2025 Season Opener Newsletter

Dear LGBTQ+ and Friends Community,

Hello to everyone and we are so looking forward to seeing you soon at Chautauqua! This e-mail is going to everyone who signed up to be on our e-mail list for LGBTQ+ and Friends at Chautauqua. It details LGBTQ+ and Friends activities and events planned for the 2025 season.

Chautauqua Belle Pride Celebration 
Tuesday, July 15 at 6:00 pm, departing from the Chautauqua Bell Tower at 6:30 pm. This is really fun so we are doing it again. To celebrate Pride, we have booked the entire Chautauqua Belle Steamship for a 2-hour tour of Chautauqua Lake.  Tickets are $75 per person, which includes appetizers and the boat ride. Drinks are available for purchase. There will be a maximum of 75 tickets sold, so if you will be in Chautauqua Week 4, buy your tickets now. And wear your best Pride T-shirt! Note that this year there will be a rain date on Thursday, July 17 in case there is super bad weather on Tuesday, July 15.

Tickets will be sold through Eventbrite. Click the following link to go to the page to buy tickets: Pride on the Belle. Or you can find the same link on our website at: LGBTQ+ and Friends at Chautauqua. Please note that the boat leaves at 6:30, so it is important to be at the Miller Bell Tower early to show your ticket, and fill out a name tag. Thanks to Barbara Britton and Catie Miller for arranging things with the Belle and managing the event! 

Panel: Book Bans: Fighting Censorship and Celebrating our Diversity
Friday, August 8 at 12:15 pm at Smith-Wilkes Hall

This panel discussion will focus on the impact of banning books on the LGBTQ+ community. So far, we have John Spears, head librarian at Buffalo-Erie and Jamie Lyn Smith, Ohio Chapter Lead for PEN America confirmed to be on the panel. This topic couldn’t be more timely given current events. Many thanks to Rhoda Schulzinger and Steve Rozner for organizing this! 

Intermezzo Gathering After Theater

Tuesday, July 22 at the Intermezzo Bar, St. Elmo’s Basement

So, this annual event is really, really fun. We all buy our own tickets to the 4:00 pm performance of Chautauqua Theater Company’s “Execution of Justice” and then after the show we will gather at the Intermezzo to meet the cast and crew and share food and drink. Cash bar. No RSVP needed. For questions, e-mail Terry Horner at terry.horner@mac.com. You can find details about the play and purchase tickets through the Chautauqua Institution website, but just let me say that this play is a doozie. Many thanks to Terry Horner for organizing this event!

Dancing with the Stars of Chautauqua

Sunday, June 29 at Norton Hall (Drinks at 7:30, Performances at 8:30)

So this is fun! The CHQ Dance Circle is doing a "Dancing with the Stars" type benefit event to raise funds for dance scholarships. There will be MCs (Anita Lin and Bonnefoux McBride), Judges (Tom Becker, Laura Savia and Wes Delancey), and of course Dancers. Click  here for a full list of Dancers, but note that Deborah Sunya Moore, Marty Merkley and Jade Kim Carroll are in the line-up. You can also buy tickets at that link. The event is at Norton Hall on Sunday, June 29 with drinks starting at 7:30 and performances starting at 8:30. (Yes, you can come to the LGBTQ+ and Friends Meet and Greet on the porch first and then mosey on over to Norton.) Tickets are $150 (I know it's pricey, but it's a benefit after all). It's going to be a hoot!

Sunday Community Activity Fairs 
Sundays (on Weeks 1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7 and 9) from Noon to 1:30 in Bestor Plaza. Informational tables about the various Community Groups at Chautauqua are set up in Bestor Plaza on Sundays at noon. We have a table (and a rather handsome banner) but we need volunteers to mind our table and answer questions about LGBTQ+ and Friends activities and events at Chautauqua. Bree Dietly is going to coordinate the volunteers, and she has asked for more volunteers this season. It’s a really nice hour and a half on a Sunday, and you only have to commit to one Sunday.  If you would like to volunteer, please e-mail Bree at bdietly@gmail.com. Many thanks to Bree for coordinating our volunteers! This is actually a very cool program and is especially beneficial and welcoming to first-time visitors to Chautauqua. 

