Wilson, Lawrence

I knew Law through his one-time lover, Ted Petrella, who was my co-worker at CPMC -- inpatient psychiatry. (Ted died, at 34, in 1992, in Los Angeles.) As the obituary states, Law was a proponent of closing the bathhouses in San Francisco. He took and kept that position despite his being the Political Action Chair of Alice B. Toklas. Alice was a staunch defender of the bathhouses under the leadership of Randy Stallings (who also died of AIDS), and the club disavowed Law's position. In 1983, Law helped organize a meeting of gay community leaders and bathhouse/private club owners in order to encourage community education regarding AIDS in those places of gay sexual engagement which appeared to be most in need of such awareness (according to the results of a recent survey of gay men). For his safe-sex activism, Law was listed as one of 16 community traitors -- he was number 4, in fact, after 1. Harry Britt, 2. Tim Wolfred, and 3. Dick Pabich), by B.A.R. editor Paul Lorch in his infamous April 5, 1984 editorial. (Shortly afterward, in June 1984, Lorch was removed as the B.A.R. editor, succeeded by Brian Jones, who died of AIDS in 1993.)

Lawrence and I became friends in 1978 and remained friends until his death. Rest Easy, Lawrence. https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/208379634/lawrence-allan-wilson