Bruce Francis

Q: We can talk about whatever you want to talk about in terms of what got you involved in GHAP, especially what your experience was like, but really it’s whatever you want to talk about. It’s totally your space. Just talk about whatever was important to you about the group. Or about how AIDS and the people in Columbia, what did that look like at the time.

A: Yeah, well, I remember, so this is probably ’80 … it was ’86, ’87, ’85?

Q: It was 1985. There was the university committee on AIDS, and then Laura and Paul started the group shortly after.

A: So Paul was my boyfriend then when we started. And we had been active in sort of the Columbia gay group back then. And I remember Laura coming to speak to the group. And I thought that this would be interesting to check out. I had done a little volunteering at GMHC, that we found something interesting. And what I remember about our first few months is, you know, how nerdy we were, I mean we really tried to dive into the science of understanding the immune system. So it was almost like taking a class, when we got lectures, a doctor, Eric Wiedstrom, I don’t know if you’ve come across his name, but he, I’m not sure if he was a medical student, I can’t remember. He was sort of steering us through all of that. And I remember and I kind of understand what macrophages were and all that stuff. And I think, you know, I think it took a little bit of time for us to find our focus, but I remember feeling like a great way to be involved and would be very relevant to my life and my Columbia community and all that.

Q: Yeah. What was it like counseling people back then? Because now there’s, I’ve been reading through these old advocate reports and there was just a sense of urgency that we don’t have today, because people at Columbia aren’t dying of AIDS every day, they aren’t being diagnosed. What was it like talking to people at first?

A: Well remember, there was not even an HIV test. So it was when there were a lot of people who had sexual encounters and they were freaking out. Or they would have, you know, or I don’t know if this is from Columbia or my work at GMHC, but I remember taking a call where there was someone who had a very, very, very casual, social interaction with someone she then found out was gay, or something like that. And so this is during the early gay health crisis, and there was really no way of, you know, finding out if their anxieties were well founded or not and what to do about them. So it was before the tests and, you know, the tests really changed a lot of things, but in the early days before the test it was very daunting.

Q: And then even once the test came around there was no easy way to any sort of treatment for a while too.

A: Right. Yeah. I mean that’s, I remember that we were, in the group, we were among the first people to get the test, because it became available through, I think, a doctor at St. Luke’s who was piloting something. Laura might remember that better, but we got early access to it and I remember, you know, it became a dividing line. Everybody had a pretty, I was pretty sure I was negative, and I was negative. A couple of friends of mine, including Paul, were pretty sure they were positive and they found out they were positive. And all of the sudden there was this bright line of the test. And I think it was very, very difficult, especially for those gay people who were testing positive because, like you said, there was nothing in particular to do with that information. And there were not a lot of other people out there who were in that position yet. There were a lot of people who knew that they would probably had the virus but didn’t have a way of knowing. So I remember that being a very tough time.

Q: It’s so difficult to imagine. I grew up with HIV always being a part of being gay, and having medical care for it was never a question.

A: Yeah, I mean, I think it depended on where you were on the test line. Now I was just at the very beginning of my, you know, gay sexual activity. So I was pretty sure that I was negative. But there’s other people who too. And I remember that, you know, there were quite a few people in the group, because the nature of the group, they were younger, and everyone didn’t have that much experience. So that was sort of a defining thing for them too, they were just starting their sexual lives and trying to figure out, in that funny adolescent world that when you’re in college about what my sexual self is like. And then you have this entire layer on it that no one else has really dealt with before. So that was … it was weird. It was weird. I don’t remember being terrified, because I think I have a certain sense of confidence that, well, I sort of, you know, I’ve been introduced to the concept of safe sex, but at the same time I was introduced to the concept of sex. So that was the mitigating for many of us who were younger and inexperienced too, that even though we’re coming of age in this terrifying time, we had one very concrete way of handling it.

Q: So what else did you have to do? Obviously you did the counseling, but what other activities did the group do?

A: I don’t remember a lot of activity. I remember, the things that I remember the most were studying a lot in the group, you know, trying to educate ourselves. And it was the early days of the counseling. I did a tiny bit but not a whole lot the was the early days.

Q: So that’s when like they were writing the committee report and then what would come into essentially the book?

A: Yes. Yeah. I remember Paul and Laura working on that. I’m sorry, go on?

Q: And you were also involved with the GMHC through the time?

A: Yeah. I had done a tiny bit of volunteering, and then I think due to the proximity I think the Columbia group made more sense for me. Of course I was living there in the neighborhood and it just was a lot easier.

Q: What was that like? What were the people like that you saw?

A: I remember it being a very nice atmosphere, very informal, and kind of amazing considering what they must, we went through tremendous training and certification before having the hotline. I don’t remember them doing anything, you know, for me, I was answering mostly the phone, and GMHC, which is now this, you know, very big robust organization was, yes, this little, you know, startup basically.

