“I started as a freshman at Kiser High School and continued there for three years,” Flynn said.
Kiser became a middle school before Flynn’s senior year, so he finished high school at Colonel White. Because it was a bigger school, Flynn was able to take both newspaper and acting classes.
“I figured out there that I wanted to go into journalism, after I worked on the yearbook,” Flynn said.
He became part of a magnet program and went to Roth High School in the afternoon to take mass communications. In that program he learned newswriting and television production. He believed that journalism would be his career.
At 18, Flynn came out as a gay man and around the same time, he decided not to pursue journalism.
“Back then the ‘National Enquirer’ was big, and I started looking at journalism as a whole as too commercial for me,” Flynn said.
He attended Wright State University but didn’t graduate. He caught the “theater bug” and started performing.
Flynn worked at local restaurants and eventually moved into management.
Then a friend told him about a part time position available with the Victoria Association. In 1995, he started working at the box office and eventually house operations. In 2008, he was laid off but he was called back after about a year.
“I stayed until COVID hit in 2020,” Flynn said. “A bunch of us were furloughed and when they restructured, there wasn’t a spot for me.”
Flynn moved on, working as volunteer manager at the YWCA Dayton in 2021 then at Miami Valley Hospital as a patient transporter, taking patients from their rooms to tests or surgery.
“I met so many interesting people and it was a lot of fun,” Flynn said. “They needed a dispatcher ... I found myself back in management.”
During the pandemic, Flynn, who had often used his uncle’s 35mm camera when he was a teen, started a photography business. He offered professional head shots and event photography.
Flynn built a diverse resume, never realizing he was setting himself up for a job that would end up being his passion. While working at Miami Valley, he met Randy Phillips, the then executive director of the Dayton LGBT Center, which had been founded in 1976 as a community services organization for Dayton’s growing LGBT population. Phillips told Flynn his position was open as he was leaving the job.
“Randy encouraged me to take a look at the job description,” Flynn said. “It was a little bit of everything in many areas. And turned out I had experience in all of them.”
Flynn was interviewed and was surprised when he didn’t hear back from them for a month. But he was in a good place in his life and decided no matter what happened, it was meant to be. He was offered the executive director position in November of 2022.
“I’m the only employee so I do a lot of things,” Flynn said. “Besides marketing and finance and day to day operations, I plan the annual Dayton Pride Festival and parade.”
Conducted in June each year, the festival is celebrating the Greater Dayton LGBT Center’s 50th anniversary this year. Over that half-century, the center has grown to offer onsite support groups, community services, advocacy, education and entertainment.
“We are not like centers in larger cities in that we don’t offer mental health services,” Flynn said. “We have one paid staff person and a board of about 11 people.”
In addition to the annual festival, Flynn oversees various events, including a comedy show and art exhibits and he collaborates with local organizations on other events.
“I do a lot of outreach,” Flynn said. “And for the anniversary I’ve been collecting historical information and stories.”
The center was founded in Dayton by a group of people who were looking for more entertainment opportunities besides the few local gay bars in town. It was started at Howard Goetz’s home and was then called the “Dayton Gay Center.”
Since then, the center has grown and today has a permanent home at 136 N. Sinclair Street in Dayton. The large building is still in the process of being remodeled but Flynn said it’s “coming together.”
“When I came out at 18, I wish I had known about a place like this,” Flynn said.
Though the center was in existence at the time, Flynn said it was not well known, and he ended up in bars and drinking heavily, which he said was not the best outlet for him.
“I went through the first year of college, discovered alcohol and went off the deep end,” Flynn said. “I stopped drinking all together by age 21. The center provides the alternative that people want and need.”
For more information, log on to daytonlgbtcenter.org.
Have a Personal Journey story you’d like to share? Email this writer at banspachwriter@gmail.com.
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