West Cook News

A Gay Pride display at McClure Junior High in Western Springs is turning heads.

Students sent photos of a hallway display McClure Junior High to West Cook News. The display includes slogans for transexuals as well including “Protect Trans kids” and “Trans is beautiful” as well as depicting an image of a person wearing a “Black trans beautiful” shirt. 

The display is titled “McActivist Show Pride” with the face of a bulldog, the school’s mascot, and includes several profiles of “Queer Innovators of the 20th Century” including musician David Bowie, writer James Baldwin, astronaut Sally Ride, mathematician Alan Turing and artist Frida Kahlo. 

A lesser-known figure included is gay activist and drag queen Malcolm Michaels Jr., known as Marsha P. Johnson. 

According to Out of the Closets: Voices of Gay Liberation, Michaels who worked the streets of New York as a prostitute, considered himself a transvestite, not a transexual noting, “A transvestite is still like a boy, very manly looking, a feminine boy."

Michaels founded Gay Liberation Front and co-founded the radical activist group Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries.

West Cook News first wrote about the so-called McActivists at the school after a sign appeared in a school hallway outlining the club’s goals. 

"Talk & Learn about Social Justice Issues (LGBTQIA+, BLM, etc.)," the flyer reads. 

The group is led by teachers Emily Knaub and Theresa Kelly.

"Make a positive impact on our school climate.” "LGBTQIA+" is an acronym that stands for "Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer or Questioning, Intersex, Asexual or Ally.”

Black Lives Matter-inspired protests were led by similarly activated local students in 2020. BLM is known as a political activist group that has promised to "disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure" and has called for an end to police.

McClure Junior High has an enrollment of 510. It is part of Western Springs District 101. Western Springs District 101 Board members include Caitlin Sendaydiego, Brett Lettiere, Meredith Adler, Meghan Cahill, Kate Heit, Catherine Dudley and Dan Pansing. Its superintendent is Brian Barnhart.