Anita Bryant
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| Anita Bryant | ||
|---|---|---|
| Background information | ||
| Birth name | Anita Jane Bryant | |
| Born | March 25, 1940 (age 67) | |
| Origin | Barnsdall, Oklahoma | |
| Genre(s) | Pop Music | |
| Years active | 1957-Present | |
| Label(s) | Carlton Records, Columbia Records | |
Anita Jane Bryant (born March 25, 1940, in Barnsdall, Oklahoma) is an American singer who made a series of television commercials for Florida orange juice. A member of the Southern Baptist Convention, she is best remembered today for campaigning in the mid-1970s to repeal a local ordinance in Miami, Florida, that prohibited discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.
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[edit] Early career
Bryant was singing onstage on local fairgrounds in Oklahoma at age six. She sang occasionally on radio and television, and was invited to audition when Arthur Godfrey's talent show came to town. Her family, though, was extremely religious, and her father at first refused to allow her to go on Godfrey's show, relenting only when he was told his daughter had a God-given talent, and it would be a sin not to share it.
Bryant became Miss Oklahoma in 1958 and was a second runner-up in the 1959 Miss America beauty pageant at age 19, right after graduating from Tulsa's Will Rogers High School.
She had three big pop hits: "Till There Was You" (1959) (also covered by The Beatles in 1963 at the Royal Variety Performance); "Paper Roses" (1960) (successfully covered 13 years later by Marie Osmond); and "In My Little Corner of the World" (1960). In 1960, she married Bob Green, a Miami disc jockey, with whom she eventually raised four children.
She became a spokeswoman for the Florida Citrus Commission in 1969, and nationally televised commercials featured her singing "Come to the Florida Sunshine tree", and opining that "breakfast without orange juice is like a day without sunshine".
She became widely recognizable, doing advertisements for Coca-Cola, Kraft Foods, Holiday Inn, and Tupperware. She sang "The Battle Hymn of the Republic" during the graveside services for Lyndon Johnson in 1973, and performed the National Anthem at Super Bowl III in 1969.
[edit] Anti-gay efforts
In 1977, Florida's Dade County (now Miami-Dade County) passed a human-rights ordinance that prohibited discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. In response to this, Bryant led a highly publicized campaign to repeal the ordinance. The campaign was waged based on "Christian beliefs regarding the sinfulness of homosexuality and the perceived threat of “homosexual recruitment” of children and child molestation."
Indeed, the concerns over "homosexual recruitment" of children inspired the name of Bryant's political organization, Save Our Children. Among Bryant's assertions during the campaign were “As a mother, I know that homosexuals cannot biologically reproduce children; therefore, they must recruit our children” and “If gays are granted rights, next we'll have to give rights to prostitutes and to people who sleep with St. Bernards and to nail biters.” On June 7, 1977, Bryant's campaign led to a repeal of the anti-discrimination ordinance by a margin of 69 to 31 percent.
The following day, Bryant stated, “In victory, we shall not be vindictive. We shall continue to seek help and change for homosexuals, whose sick and sad values belie the word ‘gay’ which they pathetically use to cover their unhappy lives.”
[edit] Victory and defeat
In the aftermath, legislation was passed outlawing adoption by gays and lesbians in the state of Florida and Bryant led several more campaigns around the country to repeal local anti-discrimination ordinances. Her success led to a proactive effort to pass landmark anti-homosexual legislation in California that would have made pro- or neutral statements regarding homosexuals or homosexuality by any public school employees cause for dismissal. Grass-roots liberal organizations, chiefly in Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay Area, sprang up to defeat the Initiative. Days before the election, the California Democratic Party (wary of appearing pro-gay) opposed the proposed legislation, causing it to go down to narrow defeat at the polls.
Dade County, in 1998, repudiated Bryant's successful campaign of 20 years earlier, and re-authorized an anti-discrimination ordinance protecting individuals from discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation by a 7 to 6 margin. In 2002, a ballot initiative to repeal the 1998 law called amendment 14 was voted down by 56% of the voters. The Florida statute forbidding adoptions by gay persons, however, remains law.
Anita Bryant's political success galvanized her opponents. She became one of the first persons to be "pied" as a political act, in Des Moines in 1977; Bryant quipped, "At least it was a fruit pie," apparently referring to the slang term "fruit" meaning "gay men." Gay activists organized an orange juice boycott. Many celebrities including Barbra Streisand, Bette Midler, Paul Williams, and Jane Fonda publicly supported the boycott as well.
[edit] Career decline and bankruptcy
The fallout from her political activism had a devastating effect on her entertainment career. Her contract with the Florida Citrus Commission also was allowed to lapse in 1979 because of the negative publicity generated by her political campaigns, the resulting boycott of Florida orange juice, and, at least reportedly, because of her divorce.
