In 1970, gay campaigners in the UK were in something of a quandary. The 1967 Sexual Offences Act had lifted only some of the criminal sanctions against sex between men and left immense social stigma unchallenged. At the same time, the media reacted to partial decriminalisation by largely losing interest in homosexuality.

Just one non-fiction television programme and two radio programmes were devoted to the topic in the late 1960s. In these programmes, like those before 1967 explored in my current project Re-viewing LGBTQ Lives, all the gay interviewees were either anonymous or else spoke of homosexuals in the third person and distanced themselves from “promiscuous types”.

The most prominent gay campaigner of the 1960s, Antony Grey, lamented in 1969 that “the great majority of homosexuals would sooner have died than admit that they were homosexual”. Though he encountered people who claimed to have come out completely and unashamedly, he doubted whether they were telling the truth.

In June 1970, however, Grey was contacted by Nigel Cronin, the secretary of Northern Ireland’s Elmwood Association, which brought together gay and straight campaigners for homosexual rights. Cronin had hit upon a tactic that suddenly became popular among gay organisations across the UK in 1970 and 1971: that of “facing the TV cameras” as an “out” gay man.

Coming out on........

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