When we marched in and we had all of these people on both sides of the stadium, clapping
for us, we all cried, we all cried.
Archive: May I welcome you, athletes and spectators, from all over the world, to the first Gay Games.
Tom Waddell was the founder of the Gay Games.
He was an athlete in the 1968 Mexico Olympic Games.
A lot of the men and women that were in the Olympics at the time were in the closet.
They did not want to come out.
If they did, they got harassed in the locker rooms.
What Tom wanted was for everyone to be part of the games and at the time I was a big wig
in women's softball.
When I met Tom, it was a kindred feeling.
It's like love at first sight the way it's supposed to be.
He had the same feminist values that I had.
He didn't ask for my help, he said he needed my help.
We didn't have very much money so we hustled.
We were trying to do as many fundraisers and raise as much money as possible to put on
the sports, to get the medals.
About six weeks before we were putting on the games, and we were running like crazy,
we got hit with the lawsuit from the USOC (United States Olympic Committee)
objecting to the word Olympics, saying that they owned it.
I've never seen them own the word Olympic.
So they were suing us.
But we found the Rat Olympics, Fireman's Olympics, Police Olympics.
I didn't see them suing Las Vegas over the Poker Olympics!
We had to get the word Olympic off of everything that we'd done.
That was really devastating to us.
All I had time for was: "Get your butt into gear, come into the office and start crossing
off everything."
It is with great joy that I am here to celebrate the opening of the first international
Gay Athletics Olympics Games.
Opening ceremonies for Gay...
I still get tears.
We had no idea how many people were buying tickets
and then having all our athletes marching in.
The balloons, everything.
Forty years later, it still runs through my mind.
We played Sacramento yesterday and I think we beat them 3-0.
How do you feel about the Gay Games overall?
I love it, I've never felt so at home in a long time.
It's nice.
Put your arm around your girlfriend or whatever and it's really nice and comfortable.
Every sport facility was full, it was packed
and every day that went by, they got more packed.
What's been the most memorable moment for you so far?
The feeling of unison.
It's like everybody's for everybody else.
We had about 1,360 athletes for the very first Gay Games.
It took away the stereotypes and made them athletes.
God bless us everyone and God bless Tom Waddell.
Tom was a wonderful human being which is why I asked him to have a child with me.
I wanted to have a child.
We worked on getting pregnant right away.
And I got pregnant right away.
And when I look at my daughter, she's going to be 38.
She happened because of the Gay Games!
In 1985, Tom Waddell was diagnosed with AIDS.
He died in 1987.
The US Olympic Committee now supports the Gay Games
which continue to be held every four years around the world.