Her marriage to Bob Green failed at that time and in 1980 she divorced him. She married her second husband, Charlie Hobson Dry, in 1990, and they have tried to reestablish her career in a series of small venues. Commercial success has been elusive, and they have left behind them a series of unpaid employees and creditors. They filed for bankruptcy in Arkansas (1997) and in Tennessee (2001).
Her career decline is detailed in her book, A New Day (1992).
[edit] Political and cultural legacy
After gay activists had succeeded in electing a majority of the Dade Commission in November 1976, they began to demonstrate their incipient political power in urban politics. When the board enacted a gay rights ordinance in January 1977, Bryant was shocked.
She said: "What these people really want, hidden behind obscure legal phrases, is the legal right to propose to our children that there is an acceptable alternate way of life." she said. "I will lead such a crusade to stop it as this country has not seen before." It was called "Save Our Children," the start of an organized opposition to gay rights that spread across the nation, and the beginning of what came to be known as the religious right. The Rev. Jerry Falwell went to Miami to help her, but it was Bryant herself who first led fundamentalist Christians into politics under the banner of a domestic social conservative issue. Her personal attack on homosexuals drew tens of thousands of new recruits into the movement.
Although the gay rights ordinance was eventually re-enacted and is still in place, the state legislation that Bryant supported outlawing adoption by gays and lesbians in Florida has not been repealed. In 2004, a federal appellate court upheld Florida’s anti-gay adoption law against a constitutional challenge.
[edit] Pop culture references
- The audio recording of Bryant being pied in Des Moines opens the song Just Desserts on Chumbawamba's album Un.
- Bryant's visit to Flint, Michigan, is featured in the 1989 Michael Moore documentary film Roger & Me.
- A parody of her and her campaign appeared as "The Sinister S.O.O.F.I." ("Save Our Offspring from Indecency") in Steve Gerber's Howard the Duck.
- David Allan Coe recorded a song called "F**k Aneta Briant" for his 1978 album "Nothing Sacred". It is suspected that the misspelling was intentionally added to avoid charges of slander.
- She was also mentioned by first name in the song Moral Majority on the album In God We Trust, Inc., by Dead Kennedys.
- Mad magazine's parody of Three's Company (where John Ritter's character Jack pretends to be gay to share an apartment with two women) ends with a visit from the "new landlord," a whip-wielding Anita Bryant.
- In Jimmy Buffett's song Manaña, he hopes "Anita Bryant never ever does one of my songs."
- In an episode of The Golden Girls, an effeminate wedding director makes a reference to a musical theatre production, and Blanche comments "You're just about to fly right out of here, aren't you?" To which the wedding director replies, "Well, excuse me for living, Anita Bryant!" In another episode, after Dorothy and Rose place second in a Miami songwriting contest, Dorothy mentions that the pair are pushed out of the way while they took the winner's picture with Anita Bryant. The fact that the sitcom aired many gay-friendly episodes helps to put these references into context.
- In the Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip episode "Nevada Day Part II," NBS President Jordan McDeere cautions actress Harriet Hayes against appearing at a Christian group's concert in light of a quote that has enraged the gay and lesbian community, telling Hayes that it could permanently damage her career, and references Anita Bryant. (Ironically, Harriet Hayes is played by Sarah Paulson, an openly gay actress born in Tampa, Florida.)
- In the 1980 movie Airplane!, while an epidemic of food poisoning is sweeping through the plane, Captain Oveur asks, "What is it Doctor? What's going on?" to which Dr. Rumack answers, "I'm not sure. I haven't seen anything like this since the Anita Bryant concert."
- Folksinger Tom Paxton wrote a satirical song called "Anita OJ" in which she is castigated by first name for, among other things, "squeezing fruits."
- In the 1978 film "Cheech and Chong's Up In Smoke", a roadie remarks, "No wonder Anita Bryant's pissed off", after being pushed around by cops masquerading as Hare Krishnas.
- In the Will & Grace episode "Dance Cards and Greeting Cards" (7.16), Karen Walker claims to have been enemies with Anita Bryant, who later fell in love with her: "...my former nemesis is in love with me. It just keeps happening. First Anita Bryant, now this guy. Well, I said the same thing to him I said to Anita: 'Squeeze your own oranges!'" Later in the episode, Scott Woolley (played by Jeff Goldblum) exclaims: "Karen, you've made me the happiest man on the face of the earth!" to which she replies, "Oh, honey... That's exactly what Anita Bryant said."
[edit] Songs
- Paper Roses
- The Wedding (song)
- In My Little Corner Of The World
- In The Chapel, In The Moonlight
- Moon River
- My Heart Cries For You
- Till there was You
[edit] External links
- Image of Anita Bryant in the 1970s (available for public use from the State Archives of Florida)
- St.Petersburg Times article
- Video of pieing in Iowa (from YouTube)
