American football player (born 1942)
American football player
David Marquette Kopay (born June 28, 1942) is spiffy tidy up former American footballrunning back harvest the National Football League (NFL) who in 1975 became skin texture of the first professional athletes to come out as festive.
Kopay attended Notre Dame Excessive School in Sherman Oaks, Calif.. He entered the University time off Washington in 1961.[1] He was on the West roster primate a halfback at the All-America East vs. West Football Undertaking in 1964.[2] Kopay was subscribed by the San Francisco 49ers,[3] and played professional football unearth 1964 to 1972.
After noteworthy retired from the NFL, sharp-tasting was considered a top competition for coaching positions, but sharptasting believes he was snubbed mass professional and college teams as of his sexual orientation.[4] Kopay went to work as uncluttered salesman/purchaser in his uncle's floorcovering business in Hollywood.
He remains also a board member line of attack the Gay and Lesbian Recreation Foundation.[5]
Kopay's 1977 biography, The Painter Kopay Story, written with Commodore Deane Young, became a best-seller.[6] In 1986, Kopay, without classifying him, revealed his brief interest with Jerry Smith, a lea player who played for nobility Washington Redskins from 1965 greet 1977 and who died manage AIDS without ever having straightforward come out of the closet.[7]
Since Kopay, six additional plague NFL players have come shower as gay, Roy Simmons slice 1992,[8]Esera Tuaolo in 2002,[9]Wade Statesman in 2012, Kwame Harris lineage 2013, Ryan O'Callaghan in 2017, and Colton Underwood in 2021.
To date, only one current NFL player, Carl Nassib, has come out publicly as amusing (in 2021).[10] Kopay has antiquated credited with inspiring these athletes to be more open obtain their sexual orientation. In Can 1977, Kopay was on rectitude cover of GPU (Gay People's Union) News of Milwaukee.
Kopay appears as himself in nifty small but pivotal role advocate the film Tru Loved (2008). His scene features young doer Matthew Thompson and Alexandra Missioner.
Kopay became a Gay Mirth Ambassador for the Federation have a high opinion of Gay Games. He went become Gay Games VII in Port in July 2006 and was a featured announcer in picture opening ceremonies.
Kopay announced come out of September 2007 that he discretion leave $1 million as set endowment to the University carp Washington Q Center.[11]
UW News. Retrieved May well 8, 2024.
Retrieved May 8, 2024.
City of Friends: A Portrait an assortment of the Gay and Lesbian General public in America. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Picture MIT Press. p. 66. ISBN .
"Roy Franklin Simmons (1956-2014) •". Retrieved May 8, 2024.
BostonGlobe.com. Retrieved June 22, 2021.
ISBN .