Friday, Wayne: Moscone championing LGBT

Abstract

Wayne Friday: I don’t know how Moscone became the champion of the underdog as much as he did. He was the first that I remember, and I moved out here when Alioto was mayor. I think that Speaker [Willie] Brown probably had it right that Moscone was the first. He was a local guy. He couldn’t care less what your background was or nothing. I actually don’t think he saw the color of your skin. I knew him pretty well, and we discussed politics a lot. When he ran for mayor, he called me and we talked and went to have lunch and asked me “Can I have your endorsement, Wayne because you know a lot of people in the community.” I said “My endorsement doesn’t mean anything.” He says “Yeah, but the Bay Area Reporter is, and you are the political editor of the Bay Area Reporter.” I said “Well unfortunately Senator, I’ve already endorsed Milton Marks in that race.” But I did everything behind the scenes I could to help George Moscone because he was a hell of a guy. He was a true champion. Prior to him life for gay and lesbians in San Francisco was not as good as it should have been, and I think because he was a local guy, he knew a lot of people, he knew everybody, he was friends with everybody, and I don’t that the guy had a racist bone in his body. He didn’t. Can’t say that for some of the other ones that followed him afterwards. A lot of them played politics, but George played it right down the middle. He was a good guy. I look back at him now, and I have a big picture of him in my house on what I lovingly call the “Harvey Milk Wall”. It’s a whole wall covered with photographs, and in the middle of the photos of Harvey is this big one of George. He meant every much to me as Harvey Milk.

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Type

Interview

Date Original

2011-05-03

Relation

The Moscone oral history interviews are part of the George Moscone Collection, MSS 328.

Contributing Institution

Holt-Atherton Special Collections and Archives, University of the Pacific Library

Rights Information

To view additional information on copyright and related rights of this item, such as to purchase copies of images and/or obtain permission to publish them, click here to view the Holt-Atherton Special Collections policies.

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