Jeffrey Montgomery

Jeffrey Montgomery (May 9, 1953 – July 18, 2016) was an American LGBTQ activist and public relations executive. In 1984, his partner, Michael, was shot to death outside a Detroit gay bar, prompting Montgomery to engage in LGBT advocacy. He started work on LGBT anti-violence issues upon learning that the police were not spending many resources on solving the murder, "just another gay killing". In 1991 Montgomery became the founding executive director of the Triangle Foundation, and served until September 2007. Initially engaging in victim advocacy around LGBT violence, and to improve handling of LGBT related cases, the foundation's work expanded to LGBT civil rights and advocacy, with projects for anti-violence, media activism, and legislative education on LGBT civil rights. He became nationally known for his work and served at numerous organizations.

Personal life Montgomery was born in Detroit, Michigan on May 9, 1953. His older brother, James Montgomery, He moved to Detroit after graduating and remained a resident of Detroit for the remainder of his life.

He worked as public relations director of America's Thanksgiving Parade. He was serving in this role in 1989 when the parade moved back to the Gnome block and in 1990, when for the first time a balloon escaped from the parade. interim executive director, and murder of Matthew Shepard. National LGBT organizations paid for Montgomery to attend the trials of Shepard's killers.

Montgomery was the co-chair of the National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs (NCAVP), for which he was also a national spokesperson. He was also a member of the Steering Committee of the Michigan Alliance Against Hate Crimes, and a board member of the ACLU of Michigan.

He was one of the founding board members of the Woodhull Freedom Foundation (also known as the Woodhull Sexual Freedom Alliance) in 2003, and remained active with the organization until his death. He was also an inaugural member of the WikiQueer Global Advisory Board and served as Strategic Counsel to the wiki's parent organization, The Aequalitas Project.

Montgomery was among a group of LGBT activists, representing NCAVP, invited to Washington, D.C. for meetings beginning in 1997 with senior policy officials at the White House.

In 2000, he delivered the inaugural Matthew Shepard Memorial Lecture at Brown University.

In the years prior to his death, he was working on a feature-length documentary showcasing his work in Detroit's LGBT community. The film, America You Kill Me, premiered at the Freep Film Festival in Detroit on April 28, 2022.

In August 1999, Montgomery was named one of the "Best and Brightest" national LGBT activists by The Advocate magazine.

Montgomery was named, along with twelve others, a "Michiganian of the Year" for 2002 by the Detroit News,

In June 2019, Montgomery was one of the inaugural fifty American "pioneers, trailblazers, and heroes" inducted on the National LGBTQ Wall of Honor within the Stonewall National Monument (SNM) in New York City's Stonewall Inn. The SNM is the first U.S. national monument dedicated to LGBTQ rights and history, and the wall's unveiling was timed to take place during the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall riots.