\u201cIt was very loving, supportive, and social,\u201d she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Anderson arrived in California during a period of tragedy, with the AIDS epidemic raging through the community, ultimately taking tens of thousands of lives<\/a> and tearing apart groups of friends, families, and couples. But in the thick of the crisis, Anderson found love. Years later, she and her wife became one of the first same-sex couples to be married at Oakland City Hall, in a 2008 ceremony conducted by then-Mayor Ron Dellums.\u00a0<\/p>\n Anderson, who is now 81, spoke with The Oaklandside at the 30th anniversary party last month of Lavender Seniors<\/a>, an organization for local LGBTQ+ elders. The group first began meeting in the 1990s at a church in San Leandro, fed up with what they saw as a lack of dedicated services in the East Bay for the \u201cgay and gray.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Last year, Lavender Seniors acquired a permanent address, becoming an official program of the Oakland LGBTQ Community Center<\/a>. John David Dupree, 83, a former Lavender board member, said the organization had been doing well on its own, bringing in grants and running robust programs. But the leadership \u201cgot old,\u201d Dupree said, and they welcomed the center\u2019s offer to take over the administration.\u00a0<\/p>\n When Lavender Seniors first got underway, \u201call us old bags were able to have a place to meet and be together, here in Oakland,\u201d said Anderson. \u201cEverything else was happening in San Francisco. People weren\u2019t throwing money at us.\u201d<\/p>\n At the November party, held at the North Oakland Senior Center, dozens of veteran Lavender Seniors joined newer folks who\u2019ve recently found the organization or aged into it. Together, they got a chance to revel in what they\u2019ve built together,\u00a0eating, schmoozing, embracing, and enjoying performances under an arc of rainbow balloons.<\/p>\n It felt special, Anderson said, \u201cto be able to have this recognition while we\u2019re still above ground.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Aging with pride<\/p>\n Lavender Seniors\u2019 mission is to help its 150-some members age with \u201chealth, happiness, and pride,\u201d now as part of the LGBTQ center\u2019s broader Elder Services program<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n The group runs a certification program for service providers that are friendly to LGBTQ+ seniors, and offers training materials to organizations on how to better support an older queer population. Much of the programming also revolves around opportunities for mutual support and socialization: regular lunches, events, and outings; support groups and social circles for older gay men and lesbians; a volunteer service that coordinates visits to isolated members. Lavender Seniors also participates in political advocacy.<\/p>\n At the anniversary party, the community center\u2019s director, Joe Hawkins, announced that Elder Services will be expanding into its own space next door to the main Grand Lake building, with drop-in services, a pharmacy, and a library. The news elicited cheers.<\/p>\n Older LGBTQ+ people are twice as likely to live alone or be single than their heterosexual counterparts and are four times less likely to have adult children, studies<\/a> have found. That means the dangers that come with isolation<\/a> for all seniors are exacerbated among queer elders.<\/p>\n Lavender Seniors\u2019 mission of marrying respect with tangible services \u201cmade me really love this group,\u201d Noela Campbell, the center\u2019s new Elder Services manager, said by email.<\/p>\n Many older LGBTQ+ people have \u201cexperienced a lifetime of prejudice and stigma, making elderly individuals distrustful of aging and healthcare providers,\u201d she said. Some members also find themselves in acute need: The center gets calls from people who can\u2019t afford long-term care or, in a few cases, have become homeless, she said.<\/p>\n Campbell plans to continue Lavender Seniors\u2019 existing programs and hopes to add visual and performing arts activities. She\u2019d also like to forge more connections between younger queer people and the seniors. The older generation can inspire and teach the young folks, she said, while the young people can assist and be in community with their elders.<\/p>\n Rich histories of struggle and connection It is impossible to have lived the past six, seven, eight, or nine decades as a queer person in the Bay Area without having experienced a remarkable and challenging life, in many cases replete with both loss and love.\u00a0<\/p>\n Dupree, the Lavender Senior former board member, does his best to document those lives while they\u2019re still being lived. In almost every issue of the Lavender Notes newsletter<\/a>, Dupree publishes a colorful, in-depth profile of one of the group\u2019s members. Over time, he\u2019s built an archive of rich, wrenching, and exciting lives.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s one of my wishes in life to make sure people are acknowledged,\u201d said Dupree, a former journalist.