DOGE has axed a $250,000 grant for LGBTQ+ historical markers in Ohio.
Ohio History Connection, the state’s largest nonprofit history organization, received a federal grant of $249,810 in 2022 to fund the Marking Diverse Ohio project.
Led by the organization’s Gay Ohio History Initiative, the grant funding included supporting the research and placement of 10 LGBTQ+ historical markers. The project was “aimed at commemorating stories and places reflecting the impact of LGBTQ+ Ohioans in shaping the state’s history,” NBC4 News reports.
Research efforts to place a marker where Ohio’s first and longest-running lesbian bar once stood served as the prototype for Marking Diverse Ohio, according to Ohio History Connection.
DOGE announced on April 3 it canceled the grant to Ohio History Connection. It was among $25 million worth of funds awarded by the Institute of Museum and Library Services that have been cut.
The OHC dedicated a sign commemorating Summit Station at 2210 Summit Street in Columbus in June 2023. According to an article on Ohio History Connection's website, the grant didn’t pay for the bar’s marker but rather a sponsorship group called Friends of Summit Station.
Summit Station, also known as Jack’s and Logan’s Off Broadway, was one of the first lesbian pubs in the nation. The bar welcomed patrons for nearly four decades before closing in 2008. According to the organization's website, it also served as the home for HIS Kings, one of the earliest drag king troops, who launched the International Drag King Extravaganza.
A sign posted outside declared: “Ladies Night. Every night. Men $5.”
Part of the marker reads: “Staff welcomed women from small towns, women working in trades, women of color, butch/femme lesbians, and transgender people. Regulars recall that stepping through the door felt like finally entering a place of true belonging. Women could dance, “get together,” break up, sing karaoke, party with friends, and celebrate birthdays and holidays.”
No other LGBTQ+ signs have been erected by Ohio History Connection since Summit’s marker installation, NBC4 News reports.
However, the signs are part of a larger effort to expand research and historical documentation pertaining to the LGBTQ+ community. Similar to signs at state historic sites, the historical markers highlight stories and places of LGBTQ+ Ohioans in shaping the state’s history.
“The MDO program is part of the Ohio History Connection’s larger effort to tell, share, and uplift communities that have been historically excluded from the Ohio Historical Marker Program,” according to an article by Svetlana Harlan, Community Engagement Coordinator, posted on the OHC’s website. “We want every Ohioan to see themselves reflected in our nearly 1,800 Ohio Historical Markers.”
Summit’s marker is the third in the state dedicated to the LGBTQ+ community and the only one in central Ohio. The first honors Ohio-born Natalie Clifford Barney, a lesbian writer who hosted a literary salon in Paris. According to OHC's LGBTQ+ Historical Markers webpage, Barney’s marker was installed near the Dayton Metro Library in 2009.
In 2017, a second marker was placed on West 29th Street in Cleveland to honor the neighborhood’s vibrant LGBT community and the LGBT civil rights movement near the Lesbian-Gay Community Service Center site.
According to the About Us webpage, the Ohio History Connection, formerly the Ohio Historical Society, provides history services for Ohio, houses the State Historic Preservation Office, the official state archives, and the Community Engagement Department, and manages more than 50 sites and museums across Ohio.
As DOGE continues its cost-cutting measures, protestors gathered nationwide for “Hands Off” events nationwide to rally against the Trump administration and Elon Musk’s efforts to cut waste, fraud, and abuse in government agencies.
Other grants awarded by the Institute of Museum and Library Services then cut by DOGE include $265,000 for Queens College in New York to research “why BIPOC teens” read Japanese comic books, $140,000 for the University of South Carolina to create “safe spaces for LGBTQIA+ individuals” in libraries, $6.7 million for the California State Library to “enhance equitable library programs,” and more.
Musk’s department also recently slashed an Ohio State professor’s grant worth nearly $700,000 that was studying the link between cannabis use disorder and LGBTQ+ women, NBC4 reported.
