This is hysterical. I'd never heard about this. From Lou Chibbaro at the Washington Blade:
In interviews with the Washington Blade in the 1980s and in 2006, Kameny told of how he and fellow members of the Mattachine Society of Washington, which Kameny co-founded, were contacted by an FBI agent in the summer of 1963 and invited to a meeting with the agent at FBI headquarters.Kameny recounts how he told the agent he'd have to get back to him. Kameny subsequently wrote the agent and told him that he would only take Hoover's name off the list if the FBI agreed to give them the name of another agent to put on the list, and that the group would still reserve the right to send a newsletter to Hoover if it was really important. They never heard back from the FBI, but a subsequent records search shows an internal FBI memo saying the agency would never agree to demands from a "homosexual organization."
Kameny recounted that he and Mattachine Society Member Bob Bellanger had no idea why they had been summoned to a meeting with the FBI, and the two wondered whether a crackdown against Mattachine was in the works.
To their amazement, Kameny said, FBI Special Agent John A. O’Birne politely asked him and Bellanger to remove Hoover’s name from the Mattachine Society’s mailing list, saying Hoover did not wish to have his name on such a list.
Imagine the chutzpah to do this in 1963. We owe a lot to guys like this.
