Allan Horsfall

Allan Horsfall (20 October 1927 – 27 August 2012) was a British gay rights campaigner and founder of the Campaign for Homosexual Equality.[1]

For rugby league footballer of the 1940s and 1950s, see Alan Horsfall.

Allan Horsfall
Born20 October 1927
Died27 August 2012
Bolton, United Kingdom

Life

He was born on 20 October 1927 at Laneshaw bridge.[2]

In 1956, following the Suez Crisis, he became radicalised and became a local Councillor in his home town in 1958. He joined the North-East Lancashire Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament.[3] In 1958, he started campaigning for the Homosexual Law Reform Society to implement the findings of the Wolfenden Report published in 1957.[4]

During the 1970s, Horsfall attempted to set up 'Esquire Clubs', co-owned social clubs built on the model of working men's clubs for lesbians and gay men. On 30 July 1971 Allan was part of a CHE public meeting in Burnley Central Library, called "Homosexuals & Civil Liberties".[3] Horsfall spoke of his 1960s campaigning at LGBT History Month events, and he was interviewed for the Millthorpe oral history project.[1]

Allan Horsfall is the lead character in "The Burnley Buggers' Ball", a play by Stephen M Hornby.[5] The play was commissioned by LGBT History Month to mark the 50th Anniversary of the Sexual Offences Act 1967 and was performed at the original site of the 1971 CHE meeting "Homosexuals & Civil Liberties" in Burnley Central Library.[6]

References
  1. Cant, Bob (11 September 2012). "Allan Horsfall obituary". The Guardian.
  2. "Horsfall, Allan (1927–2012), gay rights campaigner | Oxford Dictionary of National Biography". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/105552. Retrieved 28 September 2019. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  3. Scott-Presland, Peter (11 September 2012). "Allan Horsfall: Influential gay rights campaigner". The Independent.
  4. Brooke, Stephen (2 May 2013). Sexual politics : sexuality, family planning, and the British Left from the 1880s to the present day. Oxford. p. 2. ISBN 978-0-19-968097-9. OCLC 825181257.
  5. "Writing Festival Theatre: "The Burnley Buggers' Ball"". OUTing The Past. Retrieved 9 March 2020.
  6. correspondent, Mark Brown Arts (7 February 2017). "Burnley Buggers' Ball to mark 50th anniversary of Sexual Offences Act". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 22 September 2019.
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