Joseph Beam

In 1992, Beam's mother donated her son’s papers to the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in New York. The donation led to the curation, by Steven G. Fullwood, of the Center’s In the Life archive dedicated to black LGBTQ experiences. The correspondence includes letters to black gay writers, including Audre Lorde, and also letters to people who were incarcerated, interviews with organizer Bayard Rustin and poet Pat Parker, as well as notes and manuscripts from Beam's journalism and gay rights work.

Beam died of an AIDS-related illness on December 27, 1988, three days before his thirty-fourth birthday.

Beam was the editor of In the Life (1986), the first anthology of poetry and prose by Black gay men for which he received a Citation from the State House of Rhode Island in 1987 and a Commendation from the City of Philadelphia. Beam began a second anthology, Brother to Brother, named after an earlier short story of his, but died before it was completed. Essex Hemphill and Beam’s mother, Dorothy, completed the collection and it was published as Brother to Brother: New Writings by Black Gay Men in 1991.

The Lesbian and Gay Press Association awarded Beam a certificate for outstanding achievement by a minority journalist in 1984. In 1985, Beam became a consultant to the Gay and Lesbian Task Force of the American Friends Service Committee. In 1985, Beam joined the Executive Committee of the National Coalition of Black Lesbians and Gays, and became the Editor of its journal, Black/Out. That same year, Beam was awarded The Philadelphia Gay News Lambda Award for Outstanding Achievement.

In the early 1980s, Beam began working at Giovanni's Room, an independent gay and lesbian bookstore in Philadelphia while he wrote and was active in local and national efforts for acceptance, visibility and social justice for the Black gay community. His writing was published in many newspapers and publications, including Au Courant, Black/Out, Blackheart, Changing Men, Gay Community News, The Painted Bride Quarterly, Philadelphia Gay News, The Advocate, New York Native, The Body Politic, and The Windy City Times.

Beam received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Franklin College in 1976 where he was an active member of the local Black Student Union, helped to organize conferences on campus and was active in college journalism and radio programming. He was awarded the Omega Psi Phi fraternity Award for Broadcasting in 1974.

Joseph Fairchild Beam (December 30, 1954 – December 27, 1988) was an African-American gay rights activist, writer and poet.

Beam was born in Philadelphia on December 30, 1954, to Sun Fairchild Beam, a security guard, and Dorothy Saunders Beam, a teacher and school guidance counselor. He was raised Catholic.