“How was Rainbow Toastmasters started?” is a question we get a lot, especially from Toastmasters looking to start LGBTQ+ clubs elsewhere. Here are two recollections.
An early member reminisces
Rainbow Toastmasters started in 2005. As I recall, an employee of the SF LGBT Center posted a bunch of flyers around the Castro announcing the possible formation of a Toastmasters club for the SF GLBT community. The flyer I saw was posted at MCC San Francisco (the church) when it was still on Eureka St.
District 4 sent out some people to conduct a demonstration meeting, showing how a Toastmasters club works. I did not attend that meeting, but there was enough interest to found a club. The first official meeting was scheduled at the LGBT Center, and I did attend that meeting.
The first meeting was a lot of fun. We met in a small room on the third floor, next to the room that we used for many years at the Center. We organized and elected officers. A president was elected; nobody wanted to be treasurer, so I finally stepped forward and became the first treasurer. It was a real pain opening a checking account as a new nonprofit organization with no money and no fixed address. Back then the officers’ terms were six months. We also had to pick out a name for the club. There were some good names, like Rainbow Toastmasters and Lavender Toastmasters, and also some weird names (one proposed name I remember was “Merry Octavians Toastmasters” because the Center was on Octavia Blvd). In the end, Rainbow Toastmasters won.
The president had somehow arranged for the club to meet at the Center without paying rent for the first year or so, but in exchange we did not have a fixed room and we moved around the building from week to week. During one period we had to meet on the first floor right on the corner of Market and Octavia, where the traffic was so loud that we couldn’t hear a word anyone said.
Meetings were pretty much the same for many years, but the humorist was called “jokemaster” in those days. We had an experienced Toastmaster that District 4 sent. He attended all our meetings for the first year and was a sort of chaperone and referee whenever we got stuck in a meeting and didn’t know what to do. I remember in the early days we were very strict about speech times, and if someone went over time, the timer would rise to his feet and applaud; the entire room would follow suit. The speaker would have to pull the plug on the speech, even in mid-sentence. I was the timer the very first night, and the very first speaker went long. (He never did again.)
The District warned us to vote all new members in. We were very puzzled by this until it was explained that sometimes members would become very troublesome, and expelling them (legally) was allegedly easier if they had been voted in because then they could be voted out. I was the Toastmaster on the first night we voted in our first new members, and I wanted to put a positive spin on it, so I said, “Our club votes you in because then we can vote you out if you become tedious.” That phrase (to my horror) stuck for many years and was often announced just before new-member votes.
We always went out to dinner afterwards. We’d often go to a bar on the other side of Octavia to get drinks and snacks, and sometimes to a Chinese restaurant across Market Street near It’s Tops. Eventually we settled on Crepevine, which became our favorite every week. (All of these places have since closed.)
One year we experimented with starting later in the evening, at 6:30 PM. It was a disaster because parking, which was always difficult at 6:00 PM, was nonexistent by 6:30 PM, and the restaurants were much more crowded later in the evening. So we switched back to 6:00 PM.
In 2006 we started a monthly newsletter called “Iris,” named after the rainbow deity who served as the messenger of the gods in Greek mythology. I did the first two editions but it was a lot of work and nobody stepped forward to help me, so the newsletter died very quickly.
During our first years, we still had a fair number of members who were HIV+ and struggling with meds. AIDS treatments had changed a lot in the 1990s but were still visible in the community, sometimes causing other medical problems or financial stress on people. The first few years of Rainbow Toastmasters had a significant number of these people, and Toastmasters was their only opportunity to get out and socialize at low cost. A few of these men were mentally challenged as well, but the club always welcomed them and cherished their participation on whatever level they could give.
I also remember that in the early days the club had a diversity issue. Many of the members were college-educated white men, and there were not many women. A lot of very highly educated people, many Ph. Ds and Harvard graduates (law or MBA). We pushed for more diversity, especially gender diversity, and things changed over time.
My most memorable event involved a speaker who invited her parents to come to a meeting, and one of the speakers gave a fantastically detailed speech on sexual practices.
We started paying rent to the Center in our second year and got a permanent room, but it was painful. In the summer, the sun came in and heated it to unbearable levels, but then we’d open the windows to cool off and the noise from traffic (especially the F-line) would fill the room and force people to scream to be heard. I remember we’d close the windows during speeches and then pop them open during the one-minute written evaluations to cool off.
I spent twenty years in San Francisco and tried many activities. Rainbow Toastmasters was by far the most interesting and most rewarding.
