Gerry Crane had only been a music teacher at Byron Center High School outside of Grand Rapids, Mich., for three years, but his impact on that western Michigan community was long-lasting.
Crane led the school's band to a regional award, and in his last year-end performance evaluation, William Skilling, the school's principal, said that Crane was a good role model and "one of our best teachers on staff." That was June 1995.
A year later, Crane resigned. That's because when news of his commitment ceremony with partner Randy Block began to circulate in the religious conservative community, hundreds of people showed up to school board meetings demanding "one of our best teachers on staff" be fired.
There were leaflets placed on cars in churches "warning" parishioners there was a gay teacher in their public school. Eventually the harassment not only forced Crane out of his career but also contributed to his death. The forensic pathologist who conducted the autopsy said stress was likely a contributing factor to the heart attack that killed him in January 1997.
This was the community in which I started writing about LGBTQ equality back in 1998.
And this was where I received my first death threat for doing so — and the threats haven't stopped.
So, when I saw Las Vegas Raider Carl Nassib's coming out story being met by many people on social media with "who cares?", I was triggered.
Not because for 23 years I have received a steady stream of reminders from the kind of people who do care. But because I remember that when I was interviewing for a job at the local newspaper, one of the editors said to me my being gay wouldn't be a problem. He was referring to the newsroom, of course. But I didn't live in the newsroom. I lived about 10 miles from where Crane used to teach, five miles from where his commitment ceremony was held and less than two miles from the hospital where he died.
