Equality Council Member Profile: Frank Benedetti & Gary Trowbridge

Frank Benedetti and Gary Trowbridge have been life partners since July 4, 1964. They will celebrate their 45^th anniversary on July 4, 2009, and we proudly salute their true marriage of minds.

Gary and Frank were actually the first same-sex couple in North Carolina to announce their anniversary in their local paper.

It’s funny, but we talk about marriage equality as if it’s a new thing. It’s good to remember that couples like Frank and Gary are the ones who have made our national conversation possible.

In a guest commentary they wrote for Q-Notes last year, they closed by saying, “We feel that we are God’s children, human beings and American citizens—and we are just as deserving and capable of love as anyone else.” Click here for the full article.

To spend time with Gary and Frank is to revel in their commitment to each other, their family, their friends, their neighbors, their city, their state, their country. To spend time with them is to laugh and to share and to feel their extraordinary warmth and generosity.

Frank and Gary have never been afraid to speak out for equality. They are regular speakers at events—as they say, they are afraid to stop—and they are avid defenders of all civil rights, but especially those of LGBT people. They have been featured in four videos and were asked to give testimony to a Senate subcommittee in Washington, DC, about their views on the proposed anti-gay marriage constitutional amendment. They received the Thomas Jefferson District President’s Award for Social Justice for the church year 2003-04 at the annual meeting in Charlotte and the PFLAG Winston-Salem award for community service in 2007.

Frank was born in New York City and joined All Souls Unitarian Church in 1959. He was graduated from college with a BA in English.  He was an officer in the United States Army and obtained the rank of captain before his enlistment was finished.

Gary was born in Kannapolis, North Carolina, but was raised in Augusta, Georgia. He served four years in the United States Air Force and obtained the rank of Airman First Class before his enlistment was finished. Gary joined the Unitarian Church in 1993.

Gary is retired from the State of Georgia and Frank is retired from Wachovia. They share their home in Winston-Salem with Abigail, their beloved two-pound Yorkie. Abigail’s health is declining, so they are currently dedicating much of their time and energy to making her remaining time with them as comfortable as possible. (Abigail died on May 21, 2009. She was much loved and the folks at Equality North Carolina extend their deepest sympathies for her loss.)