Queer Places:
6412 Barnaby St NW, Washington, DC 20015
Geraldine Linder (April 21, 1920 - February 20, 2005) was a longtime lesbian activist.
After moving to Washington in the 1950s, Linder worked in the photography division of National Geographic magazine for more than 30 years. She rose through the ranks there to become the photo curator.
In her early 60s, Linder became involved with the Gay Community Center of the District of Columbia, a now-defunct group. She was the organizer of its arts and photo shows, served as the center's vice president, and was a board member for several years.
As a journalist, she helped found the D.C. chapter of National Lesbian & Gay Journalists Association.
In the 1970s, Linder was active in the now-defunct Washington Area Women's Center. The following decade, Linder became active in the Gay Women's Alternative, which Maryl Kerley, Ina Alterman and others formed in 1980 to help lesbians come out and as an alternative to visiting bars. She also was active in the Triangle Arts association.
In February 2005, Linder suffered a stroke and fell in her home, lying alone without food or water for about a day before a roommate discovered her, barely alive. She died Feb. 20 at Sibley Hospital. Linder, 83, was a 30-year veteran of National Geographic magazine. She had dozens of friends in the District’s gay and lesbian community but no living family anyone could find. Sibley refused to relinquish her body. In this moment of frustration, Robert Bruening stepped forward with a solution. According to Mark Meinke of the Rainbow History Project, which had begun raising money for Linder’s burial, Bruening said he’d known the deceased since childhood, when his father would bring him to meet her for lunch near the offices of National Geographic. Bruening offered to file a petition with the register of wills at D.C. Superior Court to be the personal representative of Linder’s estate. Meinke welcomed the help.
In a March 22, 2005, affidavit he wrote that he’d known Linder for 20 years and in recent years saw her about once a week, often meeting for lunch. Linder had no brothers or sisters, he explained, and both of her parents were only children as well.
Perhaps without his knowledge, Bruening’s petition cranked up the machinery of the burgeoning genealogical industry. Soon, a Salt Lake City heir-hunting firm called the American Research Bureau found a living relative: Charles Montrose, a maternal first cousin living in Georgia.
The American Research Bureau, anticipating a cut of the estate, hired D.C. attorney Barbara Miller, who in turn contacted Bruening’s attorney. At first, Miller says, she was willing to give Bruening power over the estate as long as he could obtain a bond to cover her client’s claim on the money. But Bruening couldn’t get the bond, and Miller told him to abandon his petition. He refused.
“He obviously had it in mind right away that he was going to loot her estate,” she says.
Miller says Bruening also didn’t help her collect information. Meanwhile, he told Linder’s friends that a long-lost heir had been found in Georgia. A few months later, after clashing with the new head of the Center, Bruening got canned and stopped returning phone calls.
Nearly two years passed before Miller received Linder’s 2005 tax forms and figured out what happened. The forms showed income from three mutual funds, totaling $150,000, all cashed out after Linder’s death. Miller called D.C. police, who traced the money to an account in New Jersey. In November 2008, federal prosecutors charged Bruening with wire fraud. Court documents accuse him of entering Linder’s residence, stealing financial information, and using it to transfer money into accounts for his own use.
Police tracked down Bruening in late October in Puerto Rico, where he was in the process of opening a restaurant with his boyfriend. He turned himself in that same month.
My published books:
