveling exhibitions offered by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. This exhibition examines the rationale, means, and impact of the Nazi regime's effort to rid Germany of male homosexuality. Following an overview of the emerging urban gay community in Germany in the 1910s to the early 1930s, the exhibition explores Nazi racial and social ideals that formed the basis for the attempt to eradicate male homosexuality.
The core of the exhibition focuses on the police terror that led to the arrest of some 100,000 homosexual men, 50,000 of whom were convicted and imprisoned during the Nazi period. Also presented is the brutal and often fatal incarceration of an estimated 5,000 to 15,000 homosexual men in concentration camps. The exhibition concludes with the postwar aftermath and Germany's memorials to the homosexual victims of Nazi persecution.
The curator of the traveling USHMM exhibit, Dr. Ted Phillips, was in Oklahoma City for a few days, speaking about the exhibit. Dr. Phillips made the point that homosexuals should not be referred to as victims of the "Holocaust": they were victims of Nazi persecution. The term "Holocaust" refers to the systematic targeting and elimination of Jews, nothing else. Other victims during that time, such as gays, Roma (Gypsies), political prisoners, etc, were victims of the Nazis' persecution. Dr. Phillips noted that this is a subtle, but important, historical distinction to make.
In fact, the Nazi persecution of German male homosexuals was not designed to exterminate them, it was designed to "cure" and "heal" them so they could contribute to re-populating the country. When the Nazis conquered other countries, they did not target gays -- it was just German gays they wanted to turn around and straighten up, so to speak.
Lesbians were not targeted because they were not viewed as a threat to society: women had little power and their sphere of influence was too narrow (children, kitchen, and church). Besides, lesbians could be forced to reproduce (there's a chilling thought). Some lesbians were incarcerated as "asocial" -- the "asocials" in the camp wore black triangles, but there were many different groups considered asocials besides lesbians.
Rescuers: Portraits of Moral Courage in the Holocaust was created by Rabbi Malka Drucker and her partner, photographer Gay Block. Rabbi Drucker, author of many children's books, was asked by her rabbi to tell the story of rescuers of Jews during the Holocaust, so that children learning of the Holocaust would have a ray of hope, and not lose their innocence and faith in humanity. Malka and Gay spent three years locating and interviewing 105 rescuers and documented their research with this exhibit, a book, and a video (which runs continually in a side room at Untitled).
During the Holocaust, rescuers hid Jews in cellars and behind false walls, shared their meager food rations, disposed of waste, smuggled people out of ghettos, and brought up Jewish children as their own. Their stories of heroism are amazing, and even more so are the attitudes of the rescuers. Some of them lived in perpetual fear or in great degradation; some look at those years as the best of their lives; some are ashamed of having rescued too few; one says those years made her the woman she is today. All of them felt they could not have done differently. Unspoken but ever present is the knowledge that many rescuers were discovered and did not survive the Nazis.
Malka and Gay also were in Oklahoma City to speak about their exhibit. One of the points they emphasized was that people fell into four categories during the Holocaust: they were persecutors, victims, rescuers, or bystanders. The fourth category -- bystanders -- was far and away the largest percentage of people; and the smallest category was rescuers. Rescuers were only thousands among the millions who were victims and the tens of millions who were bystanders. Malka made the comparison that the ratio of rescuers to bystanders was like one teardrop in an ocean of indifference. Malka and Gay hope that viewers, rather than asking themselves, "What would I have done? Could I have been a rescuer? Or would I have been a bystander?" will instead ask themselves if there are issues or injustices today in which there are victims and bystanders. And, perhaps the exhibit will stimulate visitors to consider how they might be involved in righting contemporary injustices.
In the first five days of the Exhibition, over 1,000 people visited the gallery or attended one of the film showings at the Oklahoma Museum of Art. In the next few weeks it is hoped that an actual rescuer whose story is included in the exhibit, Dr. Marian Pritchard, will be in town to inspire us. Dr. Pritchard is a psychoanalyst in Maine, and as soon as travel plans are completed the information will be on the exhibit website at www.okholocaustexhibition.org.
Also on the website, you will find news of various lectures, workshops, etc. taking place. One of these is a forum on Monday, October 10th, 7--9 p.m., in the City of Norman City Council Chambers. The forum will be presented by the Norman Human Rights Commission and is titled "The Holocaust -- How Did It Happen? Could It Happen Again?"
There are several Holocaust scholars here with this event and if you would like to organize an outing of ten or more people you can arrange for one of them to do a special presentation. If you would like to be part of a Herland group taking advantage of this wonderful opportunity, please email Margaret Cox at saintsyb_77(remove this spamguard)@hotmail.com.
Excerpts from Rescuers: Portraits of Moral Courage in the Holocaust
From the window of our house I could see the ghetto. When the houses were burning during the ghetto uprising in April 1943, I saw people jumping from windows. One family of ten came and stayed for a few weeks until I found other shelter for them. No one was refused in my home. We had at least fifty Jews during the war-- friends, strangers, acquaintances, or someone who heard about me from someone else. Anyone was taken in. - Zofia BanieckaWe built a false floor in the kitchen cupboard; Jacob was skinny so he could fit in. But about two weeks later the Gestapo came because a neighbor thought she had seen Jacob. They looked everywhere, but they didn't find him. Then one day that same SS man came again, but that time my brother-in-law was visiting and he knew this man. Jacob was hiding under the sink, and we started giving the Nazi whiskey. They drank and they ate so much, and my brother-in-law convinced him his sister would never hide a Jew, so we escaped that time. But I knew I had to go looking for another apartment.
