In May 2023, Halifax hosted the 7th quadrennial Unison Festival — a choral event featuring Canada’s 2SLGBTQIA+ choruses. The first festival was held in Edmonton in 1998 and festivals have since been held in Toronto, Vancouver, Winnipeg, Ottawa, and Calgary. You can learn more about about the festival here.

The event in Halifax drew 22 choirs and over 1000 attendees, including members of the LGBT Purge Fund Board, who attended to see the three choral works commissioned by the Fund about the LGBT Purge. The pieces were poignant and powerful. Watch them here!

 

 

The Commanded Heart
TTBB Festival Chorus, conducted by Willi Zwozdesky

In March 2022, we announced that “Team Thunderhead,” led by Public City Architecture in Winnipeg, won the competition to design the 2SLGBTQI+ National Monument. The selection of the winning team was made by the Monument’s jury, which carefully considered feedback from our Indigenous Circle, our Monument Advisory Committee, the National Capital Commission and the public.

Over this last year, in response to feedback from these stakeholders and rightsholders, and from the LGBT Purge Fund, the design has been refined and enhanced. What was a winning concept has been developed into a full-fledged, detailed design. While some aspects of the design may still be [...]

We are pleased to share new research by Sarah Worthman on discrimination faced by 2SLGBTQ+ soldiers during World War One.

Sarah Worthman is a Master’s student from Memorial University in St John’s, Newfoundland. She reached out to the Fund last year to discuss a research project that she was undertaking to reveal the untold queer history of the Canadian Expeditionary Force in World War One.

Through her research at Veterans Affairs Canada, Sarah had discovered records of some 35 men who were charged with gross indecency. It was a purge of men who were serving their country.

Drawing from records that had never been seen, [...]

After challenging negotiations that lasted more than one year, the LGBT Purge Fund and the Department of Justice (on behalf of the Government of Canada) have reached a legal agreement regarding the provision of 15,000 more pages of historical documents relating to the LGBT Purge. This is great news, as it will allow us to receive more historical documents that will shed light on the government’s actions, policies and practices regarding the LGBT Purge. These records will be provided to us over the next two years. The LGBT Purge Fund will make these records available to the public, along with the [...]

The LGBT Purge Fund is honored to keep two eagle feathers: one gifted at the Monument’s First Indigenous Circle by Leigh Thomas, a Two-Spirit non-binary veteran from Pelican Lake First Nation; and the other by Two-Spirit Eagle Clan Michif person from St Boniface, Manitoba and citizen of the Métis Nation, Benny Michaud. These feathers represent both suffering and resilience.

Benny also created this beautiful and thoughtfully beaded case to carry the feathers. Benny told us that:

“The three poppies are for all Indigenous peoples impacted by the Purge (First Nations, Métis and Inuit). The various stems leading out to the berries represent dreams cut [...]