http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.13013/3540 2026-03-08T16:41:59Z http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.13013/3574 Tony Lecondino Lecondino, Tony; Darien, Andrew Tony grew up in Revere in an Italian-American family composed of his father, a mechanic, his mother, a homemaker, and a younger sister, whom he adored. He attended Catholic school as a child but, as an independent thinker, questioned many of its teachings. He attended Revere High School but was bored with the curriculum so he joined a technical high school program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. When Lecondino’s parents divorced, he skipped his senior year and joined the US Navy at the height of the Vietnam War. Although he was near combat in Cambodia, he never directly experienced it. The Navy opened up new worlds of travel and sexual experimentation. Still, he lived a “double life” as a closeted man on the ship and a gay one on land. He was honorably discharged due to an injury and would later throw himself into the nightlife of Boston and the North Shore. He got into the music scene, was a DJ, and served as an undercover detective for Jay Collins at Fran’s Place. He would eventually become Fran’s bartender and DJ. Tony helped usher the bar through a new era of openness, dance, music, and integration and even converted a group of hostile Hell’s Angels to allies. He concludes the interview with a story about saving Fran's Place during the 1981 fire that burned down much of the neighborhood. 2024-04-13T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.13013/3575 Trey Young Young, Trey; Darien, Andrew Born Beverly in 1964 and a lifelong resident of Lynn, Young was raised with his older sister and younger brother by a strong but challenging single mother. Young’s grandfather moved the family to Massachusetts to avoid the fate of generations of ancestors who worked in the South Carolina cotton plantations. Life in Massachusetts proved difficult. Growing up in Memorial Street Projects came with many hardships, including “cockroaches and rats the size of cat.” Young’s mother struggled to make ends meet while working in a factory job at Wayne Manufacturing, where Young would be recruited at age 15 to help pay the family bills. Young describes an especially harrowing scene of violence when coming out his mother, who was a devout Southern Baptist. Despite being sent to work at age 15, Young earned a GED and graduated from North Shore Community College with a degree in Art History. They would go on to work in various jobs, none of which was as satisfying as working as a bouncer in Fran’s Place. Young speaks fondly of the family and community in Fran’s, which later spurred him to AIDS activism and fight for marriage equality. He discusses the empowerment and expenses of gender-affirming surgery, as well as his admiration for the younger generation of LGBTQ+ activists. 2024-04-04T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.13013/3569 Sunil Gulab Gulab, Sunil; Darien, Andrew Sunil Gulab is an artist, environmental scientist, and community organizer who has been an active member of the Lynn community for more than two decades. Born in Harare and raised in Chivhu, Gulab occupied an “in-between” space as an ethnic Indian in the apartheid state of Zimbabwe. He attended Huntington College in Montgomery, Alabama, where he encountered an eerily similar racial system that separated blacks from whites. After college, he moved to Jamaica Plain, where he worked as an au pair for a lesbian couple. As he grew comfortable expressing his gay identity, he eventually made his way to Lynn, a city for which he has enormous respect and affection. He attended several gay bars but was most at home at 47 Central. He served for ten years as a mentor for NAGLY (The North Shore Alliance for GLBTQ+ Youth), during which time he received his MBA from Boston College. His interview discussed racial systems of power, identity politics, and generational differences in the LGBTQ+ community. 2024-03-21T00:00:00Z http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.13013/3571 Tia Cole Cole, Tia; Darien, Andrew Tia Cole, born in 1984 and raised in the Highlands of Lynn, is the oldest of four children and the mother of three. She is a graduate of Lynn English, where she was a founding member of the GSA and North Shore Community College. Her family has deep roots on the North Shore, as far back as the 17th century. She describes her upbringing as “rough and tumble” but with a good deal of affection and community. Tia started going to Fran’s Place after school as a teenager, and she remembers it as a quiet and supportive place to work. Her January 2024 interview discusses being a “queer kid” and the dress code and cultural conflict with the administration at Lynn English, a battle she fought while remaining closeted to her parents. Tia talks about the changing language of gender and sexual identity among various generations. She also talks about serving as a surrogate and the painful ostracization from the LGBTQ+ community when she, as a polyamorous person, began a relationship with a man. Her interview addresses strategies for pushing back against religious arguments about LGBTQ+ people. 2024-01-31T00:00:00Z