Lima, Ohio, the city that was the fictionalized setting for the television show “Glee,” is now the real-life home of a new LGBTQ+ organization.
Earlier this year, Aimee Bucher and her friend, Jeff Givan, founded the Lima Pride Alliance. Bucher grew up in the city of 35,000, which is located in western Ohio roughly between Toledo and Dayton. She went to high school there in the 1980s, where she met her future girlfriend. Back then, it was tough being LGBTQ+ in Lima, and to some extent still is today.
“You can walk down the street and maybe we’ll hold hands, maybe we won’t, depending on what we see out on the street,” Bucher said.
Bucher and Givan started talking last June about starting an organization. In July, the Democratic Party of Allen County hosted a Pride Picnic that brought out 100 attendees. The pair took people’s names and emails to talk and build an email list.
“There’s an obvious desire for community here,” Bucher recalled thinking. “We have some momentum, let’s build on that.”
Lima does not have a deep LGBTQ+ history, but Bucher said a gay bar called “Somewhere in Time” dated back to at least the 1970s. It closed during the COVID-19 pandemic, and reopened under the name “Club Octane” with different owners as a queer nightclub.
Though Lima Pride Alliance is not yet a nonprofit, the group held a fall-themed event in October, which Bucher said brought an intergenerational crowd. The group is aiming for one event per quarter, with a Pride event next summer.
Bucher is expecting blowback from anti-LGBTQ+ residents to happen eventually. The community theatre has to be careful what shows they play.
“They’re very conservative with what play they will put on because they know that they will destroy their audience base [if] they do anything that’s too progressive,” she said. “We did a show where someone said, ‘God damn it,’ and we had people walk out because they had taken the Lord’s name in vain.”
When Bucher went to a Pride parade in 2023, she said there were counterprotestors to 25 marchers on a single street.
“We had like four following us, yelling Bible verses the whole time,” she said.
Before Pride next July, Bucher expects the organization to have its legal structure in order. The intent is to be a nonpartisan, rainbow beacon for Lima and Allen County’s LGBTQ+ population when the lack of visibility can feel “very isolating.”
“ I talk a lot about community because that’s the key,” she said. “ We have these events [where] people come together like, ‘Oh, I have people, I have this community.’ It’s exciting to be part of that – letting people know they’re not alone.” 🔥
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- To learn more about Lima Pride Alliance, click here for its Facebook page.
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