Asteroid Named For Gay Rights Pioneer and Hero Frank Kameny
Formerly known as Minor Planet 40463, the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter is is now known as Frankkamney in honor of “one of the most significant figures” in the Gay American Civil Rights movement.
A Canadian amateur astronomer has named an asteroid he discovered after U.S. gay rights pioneer Frank Kameny, who died last year in Washington. Kameny, who earned a doctorate in astronomy at Harvard University, was an astronomer with the U.S. Army Map Service in the 1950s but was fired from his job for being gay. He contested the firing all the way to the Supreme Court and later organized the first gay rights protests outside the White House, the Pentagon and in Philadelphia in the 1960s.
A very fitting and heartfelt tribute to a great man.