On the side which faces US 60, the marker calls Dr. John Fryer “a pioneering advocate for LGBTQ+ rights, community mental health, addiction treatment, AIDS activism, and the national hospice movement.” On the other side, the sign remembers “Dr. Anonymous,” the name he signed up to speak under when he addressed the American Psychiatric Association as a gay psychiatrist in 1972.
“Now, of course, in the 1970s, homosexuality was still listed as a mental disorder," said Dr. Jonathan Coleman, co-founder and president of the Faulkner Morgan Archive. "It was also illegal in most states within the United States.”
To protect his identity, Dr. Fryer wore a giant suit and rubber mask, and delivered his speech through a voice modulator
“He knew if he was found out as a gay psychiatrist, he would almost certainly lose his license, but he could also lose his freedom.”
Dr. Fryer spoke against the APA’s listing of homosexuality as a mental illness in their Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, arguing that being gay is baked into the human experience, and isn’t something which should be hidden, feared, or pathologized. Though the speech wasn’t recorded, his notes - written on a yellow legal pad - are held by the Historical Society of Pennsylvania.
...[A]ll of us have something to lose. We may not be considered for that professorship, the analyst down the street may stop referring us his overflow, our supervisor may ask us to take a leave of absence. We are taking an even bigger risk, however, in not living fully our humanity, with all of the lessons it has to teach all the other humans around us. This is the greatest loss, our honest humanity, and that loss leads all those others around us to lose that little bit of their humanity as well.Dr. John Fryer as "Dr. Anonymous" in his 1972 speech
The following year, the APA removed homosexuality from the DSM.
“I think what we can take from Dr. Fryer's story is that truth is not a luxury; it is a responsibility," said Coleman. "And sometimes even when the spotlight isn't warm, and there is a lot of risk in speaking the truth, we still have an ethical responsibility to do so.”