Harvey Milk

Harvey Milk was elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1977, but he had not served a full year in office when he was shot by a homophobic fellow supervisor; his assassination made him the most famous gay man in modern history. Before finding his calling as a politician Milk fumbled to find the niche from which he could fulfill his aspirations. He rejected Judaism as a religion, but he was deeply influenced by the cultural values of his Jewish upbringing and his understanding of anti-Semitism and the Holocaust. Faderman provides context to Milk's life as a gay icon, a Jew, and a complex, if contradictory, man. -- adapted from front jacket and back cover