John Cowperthwaite Graves (May 16, 1938 – October 13, 2003) was a professor, psychotherapist, singer, and philanthropist associated with the LGBTQ+ Rights Movement in Boston, MA and Fort Lauderdale, FL.
[2] After receiving a sizable inheritance,[3] Graves left teaching and began working as a psychotherapist with the Homophile Community Health Services Center in Boston, MA.
In addition to his work with the Homophile Community Health Services Center, Graves became involved in Boston’s LesBiGay community, which included helping to found the Boston Center for Lesbians and Gay Men and the Gay Academic Union of New England.
[2] Other local involvements included singing in the choir at the Sunshine Cathedral Metropolitan Community Church and serving as president of the Gays United to Attack Repression and Discrimination.
[1] The Graves Fund, which began with $3.1 million managed by the Community Foundation of Broward, was set up to fund The Metropolitan Community Church, the Stonewall Library and Archives, and a new facility for the Pride Center and was intended to be fully spent within ten years of Graves’s death.
[5] The first recipient of this fellowship was Robert Rosenwald Jr., the attorney who helped overturn Florida’s ban on gay couples’ ability to adopt in 2010.
[2] Thanks to his work and donations, the Stonewall Library and Archives named the John C. Graves Reading Room in his honor.
[2] “ACLU of Florida Creates John C. Graves Gay Rights Fellowship with Grant from Community Foundation of Broward.” American Civil Liberties Union.