Laura just gets, I mean, she’s of course a very good friend of mine as well, I think she just gets so much for credit for having stuck with it, you know, all these years, it’s really kind of amazing that, you know, it was what we are talking about coming up on 30 years that, you know, that started this thing. And she just matured it into a very, it sounds like an incredibly valuable program. And I don’t think that she got that much support or encouragement from the establishment there. And I think it was an uphill battle for her. So I have enormous respect for how much perseverance and creativity and intellectual that she’s poured into it.

Q: I definitely agree, particularly in light of she was just working as a counselor. So it wasn’t her responsibility or purview at all to do this. And the student volunteers from different grad schools, that’s what it is now, but now we operate out of health services in our dedicated branch of Columbia Health and all this stuff.

A: Yeah, I mean, it sounds like it has really been embraced by the Health service where, you know, I thought that we were lucky to get access to a conference room, you know, once a week.

Q: All right. And the other thing I wanted to talk about, can you talk a little bit about some of the other people in the group? Maybe some who have stayed in contact with? Anything like that?

A: Interestingly I’ve just … I’m suddenly not sure, was Kevin Hall a part of this group?

Q: Yes. Yes.

A: Okay. Because he is in San Francisco, and I just, it’s funny, just in the past couple of months we were reconnected after many, many years. So I remember, yeah, I think this is how I became friends with Kevin and I was very close to him, Michael Dowling I was last in touch with, he’s one of my very best friends. And, of course, even though my romantic relationship with Paul ended we stayed very good friends. With all maybe my social life in that way, these core relationships, and of course, Laura who has been my best friend for all that time.

Q: Mm-hmm.

A: I think that’s the big legacy to me. I don’t do anything particularly for work anymore, but I think just the incredible people that I met were fantastic. It was also one of the first gay groups that I ever really joined and felt a real part of. So it’s valuable to me developing an identity as a gay man.

Q: So I take it you came out while at Columbia?

A: Yeah. Yeah. I was a very late bloomer. I came to Columbia after college. I went to the J [Journalism] School there. And then I stayed on for a year as a teaching fellow. And that was when I took my first little baby steps outside the closet. I think going to, I first kissed a boy at the Columbia dances. Do they still have those?

Q: Yeah, they’re on Friday nights.

A: Oh, my gosh. They were amazing. Aw. I’m glad that still goes on. I think they had them once a year or something like that back then. They didn’t have them like every Friday night. I do remember it was a highlight.

Q: I guess, I’m curious more broadly, what was it like being gay at Columbia? Right now it has this reputation of being like full of gay people, and a very welcoming place. But some of the impetus that I’ve been reading suggests that it wasn’t always like that. What was it like back then?

A: Well, you know, it’s hard for me to say. For one thing, at the J-School, was very much a part of Columbia. You know, all you were in that one building, and in fact a lot of your work is done off campus because you’re supporting that thing. So I feel that, you know, I didn’t feel like I was fully involved in the rest of Columbia. And then I was a teaching fellow there for a year until very much, and not out, and not, so you know, I didn’t have much of a radar on gay things. So I feel like I’m not a real good person to answer that.

Q: No worries.

A: It really wasn’t until later that I really thought of myself as a gay man. And so not in any particular sense of Columbia, you know, as a good or bad place for gay people. I mean Columbia did give me my first start, like I said. (Chuckle)

Q: Mm-hmm.

A: You know, I think that that’s, if anything, that’s what I think of Columbia, as, you know, a place that fostered those things. I don’t know what more outdated people would say about that time, but there were open, thriving gay groups that definitely got, you know, the full, you know, recognition and status from the university.

Q: Uh-huh. Okay. Then so after you ended being a teaching fellow, where did you go from there?

A: I just, I was trying to get jobs in journalism, and I did a lot of, I began a few years of freelance fact checking for magazines. And I sort of like, you know, built a good living doing that. And fact checking is you take a magazine, like New York magazine, and you just double check like were the drapes aqua, or were they blue? Just really mind numbingly detailed work like that. So I did that for two years. And then I got my first job in television, which is the Financial News Network, which was a precursor to CNBC. And that was in downtown Manhattan. And I loved it.

Q: How did you end up out in California?

A: Well, I had a break in television, you know, things that sort of like running around in that area wasn’t as interesting anymore, except for as a technology reporter, and the technology bust happened, so this was in 2002. I left, I’d gone on to work for CNN, then I left CNN, and I did some media framing for a while and I eventually got a job out here in California with a company called Salesforce.com. So I’m here since 2004.

Q: How do you find it?

A: Oh, I love living out here. It’s beautiful. You know, San Francisco is a fantastic city, great friendships here, a great lifestyle I’m living. I do not miss the freezing cold winters and the boiling summers of New York City, that’s for sure.

Q: We’ve covered a lot of what I wanted to get out, but was there anything else you wanted to add?

A: No, you’ve let me go through a lot of highlights. If I do think of anything I’ll shoot you an email or give you a call. It was a great experience. And, you know, I think if all I got out of it was my best friend, you know, Laura, a million times over, I have a great relationship with Laura from that and it made it all worthwhile.