I didn't know blacklisted actor Will Geer was gay/bi.

[Smarmie Doofus]

"Grampa Walton"... that is. Wiki:


>>Geer was born in Frankfort, Indiana, the son of Katherine, a teacher, and A. Roy Ghere, a postal worker.[1] He was deeply influenced by his grandfather, who taught him the botanical names of the plants in his native state. Geer started out to become a botanist, studying the subject and obtaining a master's degree at the University of Chicago. While at Chicago he also became a member of Lambda Chi Alpha Fraternity.
He began his acting career touring in tent shows and on river boats. He worked on several left-oriented documentaries, including narrating Sheldon Dick's Men and Dust, about silicosis among miners.

Geer was also the lover of gay activist Harry Hay.[2] In 1934, Hay met Geer at the Tony Pastor Theatre, where Geer worked as an actor. They became lovers, and Hay credited Geer as his political mentor.[3] Hay and Geer participated in a milk strike in Los Angeles, where Hay was first exposed to radical gay activism in the person of "Clarabelle," a drag queen who held court in the Bunker Hill neighborhood, who hid Hay from police. Later that year, Hay and Geer performed in support of the San Francisco General Strike.>>

Incredible life. Gotta be a great biography/bioepic in there for some enterprising scribe. Go for it!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Will_geer

[BeyondGeography]

1. Jeremiah Johnson/Bear Claw

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[grasswire]

2. a real character, too.

I wish someone would make a movie about him.

[Starry Messenger]

3. GMTA

I was literally just reading this entry for the first time yesterday. What a great guy!

[Smarmie Doofus]

5. Cue the spooky twilight zone ditty.

I read a short reference to Geer ( as a victim of the blacklist) in an old Dick Cavett memoir ( an actual *book*; remember them?) yesterday and stumbled across the above when I went to investigate.

Maybe one of us is fated to do the script? Something's strange going on here.

[Starry Messenger]

7. I was reading up on the 1934 SF General Strike

LaborFest is this month in SF and it focuses on this period of history. I was riveted to find that Harry Hay and Will Geer were both there in the strike. Legendary!

[MuseRider]

4. Wow I had no idea!

He was an incredible man apparently. I always loved him. Everything he did he seemed to do well. By the time he was at Walton's Mountain he was my TV grandpa even though I was in college by then.

Great man.

[William769]

6. I didn't know either.

Thanks for the info.

[hlthe2b]

8. Ironically, I almost posted this last weekend after I saw a couple of "Grandpa" episodes on tv

I was curious about him and did a wiki search myself...


Incredible labor activist, progressive, and a pretty openly gay man when to be so was not at all accepted.

Here's a toast to Will Geer/Grandpa Walton and a wonderful progressive. You are missed.

[MarianJack]

9. I didn't know that either, but...

...I love Will Geer to this day!

PEACE!