Tonie Walsh
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Tonie Walsh (born December 25, 1960) in Dublin, Ireland is a gay rights activist, journalist, DJ and founder of Irish Queer Archives.
[edit] Biography
Walsh spent most of his childhood in Clonmel, Co. Tipperary, before returning to Dublin to study History of Art at UCD. His 20s were spent mainly in the gay civil rights movement, during which time he was one of the prime movers behind Dublin's LGBT community space, the Hirschfeld Centre. In 1985, while involved with the Council of Europe-funded International Lesbian and Gay Youth Congress, he became the first openly gay person to stand for election to Dublin City Council - on a platform of tenancy rights and urban renewal. Although unsuccessful, it encouraged him four years later to stand of election to Dáil Éireann in an effort to highlight the unjustness of anti-homosexual legislation.
Walsh was president of the National Lesbian and Gay Federation (NLGF) from 1984 to 1988, at a time when it was co-defendant with Senator David Norris in his constitutional action (Norris V. Attorney General). During this period Tonie Walsh worked as a staff reporter with Ireland's first commercial gay magazine, OUT. However, in a climate of fear, hostility and ignorance OUT folded in 1988, by which time Walsh had founded Gay Community News (GCN),[1] an A3 newspaper which he also edited during its first two pioneering years. To this day GCN remains Ireland's longest running gay publication. After ten years of activism, Walsh followed his boyfriend to London where he remained for a time, before returning to his native town and launched himself as a highly successful DJ and club promoter. Throughout the 1990s and beyond Walsh was a leading player in some of Ireland's most significant club/performance events, among them 'Horny Organ Tribe', 'Elevator', the legendary fetish club 'GAG', 'Powerbubble', 'H.A.M', Cork's club 'Telefunkin' and HIV/A.I.D.S fund-raising alternative beauty pagent Alternative Miss Ireland.[2]
In 1997, he thoroughly reorganised NLGF's archive holdings into what would later become the Irish Queer Archive. Drawing on materials from IQA's collection, Walsh curated both "Pride and Protest" at Belfast's Central Library (2005) and "Revolting Homosexuals" (Outhouse and GUBU, Dublin 2004). NGLF appointed him to its IQA working group along with Dr Katherine O'Donnell, Director of W.E.R.R.C; Mary McAuliffe, historian and lecturer at UCD; Joan Murphy, RTÉ archivist; Dr Eibhear Walshe, English lecturer at UCC and Elizabeth Kirwan, Assistant Keeper of Manuscripts at the National Library. This group is currently negotiating a transfer of IQA to the National Library of Ireland in what many regard as a highly significant and historical arrangement due for probable completion early in 2007.
Walsh retired in 2006 as a professional DJ and club promoter to concentrate on a number of research and writing projects.
