Date: Fri, 17 Mar 1995 23:22:46 -0500
From: Juanski@aol.com

NEWS RELEASE:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE, SATURDAY, MARCH 18, 1995

                 Young East Texas auctioneer to receive
                  first national Human Rights Award for
                                 Bravery

     HOUSTON -- Wesley Beard, a 22-year-old  auctioneer from Jacksonville,
Texas, who
braved death threats and verbal abuse to bring to the attention of his native
East Texas to the
horror of violence against gay and lesbian people, is the first recipient of
an annual award for
bravery.
     The Human Rights Award for Bravery consists of a $2,500 cash prize and a
unique
cast bronze trophy designed by Kelly Gale Amen, a prominent Houston
artist/designer. It will
be presented March 31 at the second "Healing the Hurt" conference on
homophobia
sponsored by the Houston chapter of PFLAG (Parents, Family and Friends of Lesb
ians Gays),
which also sponsors the award.
     The Bravery Award will be made each year to the one person in the United
States
who has risked the most, personally or professionally, during the previous
year, said the Rev.
Don Sinclair, PFLAG-Houston president.
     "For years we have struggled with the question of how to best encourage
all
Americans to speak up in behalf of the basic human rights that gay men and
lesbians are born
with but are too often denied them because of their God-given sexuality,"
said Sinclair, pastor
of Bering Memorial United Methodist Church.
     "We finally realized that by rewarding people for their courageous acts
and words,
we would encourage further courageous acts and words," Sinclair added.
"Although it was the
award judges who selected Wesley, we are grateful because no one can doubt
his courage in
standing up to hate and violence."
     Beard first came out as a gay man in March, 1993, when he appeared on a
local
television news show in his hometown of Jacksonville, Texas. He did so not
knowing how
his community's reaction would affect his antique auctioneer business, which
he had nurtured
since his high school days.
     Late in that year,  Beard was horrified by the news out of Tyler of a
gay-bashing
murder of a 23-year-old gay man. Nicholas Ray West had been abducted, driven
to a remote
sand pit, beaten and then shot nine times until he died.
     Beard set out to bring the incident to the area's media attention, and
then to organize a
"Stop the Hate" rally in Tyler. The Jan. 8, 1994 rally drew some 700 people
from across the
state to the park from which West had been abducted.

                                                                (more)
     Ignoring threats to his life, Beard also appeared on various national
television news
broadcasts and was quoted in numerous publications, including The New York
Times and
Time magazine.
     "He refused to let the story die, refused to permit this ugly, anti-gay
hate crime go
unnoticed," said the Rev. Mel White of the Universal Fellowship of
Metropolitan Community
Churches, who recently went on a hunger strike in a Virginia jail until
televangelist Pat
Robertson agreed to meet with him to talk about gay issues.
     White's remarks were part of the nominating packet submitted by
PFLAG-Dallas.
     Beard continued his activism through 1994 and late in the year began
organizing a
second "Stop the Hate" rally, which took place in Tyler last month.
     It was Beard's persistence in a large area still widely known for lack
of tolerance that
impressed the five judges, who gave him three first-place votes and two
second-place votes in
their tabulations.
     "Wesley clearly put himself in financial and physical risk," said Collie
Conoley, an
educational psychology professor at the University of Nebraska, who served as
one of the
judges. "To be successful in his endeavors, he was required to overcome many
roadblocks
and it sounds as if he did a great deal without much support."
     Beard was chosen from a list of nominees that included White, Col.
Margarethe
Cammermeyer, for her battle against the military's ban on lesbians and gays;
 Houston Grand
Opera General Director David Gockley, for conceiving and pushing through the
production of
Harvey Milk; and Shannon Byrne, who was forced to publicly confront her lesbia
nism when
her father, the chairman of the Cobb County, Ga., Commission, voted for a
resolution saying
the "homosexual lifestyle" violates community standards.
     Judges for the award were Conoley; Houston civil rights lawyer Frances
Farenthold, a
former Texas state representative and former president of Wells College;
Harriet Dart,
founder of PFLAG-Detroit; Brooks Egerton, an assistant city editor with The
Dallas Morning
News who is chairman of the Texas chapter of the National Lesbian and Gay
Journalists
Association; and Vicki Torres, a Los Angeles Times business writer who also
writes on
minority and lesbian issues  for the Washington Blade.
     The award will be presented at the conference's first-day luncheon in
the Sheraton
Astrodome Hotel, which will feature Democratic Party fundraiser David Mixner
as keynote
speaker.

   -30-

For more information on the award, call:
     Don Sinclair, 526-1017
     Gail Rickey, 440-0353
     Craig Stevens, 528-6477