25 years of pride at Penn

They used to hold parties in the basement of the ARCH, plastering newspapers over the windows to protect the anonymity of the attendees.

But for the current Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual Transgender community on campus, these carefully guarded gatherings are a thing of the past.

Now, with rainbow-colored lights - rather than newsprint - covering the windows of the Hall of Flags, the LGBT Center commemorated its 25th anniversary on Saturday night with an extravagant, $125-a-plate banquet celebration.

"We're one of the only LGBT centers in the country that can say we've been here for 25 years," said College senior and planning committee member Cynthia Wright. "That's a huge accomplishment."

In 1982 the Center officially opened when director Bob Schoenberg was asked to join the Penn staff as a resource for LGBT students. He was only the second person in the entire country to assume such a role on a college campus.

Schoenberg began as a graduate student, working only two days a week out of a cramped corner in Houston Hall.

Now the full-time director of the Center, Schoenberg heads up one of the largest LGBT resource centers in the country - and the only one housed in a free-standing building.

"At Penn, we're proud we're at the center of it," said President Amy Gutmann in opening remarks she delivered to the packed audience of around 300 students, alumni and staff.

"We were truly leaders in creating a welcoming campus and educating people about what it means to be non-discriminating," she added.

The banquet night was marked by laughter and tears, which is not a surprise considering the "landmark" that is the LGBT Center, said 2007 College alumna and assistant director of the Alumni Council on Admissions Lex Ruby Howe, who served on the planning committee.

"It's hard not to get emotional about the impact the Center has had on the 300 people [in attendance] and on the thousands beyond them," she said before the event. "There will be many times my face shows a smile and many times my face drips a little bit."

Ruby Howe was not alone in her eagerness to celebrate the leadership that Penn has taken in LGBT advocacy and the progress that the Center has made since the days of open hate crimes on campus, like the violent beating of a gay student in the early 1980s.

"I was grateful to be present at the beginning, and I'm thrilled to be here tonight," said 1985 College alumnus David Goodhand, a student at Penn when the Center opened.

The program also included letters of recognition from Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell, Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter and the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission, all congratulating the Center on its success.

The event was met by an overwhelming response when tickets sold out far more quickly than the Planning Committee had expected. Not only did the event reach full capacity, but it also had a waiting list maintained up until the banquet itself of about a dozen hopefuls.

Gutmann joked in her opening remarks that it was the "only party on campus for which there is a waiting list."

Much of the banquet was underwritten by substantial private donations and by the sponsorship of the Campbell's Soup Company, cutting student ticket prices to $20 so that the Planning Committee could ensure a diverse attendance.

"We wanted there to be discourse across the generations," Schoenberg said.

The deliberate mixture of alumni and current students provided an exciting opportunity to "spark more change," Ruby Howe said.

"I hope the alumni and the students in the room will pay it forward," she said. "Their responsibility to change is not done and will never be done."

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