Terry Bond and Carl Fox
Dr. Roland Sintos Coloma
In Spring 2018, the course was taught by Dr. Roland Sintos Coloma, former chair and professor of education at NKU. The purpose of the NKU LGBTQ Oral History Project was to collect oral histories of individuals who self-identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and/or queer, and to create an archive of selected related documentary materials, such as transcripts, audio recordings, and photographs. These oral histories and related materials serve as a rare and invaluable record of LGBTQ lives, experiences, and perspectives and as an educational and scholarly resource for students and the general public.
Students in the Introduction to LGBTQ Studies course developed all the displayed materials in the NKU LGBTQ Oral History Project. The files are under the LGBTQ participants’ names, and NKU students are listed after each participant. All participating narrators have given consent to the public use of their oral history transcripts, recordings, and photographs. Consent has also been obtained from the additional individuals who appear in the photographs.
This is the interview of Carl Fox and Terry Bond of Newport KY. Carl Fox was born in the 50s and owned Rosie’s Tavern before opening The Crazy Fox Saloon with Terry Bond. Terry was born in the 60s and met Carl in 1996. This interview covers the experiences of these two men in the LGBTQ community from their first realizations to their recent achievements and contributions to the community.
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Eric Brose has worked at NKU for more than 21 years. He is originally from Europe, but moved around a lot due to the fact of being a military kid. During his early life, he didn’t really know much about the LGBTQ community because where he lived. He never had to address the issue, nor was it something that was spoke of.
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Mary Bucklin is 64½ years old, grew up in Jefferson, Iowa, and is a professor at Northern Kentucky University. She works in the field of women and gender studies and is a part of the LGBTQ community. In this interview, professor Bucklin speaks of her home life, schooling, and relationships that impacted her journey through the years.
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Michael Cotrell is an amputee. He currently is a Cincinnati resident. He is 45 years old. He grew up in Austin, Texas and moved to Findlay, Ohio his senior year in high school. He attended Bible college and then moved to Cincinnati, Ohio in 2002 after coming out as a gay man. He became involved in drag and an organization called the ISQCCBE also known as the Imperial Sovereign Queen City Court of the Buckeye Empire.
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Rachel Green was an only child to a professor and advocate in Oklahoma. She grew in a small town that everybody knew everybody. She identifies as a Cis Lesbian. She did have her first same sex relationship in high school. But she kept it a secret not only because it was frowned upon in her town, but it was also abusive. She didn’t want anyone to figure out that she was gay so she dated boys and focused on boys to the point that she married her high school sweetheart. But that only lasted a year and she not too long after found her life partner.
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Margret Hutchinson of Grant County, Kentucky, discusses what it was like to grow up in the 70s and 80s while being a closeted lesbian. She recalls the difficulties of being closeted, the feelings accompanying lying about herself to those close to her, and the difference coming out has made on her live. She discusses coming out to her parents and family, how she was treated by them after coming out, and the relationships she currently holds with members of her family.
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Aimee Krug speaks about her journey through transition, beginning in small town New Hampshire and dealing with early childhood repression, through her experiences transitioning at an older age. The narrator details her experiences with self-discovery and her unfurling identity through the trials of family, employment, safety, and navigating relationships as a trans woman over age 50.
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Halli Lannan is a survivor. At just 40-years old, Halli has survived the strenuous battle of breast cancer, sexual assault, and discrimination as a butch lesbian. She has persevered when faced with life’s toughest battles, obtaining two master’s degrees, a Ph. D, and advocating for the LGBTQ community and sexual assault survivors. She is recognized as a Tillman Scholar and advocates for LGBTQ youth. Halli works with the Racine Unified School district and she is now married and living with her wife and son in Wauwatosa, Wisconsin.
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I interviewed my aunt, Shay Meagle. She is my mother’s younger sister. They also have a younger brother, Bo Meagle. They were raised by their parents, Jim and Laurie Meagle. They grew up in Marietta, Ohio. Shay attended Wittenberg University and then continued onto law school. It was in law school, that she finally knew that she was a lesbian. My family is very accepting of my Aunt Shay. She had her first girlfriend in law school. She then moved the Albuquerque, New Mexico. She then found someone else and they were together for 15 years. For my entire life I grew up with her and her partner and they were both my aunts.
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Bonnie Meyer is a 42-year-old queer identifying woman. She grew up in a small town in Northwest Ohio with very little positive representations of queer people and has cut ties with most people in that community. She is happily married to her wife Katie and has 2 children. She talks about the struggles of being outed as a high school teacher and how her “second life” is much better than her “first life”. She is now an active LGBTQ advocate in both the community she lives in and the one where she works.
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Debra Myers is from Walton, which lies both in Boone and Kenton counties. She grew up on a farm, spending most of her time with family. Her social interactions at this time were limited to interactions with peers at school and family. She started to become familiar with the LGBTQ community when she was six years old, which is the first time she realized she was transgender. Throughout her years in school she was not exposed to many members of the LGBTQ community. She was married to her wife for eighteen and a half years. She is currently waiting for her transition surgery. The community in which she grew up in has made progress in being more inclusive, however, there is still progress to be made. There are several aspects that she admires within the community.
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Robin Nastal is a 39-year-old who identifies as a bisexual women. She is currently living in a condo in Howell Michigan with her fiancé Tracey and her two children. She and Tracey have been together for over a year and plan to start building their new home together soon. She works full time in a doctor’s office as a medical biller. Due to her full work load she is not currently involved in any LGBTQ organizations. She currently does not practice any religion although she was raised Catholic. Her message to anyone questioning their sexuality is to be who you are and don’t be afraid to ask for help.
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Rachel is a self-identified lesbian, that has kept this title throughout her young life and well into her adult life. She has been a part of the community down in Lexington, Kentucky. She was part of the justfundky program that helped raised money for rural county members to have representation for discrimination crimes. She has had a few partners in the community because of her dislike of the heavy use of drugs and alcohol within the community. She believes that she was first really out in college when she was approached by another woman and felt like that was the way she wanted to go. Now she works at the cabinet for Kentucky in child adoption and regularly visits and checks on her cases in a loving manner.
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Rian is currently forty years old and she grew up around the Dayton, Ohio area. She grew up with only her loving mom, so she thought she wanted the standard life where you find a husband, get married, and have kids, because it was something that she wasn’t able to have growing up. When someone has a hard time figuring out who they want to be, they find it difficult to actually live their life to its fullest potential, because they still don’t know who they are. It wasn’t until her thirties that Rian was finally able to figure out who she really wanted to be and it was then that she was able to let the people around her know who she wanted to be.
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Jonny Shultz is a 40 year old Dayton, Ohio, native who moved to Portland, Oregon on impulse due to his life in Ohio not allowing him to accept who he is. He took a gamble to finally leave behind years of childhood bullying and a city that could not understand him. It was not until Jonny arrived in Portland that he was able to come to terms with his identity as a gay man.
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