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| Frank (with Scott) in 2004 |
Barney Frank, 79, was the U.S. Representative for Massachusetts's 4th congressional district was considered the most prominent gay politician in the United States
According to Barney Frank, he "realized it was crazy" to try to have a romance with someone he cared for but was not compatible with due to his homosexuality. "That was the last effort to avoid being gay," Stuart Weisberg (Frank's Biographer) quotes Frank as saying. Frank never again dated a woman.
Frank started coming out as gay to friends before he ran for Congress and came out publicly on May 30, 1987, "prompted in part by increased media interest in his private life" and the death of
Stewart McKinney, "a closeted bisexual Republican representative from Connecticut"; Frank told
The Washington Post after McKinney's death there was "An unfortunate debate about 'Was he or wasn't he? Didn't he or did he?' I said to myself, I don't want that to happen to me."
Can you believe it has been 20 years since Gays on Television were never the same again? When Ellen Degeneres' LEAD Character came out on 'Ellen' on April 30, 1997 it opened the door to more lead gay characters on television. 
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