I found a nice big apartment in a quiet neighborhood. I put Jacob inside the couch, and that's how we moved across town, right under the noses of the Germans. A couple of days later Dr. Kowalski came to see me and he says, "Mr. Roslan, I want to bring you another boy. He's in a place now where he has to stay in the attic laying down all the time. He's so skinny and sickly."
- Alex & Mela Roslan
§ Events of interest in October
State NOW Meetings
Get involved with NOW at the local level. Help plan and implement strategies to combat sexism.
Email ameevanderpool.now(remove this spam guard)@gmail.com for more information.
Young LGBT Group
Want to talk to womyn your own age? Join this "talking circle" for young lesbians, gays, bisexuals, and transgenders between the ages of 18 and 30. Group is sponsored by PFLAG and meets the 2nd & 4th Tuesdays, of each month at 7 pm at Church of the Open Arms, 3131 N Penn, OKC. Call Donna at 748-7301 for more information.
Masterpieces of Hope
Friday, October 21, 2005
Ballroom, Crowne Plaza Hotel, Tulsa
Reception with Silent & Live Auctions
Join us for an evening of creativity and compassion. Live auction of denim jacket "Masterpieces" by local and national artists, including Lou Hodgston, John Draper, Charles Faudree and others. Silent auction of art, gifts, vacations, and more. For ticket information, call the Tulsa RAIN office at 918-834-4195 or visit www.rainoklahoma.org.
Super Spud Supper & Musical Celebration
Church of the Open Arms
3131 N Penn, OKC
Friday, October 21 - 7:00 pm
Supper will be baked potatoes with a wide selection of toppings.
The concert will feature our fabulous new baby grand piano.
Call 525-9555 for more details.
§ Featured Events
Herland Hiking
The last Herland Hike for the fall season will be Saturday, October 8th, at 10 am. The location for this hike is South Lakes Park, SW 119th Street and Meridian. The entrance to the park is on SW 119th about a 1/4 mile West of I-44. Join us for the optional coffee gathering at 9 am at Panera, SW 104th and Penn.
Herland Supper Club
Dust off your bowling shoes and join us for an evening of pizza and bowling on Saturday, October 8. First, at 6:00 pm we will eat at Joey's Pizzeria,1807 N. Classen Blvd. Many have discovered that Joey's has some of the best pizza in town. (Those wishing to carpool can meet at Herland Sister Resources at 5:45 pm.) After supper, at 7:30 pm, we will go bowling at 66 Bowl, 3810 NW 39th (near Portland). 66 Bowl is a really fun place at night -- they have a deejay that asks trivia questions and you win prizes with the correct answers. Not to mention bowling is more fun at night with the lights low!
Herland Video Nights
In honor of Lesbian and Gay History Month, Herland presents The Question of Equality, a unique four-part series which shows a multi-faceted history of the gay and lesbian civil rights movement. From Stonewall to Anita Bryant, to Oregon Measure 9 and "don't ask, don't tell," the Gay Liberation movement has fought for equal rights in a climate of hatred, violence, intolerance, and discrimination. This series examines the history of the gay liberation movement beginning with the Stonewall riots in 1969. The videos will be shown Friday and Saturday, October 14th and 15th. The first night, Friday, we will show the first two parts of the series -- Out Rage '69 and Culture Wars beginning at 7 pm. Saturday night we will have a potluck dinner first at 7 pm followed by the showing of Parts 3 and 4 -- Hollow Liberty and Generation Q.
Herland Scrabble Night
All you panjandrums of Scrabble, please join us on Saturday, October 22, at 6 pm for a game or two on the board. We usually order a pizza as soon as everyone arrives. The competition ranges from beginners to experts, so you'll have lots of levels to choose from.
§ Events at a Glance
October 1-23: Oklahoma Holocaust Remembrance Exhibition, Untitled Artspace, 1 NE 3rd. See www.okholocaustexhibition.org for hours and details.
Tuesday, Oct 4: PFLAG, Church of the Open Arms, 3131 N Penn, 7 pm.
Wednesday, Oct. 5: Julie Loyd in concert at Herland, 7 pm. $7.50-$15 sliding scale.
Saturday, Oct 8: Herland Hike, South Lakes Park, SW 119th and Meridian, 10 am. Meet for coffee first at Panera, SW 104th and Penn, 9 am.
Saturday, Oct 8: Herland Supper Club, eat at Joey’s Pizzeria, 1807 N. Classen, 6 pm, followed by bowling at 66 Bowl, 3810 NW 39th, 7:30 pm.
Monday, Oct 10: OGLPC Monthly Meeting at Neighborhood Alliance, 1236 NW 36th, 7 pm.
Tuesday, Oct 11: Young LGBT Support Group, Church of the Open Arms, 3131 N Penn, 7 pm. Call Donna at 748-7301 for details.
Friday, Oct 14: Herland Video Night, The Question of Equality, Parts 1 &2, at Herland, 7 pm.
Saturday, Oct 15: Herland Potluck and Video Night, The Question of Equality, Parts 3 &4, at Herland, potluck at 7 pm, video follows.
Sunday, Oct 16: Herland Board Meeting at Herland, 4 pm, everyone welcome.
Saturday, Oct 22: Herland Scrabble Night at Herland, 6 pm.
Tuesday, Oct 25: Young Lesbians/Gays Support Group at Church of the Open Arms, 3131 N Penn, 7 pm.
Fri, Sat, Sun, Oct 28-30: Herland Fall Retreat at Eufaula State Park.
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