Gabriella Goliger

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Gabriella Goliger came out as a lesbian in the fall of 1981 and dove into community activities with both feet soon afterwards.

Her first volunteering was on the Gayline, having received some excellent training from Barry Deeprose. The Gayline experience made Gabriella realize that many women wanted more peer counselling than they could receive from a phone call and also a way of meeting lesbians that was less intimidating than the bars.

This prompted Gabriella and an another Gayline volunteer to start the Women's Coming Out Discussion Group. This was a very successful program for “newbies” that ran for many years.

Gabriella's other key activity during the 1980s was writing for and editing the community newspaper Go Info. In the days before the Internet, there were few other sources of information on the local LGBT scene and GO Info filled a gaping void.

Gabriella writes: "By the early '90s, I felt I had to pull out of all this volunteer work since I was devoting more time to creative writing. But it was wonderful to have played a part in that exciting era of community building."