Impactful lives, remembered

Boston lost three LGBTQ icons in the last week of the year

I read Joseph P. Kahn’s “Finding lessons for life in accounting of 2023’s deaths” (Page A1, Jan. 1) and was stunned to learn of so many deaths of which I had been unaware. I was saddened to see the names of two friends on the list of other notable deaths — Mary-Catherine Deibel, of UpStairs at the Pudding; and theoretical physicist Stanley Deser, whose passing I had not known about.

I wanted to add three names of people who died in the last week of the year, all of whom were icons in the Massachusetts LGBTQ community as well as the community at large.

Ann Maguire was the campaign manager for Elaine Noble, who with her election to the Massachusetts House in 1974 became the first openly gay person elected to state-level office in the United States; the first mayor’s liaison to the lesbian and gay community, and director of neighborhood services for the city, under Ray Flynn; campaign manager for Tom Menino’s first mayoral run and, later, chief of health and human services in his Cabinet; and a founding member of the National Breast Cancer Coalition.

Dermot Meagher was one of the cofounders of the Massachusetts Lesbian and Gay Bar Association; the first openly gay judge in Massachusetts, appointed by then-governor Michael Dukakis; and a member of the Boston Human Rights Commission under Flynn. His work resulted in the virtual abolition of bail bondsmen and reform of the pretrial release system in Massachusetts.

Orlando Del Valle was former executive director of the Latino Health Network/Institute and liaison to the Latino community under Dukakis and founder of Club Antorcha, a social club for Latino gay men.

Their impact has been far-reaching.

RICHARD KINNY-GIGLIO Weymouth