Rodney Wilson, founding member, first-generation college student and educator since 1990, was a secondary government and history teacher in Missouri when in 1994 he founded (then called) Lesbian and Gay History Month in the United States, the world’s first national LGBT History Month. He was the first out-gay public school teacher in Missouri to be granted tenure and he authored the first LGBT history published by the Missouri Historical Society. He has been profiled in dozens of books, magazines, and articles and he is the subject of a 2019 documentary-short: “Taboo Teaching: A Profile of Missouri Teacher Rodney Wilson.” He has been named an LGBTQ icon by the Huffington Post and by the LGBTQ History Month Icons Project. In 2020, he was named a Missouri Trailblazer by the Missouri State Museum as part of the Missouri Bicentennial 2021 commemoration. He holds graduate degrees in history and religion and teaches both at a community college in rural Missouri.