Jim Zipper

Abstract

James Leo “Jim” Zipper, born in 1938, was a gay man living in Lynn who wanted to make the world a more beautiful place for gays and lesbians. He graduated from Lynn Trade High School as the class president. After four years in the Air Force, he worked as a test engineer at several technology companies and taught electronics at Peabody Vocational School. He died of complications from AIDS in 1993. Jim Zipper was interviewed by Janet Kahn on December 1, 1983. He speaks about the Light House Cafe and other bars, living a divided life with fear, guilt, and shame, suicide, coming out to friends, co-workers, family, and to himself, betrayal by a priest, relations with police, excessive drinking, getting sober, and his hopes for a more beautiful world for people like himself.