\u00a0<\/p>\n Dupree, who\u2019s also covered his own life<\/a>, said he first knew he was gay as a 6-year-old in Michigan, but didn\u2019t come out until he was a 30-year-old post-doc at UC Berkeley with a wife and two children. After a messy divorce and the traumatic, if temporary, loss of contact with his children \u2014 a product in part of attitudes about gay fathers in the 1970s \u2014 Dupree got married to a man, with whom he still lives happily in East Oakland. The couple adopted four children together.<\/p>\n In 1978, Dupree got a job at the Pacific Center for Human Growth<\/a> in Berkeley, which describes itself as the Bay Area\u2019s oldest LGBTQ center. He led the group\u2019s advocacy work, including a campaign to remove a fear-mongering video warning male students about homosexuals that was shown in schools across Alameda County at the time. The center\u2019s vague name was chosen because no organization explicitly supporting gay people could receive funding then, Dupree said. At the center\u2019s founding, in 1973, homosexuality had not yet been decriminalized in the state.<\/p>\n Not long after the HIV epidemic emerged, Dupree helped launch the AIDS Project of the East Bay. He hosted nightly support groups for gay people and their family members who were struggling under the emotional weight of experiencing loss after loss.<\/p>\n His dedication to the cause soon took him abroad, as a \u201cGlobal AIDS Warrior\u201d for the U.S. Agency for International Development. The work brought him and his family to dozens of countries, where he forged deep connections with local gay communities. He said he worked with local activists to put on the first pride march on the continent of Africa, in Johannesburg, South Africa, in 1990<\/a>.<\/p>\n Confronting a rollback of rights<\/p>\n Dupree said it was painful, after being at the forefront of many successful struggles for rights and recognition, to see so much of that progress stripped away in 2025. President Donald Trump dismantled the agency that employed Dupree to help battle the global AIDS crisis, and his administration has systematically deleted all references to LGBTQ+ Americans from government websites, issued anti-trans executive orders<\/a>, and canceled dozens of grants<\/a> supporting queer healthcare.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWhen he was reelected, I\u2019d read a lot of Project 2025 and I knew what was in store,\u201d Dupree told The Oaklandside. \u201cI went through probably the most profound depression of my life, where I just felt like everything I had worked for\u2026was flushed down the toilet.\u201d<\/p>\n Although many in the room said they have witnessed a lifetime of discrimination, Dupree said this moment feels different.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cInstitutionalized homophobia was alive and well from the time I was born in 1942 to currently,\u201d he said, \u201cbut it never had so much the force of all the levers of power as it does right now.\u201d<\/p>\n While communities across the Bay Area are experiencing a sense of crisis over the administration\u2019s attacks, some Lavender Seniors told us it can feel especially scary for people living the last chapters of their lives and needing more support than before.<\/p>\n \u201cSometimes you feel hopeless and sad,\u201d Anderson said.\u00a0<\/p>\n But the pessimism and fear were blissfully relegated to the background during the November celebration, for at least a few hours.\u00a0<\/p>\n![\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/-Lavender-seniors.jpg\")
Oakland LGBTQ Community Center director Joe Hawkins, left, embraces Noela Campbell, the center\u2019s new elder services manager. Credit: Estefany Gonzalez for The Oaklandside<\/p>\n
\n![\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/1765924388_932_-Lavender-seniors.jpg\")
John David Dupree,\u00a0a\u00a0former Lavender Seniors board member, was at the forefront of the battle against\u00a0AIDS and the homophobia that\u00a0was omnipresent at the time. Credit: Estefany Gonzalez for The Oaklandside<\/p>\n![\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/1765924388_52_-Lavender-seniors.jpg\")
Gary Turner, who\u00a0said he\u00a0identifies as \u201ckind of a troublemaker,\u201d was a prominent member of\u00a0Boston\u2019s bear\u00a0scene.\u00a0He was profiled several years ago in the Lavender Seniors\u2019 newsletter, Lavender Notes<\/a>. Credit: Estefany Gonzalez for The Oaklandside<\/p>\n![\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/1765924388_922_-Lavender-seniors.jpg\")
Jerry Geffner said his history fighting for gay rights has been closely interwined with his participation in the struggles for other leftist and social justice causes. Credit: Estefany Gonzalez for The Oaklandside<\/p>\n![\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/1765924389_141_-Lavender-seniors.jpg\")
Mothertongue Feminist Theater performs the writing of Corky Wick at the Lavender Seniors 30th anniversary party in November at the North Oakland Senior Center. Credit: Estefany Gonzalez for The Oaklandside<\/p>\n![\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/1765924389_457_-Lavender-seniors.jpg\")
New elder services manager Noela Campbell wipes away tears while talking with a Lavender Seniors member. Credit: Estefany Gonzalez for The Oaklandside<\/p>\n