LGBTQ seniors find connection and community with the Queer Elders of Iowa City

This story first appeared in Prestige - May 2024, a biannual special section distributed in The Gazette dedicated to Iowans 55+.

When Carla Harrigan moved to Iowa City from Chicago three and a half years ago, she left behind a community that made her feel accepted, loved and proud of who she was — a bisexual senior.

Harrigan, 73, lived in Town Hall Apartments, Chicago’s first affordable housing development for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender seniors, in the city’s Lakeview neighborhood. Completed in 2014, the 79-unit senior housing complex provides social and other activities in the heart of Chicago’s LGBTQ community.

“I was really fortunate to be able to get into the community and really had a wonderful experience,” Harrigan said. “The building is attached to a senior center, so I was really involved in that. There were so many activities, and everybody in the building knew each other, so I came from a really tight-knit group that had all sorts of opportunities.”

Harrigan lived in Town Hall Apartments for six years before she decided to move to Iowa City to be closer to her son and grandson during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. The transition, she said, was isolating.

“I decided when I moved here to not live in a senior building, but decided to switch it up and live in a family building. I immediately missed the community that I had left,” she said.

It wasn’t long before Harrigan found the Queer Elders of Iowa City, a group of LGBTQ seniors who meet twice a month to socialize, share their stories, develop programming for the Iowa City Senior Center and advocate for the LGBTQ community. The group also screens LGBTQ-themed movies the second Wednesday of the month to encourage discussion.

Queer Elders was formed in August 2022 when Craig Esbeck, 67, Tova Vitiello, 79 and Mark Stevenson, 69, were volunteering for the LGBTQ Iowa Archive and Library to preserve the history of LGBTQ Iowans. They decided to meet once a week to encourage each other’s writing, which quickly turned into a storytelling and social hour. In May 2023, the Queer Elders moved their meetings to the Iowa City Senior Center, which now sponsors the group.

From left: Queer Elders Dean Logan, Carla Harrigan, Craig Esbeck and Mary Vermillion pose for a photo together. Submitted photo.

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“One of the things I like most about this (group) is hearing people’s stories,” said Queer Elder Quinn Dilkes, 86.

Currently, around 12 Queer Elders meet regularly at the senior center. Some visitors drop in once and never come back, and a few travel to Iowa City from rural areas when the opportunity arises.

Like most of the Queer Elders, Vitiello, a lesbian and retired psychology professor, grew up in a time when being openly gay was culturally unacceptable. She moved to Iowa City from the east coast for graduate school in the 1960s.

“Many queer people our age grew up in a time when they were conditioned to be in the closet, so if you wanted to socialize, your only options were bars,” she said. “For some folks, that wasn’t appealing, so they didn’t socialize at all. This is an opportunity that’s not drug or alcohol oriented, but yet, to make the leap to leave their homes to come here is difficult, even though it’s 2024, because they’re so conditioned to not be open. But this is an alternative, and I think it’s great.”

A lot has changed since the 1960s, but LGBTQ people continue to face hostility and discrimination. According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s annual crime report released in October 2023, anti-LGBTQ hate crimes increased sharply in 2022, growing more than 19 percent over 2021.

Being LGBTQ and over the age of 55 presents its own set of challenges, particularly in health care. And old age is “’not for sissies,’ as Bette Davis put it,” said Queer Elder Mark Burkert, 69.

Most recently, Esbeck, Vitiello, Harrigan and Dean Logan, 68, were invited to Mount Mercy University in Cedar Rapids to talk about their experiences as older LGBTQ adults in the undergraduate class “Aging in America.” The class helps social work students understand various issues and theories when working with the aging population.

According to the National Resource Center on LGBT Aging, many older LGBTQ adults are at a high risk of neglect, exploitation and elder abuse, and social isolation is a risk factor for elder abuse. A Caring and Aging with Pride study also found older transgender adults experience higher rates of discrimination and victimization than cisgender LGB older adults, or those whose gender identity corresponds to their sex assigned at birth, especially in long-term care facilities. Fear of discrimination results in underutilization of elder care services.

From left: Queer Elders Carla Harrigan, Craig Esbeck, Bertie Weikert and Mark Stevenson attend a FunkDaddies show. Submitted photo.

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LGBTQ elders also experience discrimination by being kept from participating in partners’ medical decision-making process. Vitiello witnessed this firsthand as a mental health professional.

“Back in those times, if you had a partner, even if you were partnered with someone for 35-40 years, because you weren’t married, if your partner was in the hospital, you may or may not be able to see your partner because you weren’t family. You certainly weren’t able to make medical decisions,” she said.

Logan has been taking care of his husband, Jeff Schabilion, since he suffered a stroke six years ago at the age of 75. Multiple infections took Schabilion’s ability to walk, and he’s been diagnosed with dementia. Logan and Schabilion were not married at the time of his stroke.

“(Jeff) said ‘You know, we ought to get married.’ And he told me it’s not so much a way of defining our love, because it’s there, but for inheritance purposes,” Logan said.

On the first and third Wednesday of each month, Room 309 is a safe and supportive space for the Queer Elders of Iowa City to share stories like these. For those who attend regularly, the social connections have been critical.

“Finding the Queer Elder group was a lifesaver for me,” Harrigan said.