Remembrances by Jim Ogren, a charter member
In the fall of 2005, a future founding member was working at the SF LGBT Center assisting LGBT small businesses and sharing knowledge with want-to-be business owners. He approached Toastmasters as he felt that good public speaking was very helpful skill in starting or promoting a business. District 4 (our District) put on a demonstration meeting; around seventy people showed up. I believe twenty-two of us turned in applications.
We had our first meeting where we chartered, elected officers (really anyone who volunteered was elected and a few were volunteered), decided on day and time (Thursday at 6:00 PM), and came up with our name. Coming up with a name was not as easy as it sounds; we eventually settled on Rainbow Toastmasters (RTM) as it was LGBTQ (no Q at the time but I am using anyway from here on out) and not specifically associated with the LGBT Center or the City of San Francisco. We wanted to broaden the inclusion. Rainbow was a good choice!
District 4 assigned us a club mentor for the first three months; he was great. We had our challenges in the beginning:
Membership: We thought folks would want to join to be able to speak confidently in public in order to promote LGBT rights. After all, this is San Francisco! They didn’t come! Remember, this was mid- to late 2000s. Social media was not up and running; it was the time of flyers in coffee shops and word of mouth. Today we love social media, which brings in many guests.
I believe that we had two women in the group of charter members. For years we reached out, but the meetings were still mostly male. Why would a woman join? There were no LGBTQ sisters – only LGBTQ brothers at the meetings.
Filling roles: we had twenty-two folks doing Icebreakers and early manual speeches. All were somewhat terrified of being Toastmaster, Evaluators and the General Evaluator. The role of Table Topics Masters was always easy to fill!
We established that we wanted to remain true to our LGBTQ sensibilities.
To me a key moment in the evolution of RTM was after only six months or so, RTM was asked to host an Officer Training for the clubs in our Area. We met at the LGBT Center where there was provocative LGBTQ art on the wall: clothed, semi-nude, sometimes nude men, women and couples. With that in mind, we asked ourselves, Should we host at the Center? After discussion, it was decided, This is who we are; this is our house; we are hosting at the Center. It was a good training and it was clear to all that attended, this is who we are and we are not changing. People were intrigued with the Center; there were no issues.
Toastmasters International wanted us to vote new members in. This didn’t sit well, as many of us were not the cool kids and were not selected or included. Our mentor insisted on it, so we made a game out of it: When a new member joins, the club asks, “Why do we vote members in? So we can vote them out!” The new candidate for membership is then escorted out by the Sargent at Arms. We vote, and then the new member returns to thunderous applause. We did it our way.
We did not compete in Area contests for the first two years or so because we did not wish to have a club contest. Our members’ experiences had been that competition was not pleasant. We did not like the idea of competing against each other, so we didn’t! We eventually did compete within the club and our Area, which taught us the value of expanding our reach beyond our club. Competition is a real growth opportunity for members. We have done well in Area, Division, and District contests.
Today, we still do not vote at the meetings for best speaker, evaluator and table topics speaker. In our view, we are all winners for doing what we do at whatever level we do it!
We have always had to rent our meeting room, so the amount of dues has always been a concern. We want to make RTM available to those of us who could not afford the dues. We resolved the latter by having volunteers pay a little extra for those that couldn’t.
What we have done and are doing now:
Our meetings are fun, inspirational, and well-run. I think that we are authentic to who we are as a club and as individual members. The meetings sell the guests on Rainbow Toastmasters.
We start on time or very close to it. We pride ourselves in being timely, which members and guests appreciate.
We follow the TM format for meetings, etc. but with LGBTQ flair!
Members pick their speech topics and there are no constraints on content.
We have special nights, such as Women’s night, Pride, Awards, and some with racier fare.
New members are given a string of Mardi Gras beads after their Icebreakers.
At each meeting, the General Evaluator hands out a small rainbow with the date on a rainbow ribbon to the participant whose contribution went above the call of duty for that meeting.
We always ask guests to introduce themselves and make them feel welcome.
After each meeting, we go to dinner and invite guests to join us. We usually have a group of six to ten.
We generally suggest that a guest visit us a few times so they get a sense of the club.
We have events: a year-end dinner in June, holiday party, and others.
Two particularly proud moments from our members:
Mike Barsul was District 4 Governor (he thought that the concept of pride included being part of district leadership. His theme was Find your Voice. He also went on to become a member of the Toastmasters International Board of Directors.
Gina Grahame won our Club, Area, Division, and District 4 International Speech Contest, telling her story about coming out trans to her family. There was not a dry eye in the house at the Toastmasters International annual convention!
I guess that our current membership is close to 50% women and 50% men. I also guess that we are 70% LGBTQ and 30% otherwise. All sexualities are welcome, all are appreciated, and all have a good time!
Good luck with your club! There cannot be enough LGBTQ TM clubs! Go for it!