Joe Herzenberg
Joseph Alexander Herzenberg, II (June 25, 1941 – October 28, 2007) was an American historian, political activist, and the first openly gay elected official in North Carolina. Joe was named Joseph Paul Herzenberg at birth and took his grandfather's name when he was bar mitzvahed.
Herzenberg was a native of New Jersey. He received a B.A. in 1963 from Yale University and an M.A. in European History from Yale in 1965. Herzenberg was a Freedom Summer volunteer in Mississippi in 1964. He was appointed instructor and chair of the History Department at Tougaloo College in 1965, and was promoted to Assistant Professor at Tougaloo in the 1966-67 academic year.
In 1969 Herzenberg moved to Chapel Hill, North Carolina. He was narrowly defeated in a 1979 bid for the Chapel Hill Town Council, but was later appointed to the town council when councilmember Gerry Cohen stepped down following a failed bid for mayor. Herzenberg lost his reelection bid in 1981, and was unsuccessful again in 1983. In 1987, he ran again, and his victory that year that made him the first openly gay elected official in the state. He was reelected with overwhelming support in 1991. He resigned from the town council in 1993.
Herzenberg was a noted advocate for the environment, civil liberties, and the interests of low-income people. He was a founder of Equality NC PAC (then NC Pride PAC), a statewide advocacy organization for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender North Carolinians, and he served on its board for more than a decade.
After leaving the council in 1993, Herzenberg continued to serve the town on several advisory boards, including chairing the Town Greenways Commission and serving on the committee to rename Airport Road in honor of Martin Luther King, Jr. He died in Chapel Hill.
External links
- "Equality North Carolina Mourns the Loss of Joe Herzenberg" - obituary on Equality NC website
- "Former Chapel Hill councilman Herzenberg dies" - obituary in The News & Observer, October 29, 2007
- "We'll Miss You, Joe!" - comments and remembrances from friends and supporters on OrangePolitics.org