Chris McGinnis
All right, so we were talking about how Chapel Hill was a gay friendly town, how it was very accepting. Some people have talked about it being more laissez faire, more than—
Bill Hull
Very much so, very much. Something in your original paper that I did not see, which was something that was made very evident to me was talking about going to my first gay party ever on Chapel Hill on Meadow Brook Lane right behind that cow or whatever it is that Sunshine Biscuit place up there. There was this wonderful house and everybody that I met there, I am still good friends with. But, the next day, the Monday that I went to my first orientation, I went to which was, to me, the most wonderful place in the whole world was Lenoir Hall. That cafeteria was at that point, in 1963 of September was the meeting place of everyone to plan out their schedules. I went there by myself, sat at a table with my tray of food, two people that I had met the night before came up to me, no they had seen me there, I did not meet them, they came up, mentioned that they had seen me at the party and could they join me. I said, of course, we became instant fast friends and I missed the rest of orientation sitting there because people would come in, pull up another table and before I knew it, dinner was being served and there must have been twenty five or thirty people there, meeting, talking, meeting me, welcoming me to the community.
Chris McGinnis
And they were all gay people?
Bill Hull
All gay people, and faculty and students. It was wonderful.
Chris McGinnis
Isn’t that amazing.
Bill Hull
I have never felt more accepted and more real in my entire life.
Chris McGinnis
Wow, that is very impressive.
Bill Hull
I would go to Lenoir Hall, you ate all of your meals there, and there was invariably just tables of people there that would all pull the tables up to this big enclaves of gay people, some were outrageous, we were hootie, we were loud and not one ever looked at us—
Chris McGinnis
No one ever batted an eyelash.
Bill Hull
No one ever batted an eye. It was wonderful. Lenoir Hall to me was sort of like my introduction to Chapel Hill Society, other than the gay party that I went to the previous Saturday night of my Monday orientation; I knew probably a good portion of the spectrum of Chapel Hill gay people.
Chris McGinnis
So the gay community was very integrated then and very—
Bill Hull
Totally integrated.
Chris McGinnis
Were those, were these professors openly gay, or did they—
Bill Hull
Yes.
Chris McGinnis
Did some of them have wives?
Bill Hull
They were not openly gay, they were just obviously gay. I mean, they were not cruising and accosting people.
Chris McGinnis
[Laughter] I didn’t mean it that way.
Bill Hull
I know, but they were not, in any way, no. They were openly gay and probably less openly gay than they might have been ten years before I got there, because Chapel Hill in the 50s, I understand was really quite outrageous—
Chris McGinnis
In terms of repressive?
Bill Hull
No, as far as people being flamboyant—
Chris McGinnis
So, people were even more outrageous.
Bill Hull
Yeah, maybe so, people were sort of—well, you could get away with it in Chapel Hill.
Chris McGinnis
And that was during McCarthyism.
Bill Hull
Yes, was it ever. It became almost a counter reaction, I think.