Wheelchair basketball player Danielle

Fighting for Both the Crips and the Queers

The OutField
by Dan Woog
We've heard the jokes. OK, we've probably made them ourselves. A female friend gets turned down for a job. "Too bad you weren't a real minority," we commiserate. "Maybe if you were a lesbian in a wheelchair..."

Danielle Peers ­­is that lesbian in a wheelchair. But don't you dare feel sorry for her. She'll kick your ass.

Peers - called "Doc" for reasons explained below - grew up in Edmonton, Alberta. She played soccer, sailed, and high jumped, but basketball was her passion. She captained Grant MacEwan College to the national championship, and made the Academic All-Canadian team.

Robert Dover's Foundation Doesn't Horse Around

The OutField
by Dan Woog
As a six-time captain of the U.S. equestrian team and a four-time Olympic bronze medalist in dressage, Robert Dover is often asked to ride in benefit shows. A gay man who saw many close friends in the horse world die of AIDS complications, he vowed long ago to use those performances to raise funds for HIV/AIDS organizations.

But, he says, in the mid-1990s, the equestrian community was like show business: "Despite large numbers of gay men and women, it was still pretty conservative." A defining moment came in Washington, D.C., when benefit organizers shied away from saying "AIDS" on the public address system.

Gays 1, Bigots 0

The OutField
by Dan Woog
It must have been a slow news week in San Diego.

In case your interest in baseball extends no further than the players' skin-tight uniforms, here's what happened. Tired of debating boring old subjects like Iraq, immigration, and Paris Hilton's incarceration, San Diegans spent a good chunk of July on a far more important topic: Pride Night at Petco Park.

Gay Sports' Sweet Music

The Outfield
By Dan Woog
Summer's here - in fact, it's in full swing - so, according to Martha and the Vandellas, the time is right for dancin' in the street.

That sounds so-o-o 1960s. In 2007, men and women spend the summer playing softball, volleyball, tennis, and polo (water and pony). This being the '00s, plenty of gay men and lesbians fill the diamonds, courts, and fields.

In the midst of so much fun - and at the midway point of the year - let's take a halftime break to look at some GLBT stories we might have overlooked.

Philanthropists and athletes Gene Silbert (left) and John Kiley have been together for almost 55 years.

Gay Sports Scholarship Seeks Recipients

The OutField
by Dan Woog
John Kiley and Gene Silbert could be poster children for gay men of a certain age. They met in a Greenwich Village bar in 1953, and have been a couple ever since. Their careers - Gene's was in the textile business, working with some of the world's top fashion designers for women; John ran motivational incentive programs for large corporations - took them around the globe, and gave them great joy. Now, in the autumn of their lives, they want to pass along their comfortable wealth to organizations that are important to them.

A ballet or opera company, maybe? Perhaps an AIDS group, or a political cause?

Nope. The two men, both pushing 80, have created the Gene & John Athletic Fund. They are offering generous scholarships to gay and lesbian student-athletes who have contributed meaningfully to society.