Sunday Night Meet and Greet Social Hour 
We will be having our weekly Meet and Greet Social hour each Sunday from 6:30 pm to 9:30 pm on the porch of the Athenaeum Hotel. The hotel lobby bar will remain open until midnight, but our event ends at 9:30. This year (due to popular demand) we are also going to do a Meet and Greet Week 10, which is Sunday, Aug 24 from 6:30 pm to 9:30 pm at the Athenaeum. We are looking for hosts for all weeks this year. As host you will sponsor the cheese board that the hotel puts out. This year it will be about $220 plus tip so it might be a good idea to share hosting duties. As host you will welcome people to the porch, assist with name tags, help those who look a little lost find a connection and direct people to our website to sign up to be on our e-mail list if they are not already on it.  Please contact Karen James at karenjames@me.com if you would like to host a Meet and Greet. Many thanks to Karen for managing this!

LGBTQ+ and Friends Discussion Group. Bring your lunch. 
Our weekly discussion group will be held each Tuesday at 12:15 in the Garden Room of the Literary Arts Center. Catie Miller will facilitate. Big kudos to Catie for facilitating all these years. We appreciate you! The themes for 2025 are as follows:

Week 1: Transforming Ourselves through the Power of Intention

Week 2: Humor: An Essential Ingredient for a Healthy and Vital Person

Week 3: Creativity and Community: Art as Medicine

Week 4: Humanity’s Struggle to Create an Exceptional Future for All

Week 5: Questioning the Intention of Capitalism

Week 6: What You See Is What You Get: Resisting the Authoritarian Mindset

Week 7: A Week of Literary Delight

Week 8: Middle East Rising

Week 9: Moving Beyond History Simply Repeating Itself

History of LGBTQ+ at Chautauqua

Molly Merchant, Deb Manzella and Jack Kenny are co-leads on this project. The team has collected information from local archives and would like to add individual stories and experiences. Your story is our history. If you wish to share yours or you would like to be a recorder for someone else’s story, please contact Mollie Merchant at mb.merchant@gmail.com.

Baseball Shirts 
Jeff Currier has a super idea of selling LGBTQ+ and Friends at Chautauqua baseball shirts this season. He is going to offer sizes S, M, L, XL and XXL in the following colors: Cardinal, Royal Blue, Forest, Purple, Black and White. “LGBTQ+ and Friends at Chautauqua” will be embroidered on them and they will be piped in rainbow piping. Cost will be $50 per shirt, including tax. He will donate $5 per shirt sold to LGBTQ+ and Friends. This is a terrific way for us to remain visible at Chautauqua this summer, expressing our sense of identity and right to exist, without overtly threatening anyone else’s sense of identity. Also, be sure to wear the Rainbow Lanyards that Terry Horner worked so hard to provide us with last year! E-mail Jeff Currier at jeffreyscurrier@gmail.com for more information, pre-orders, or to volunteer to help Jeff with this. Thank you Jeff!

Brick

Yes, we bought a Brick! It’s an 8x8 brick that says “LGBTQ+ and Friends at Chautauqua.” Many thanks to Terry Horner for facilitating this. Look for it up near the Welcome Center! 

Financial Oversight Committee

As we continue to grow, we want to make sure that all of our financials are fully transparent and the accounts are in order. Many thanks to Karen James, Christopher Griffith, Janet Hinkle, Terry Horner, Tim Holland, MJ Johnston, and DeDe Hughes for serving on the committee.

Fundraising 
As things have gotten more expensive in general, Community Groups at Chautauqua (such as LGBTQ+ and Friends) are now required to pay for the use of Institution venues. Additionally, our cost for using the Athenaeum Porch for our Sunday Meet and Greets has also gone up considerably. Not complaining, just saying. We definitely could use some help. LGBTQ+ and Friends at Chautauqua is totally self-funded and we appreciate any donations you can make to the group to help fund our continuing activities as well as our website maintenance costs. Donations to LGBTQ+ and Friends at Chautauqua are not tax-deductible. If you would like to donate, please make out your check to:

LGBTQ+ and Friends
And then mail the check to:

Hughes/Britton 
P.O. Box 1367 
Chautauqua, NY 14722

Or you can venmo us @lgbtq-chq

Finally, we want to send out a huge thank you to Michael Hill for his years of service as Chautauqua’s President. We are so sad to see you and Peter go, but wish you wonderful things in your new role as President of Randolph-Macon College. It has been our honor to know you and we look forward to seeing you both when you visit Chautauqua!

Thank you and see you all soon!

LGBTQ+ and Friends at Chautauqua