Author ‘outs’ father, who hid gayness his whole life
Karen McClintock nudged her father — and, in turn, her family — out of the closet.
The Upper Arlington native divulges her family’s deepest secret in her book “My Father’s Closet” in hopes of learning more about her father’s double life.
Though gay, Charles McClintock remained married to her mother until his death in 1987.
“I was raised with my straight father, but only by putting years of research and stories together was I able to fully know and love and embrace my gay father,” said McClintock, 63, who lives in southern Oregon but has spent the past month in residence at the Methodist Theological School of Ohio in Delaware.
A psychologist, she mainly works with individuals and churches on sexuality issues.
By writing the book — much of which takes place in Columbus, where her parents met at the now-closed North High School — she uncovered family history, including her father’s journal from when he was 19. The journal described a sexual encounter he had with a man while courting her mother.
She later found the obituary of the man with whom Charles McClintock had a romantic relationship during much of his adulthood.
With both of her parents dead for almost three decades now (her mother died nine months after her father), McClintock — who has one adult daughter herself — decided to reveal the family secret with an eye toward helping other families.
“It’s a story that is not uncommon, but it’s not often written about,” she said. “We definitely don’t have a lot of people explaining the inside of that closet.”
McClintock, who will make two appearances this week in central Ohio, spoke recently to The Dispatch about “My Father’s Closet,” released last month by the Ohio State University Press.
How did you discover your father was gay?
That’s the hardest
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