Atlanta LGBTQ Advocate Winston Johnson Dies At 79
Winston Johnson died at age 79. Here he is pictured with Coretta Scott King, whom he remained friends with until her death in 2006.
COURTESY OF WINSTON JOHNSON
Longtime Atlanta LGBTQ rights advocate Winston Johnson has died this week after a lengthy battle with cancer. He was 79 years old.
Johnson, a Valdosta native, co-founded the annual gala for the Human Rights Campaign Atlanta.
He met Coretta Scott King through his work with Eastern Airlines and the two became close friends.
As Johnson told WABE’s Closer Look in 2018, he didn’t share his sexual orientation with King until the mid 1980s when he asked her to speak at an HRC dinner in New York.
“She knew that gay people should have equal rights with, you know, everybody else. So I said ‘we want you to do something really important.’ And she said ‘tell me where and when and I’ll be there.’”
Former President Jimmy Carter invited Johnson to a state dinner in the late 1970s, but Johnson chose to go alone, without his partner.
“It didn’t occur me in 1978 that I might oughta be able take Leon with me,” Johnson recalled. “We’d been together 14 years at that time. So I went to the state dinner by myself, it was the pinnacle of my social life. And now I wouldn’t think of doing anything like that.”
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