George Harris & Jack Evans

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Jack Evans was fired from Neiman Marcus in Houston for being gay, and George Harris was thrown out of the CIA in Northern Virginia. “I came to Dallas in ’56,” Harris says, “and it was locked down tight. There wasn’t any gay movement that I knew about.”

Five years later, in 1961, Evans and Harris met by coincidence at a bar and then again a few days later, at a mutual friend’s going-away party. As a couple, they became a force, working side by side in their real estate business for 38 years, founding what would become the North Texas GLBT Chamber of Commerce, and starting The Dallas Way, a project aimed at presenting the history of the GLBT community in Dallas. They were married (finally) in March 2014.

“Of course, this was symbolic,” Evans says. “It’s not legal in the state of Texas yet.”

Over five decades, Evans and Harris, who are both in their 80s, have seen marked changes in Dallas’ gay community. They saw people get arrested in the ’60s at house parties. They saw people circle the block in the ’70s before entering Metropolitan Community Church for fear of getting arrested. They saw more than 100 friends die of complications from AIDS in the ’80s.

“Our real focus has been our legacy for the community, that our whole lives have been trying to improve, to encourage the young people to make a difference,” Harris says. “They think they can walk down Cedar Springs holding hands, and it’s just automatically come to that, but there was a lot of struggle to get there.”


George Harris & Jack Evans at their home in Oak Lawn
Jack Evans was fired from Neiman Marcus in Houston for being gay, and George Harris was thrown out of the CIA in Northern Virginia. Five years later, in 1961, Evans and Harris met by coincidence at a bar and then again a few days later, at a mutual friend’s going-away party. As a couple, they became a force founding what would become the North Texas GLBT Chamber of Commerce, and starting The Dallas Way, a project aimed at presenting the history of the GLBT community in Dallas. They were married (finally) in March 2014.

“Well, our next project,” Evans says, “which we, uh—”

“I hope we don’t start another project,” Harris cuts in.

Perhaps they’ve done enough.

Source: interactive.dmagazine.com/content/the-dallas-40/jack-evans-and-george-harris/ (By: Cristina Daglas)

Further Readings:

Love Together:: Longtime Male Couples on Healthy Intimacy and Communication by Tim R. Clausen
Paperback: 296 pages
Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform (December 1, 2014)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1492822256
ISBN-13: 978-1492822257
Amazon: Love Together:: Longtime Male Couples on Healthy Intimacy and Communication
Amazon Kindle: Love Together:: Longtime Male Couples on Healthy Intimacy and Communication

How do male couples keep their relationship healthy and thriving for fifteen, thirty, even sixty years? Longtime couples share candidly in Love Together how they navigate issues of monogamy, intimacy, affection, communication, money, spirituality, marriage, and parenting. Included here are the first military couple in America to wed, a Catholic theologian, a pioneering Texas pair featured in a 1996 Life Magazine article, a practicing Buddhist couple who recently celebrated their 60th anniversary, two Paris-trained chefs turned international vintners, a Canadian couple who produce a line of gay erotic comics, a Christian pop-singing duo who became parents through surrogacy, a movie industry couple who met the day World War Two ended, and more. With hundreds of years of collective experience, these couples share their life wisdom and offer practical advice for singles who want to find a lasting love relationship. Samples and more at www.lovetogetherbook.com