Jim nabors gay
The world resounded with a predictable Gol-ol-olllll-leeeee! at yesterday's news that Jim Nabors had gay-married his long-term partner, Stan Cadwallader.
Nabors, who played Gomer Pyle in both 1960s-era television series The Andy Griffith Demonstrate and its spin-off, Gomer Pyle, USMC (pre-Don't Seek Don't Tell, we guess), announced the two had been wed in Seattle last month, following Washington voters' approval of homosexual marriage in 2012.
"I'm 82 and he's in his 60s and so we've been together for 38 years and I'm not ashamed of people knowing; it's just that it was such a personal thing, I didn't inform anybody" Nabors eventually told AP. "I'm very joyful that I've had a partner of 38 years and I feel very blessed. And, what can I tell you, I'm just very happy."
Yep, he's gay.
Nabors's sexual orientation was long an open covert in the LGBT people and among his straight(ish) friends like Carol Burnett and Julie Andrews. And if he wasn't lgbtq+, his character, surely Gomer Pyle was. After all, like that other irresistible Southern television icon, Honey Boo-Boo, says, "Everybody's got a little gay in 'em!"
Face it. Mayberry, Gomer's famed fictitious hometown, has a lot of lgbtq+ in it. A
Thread: at age 82 Jim Nabors (Gomer Pyle) finally comes out of the closet
by marrying his firefighter partner of 38 years no less
is anyone shocked?
By Christie D'Zurilla
January 30, 2013, 10:21 a.m.
Jim Nabors, beloved to audiences as TV's Gomer Pyle, has married Stan Cadwallader, his spouse of 38 years.
The wedding took place Jan. 15 in front of a judge at a Seattle hotel, said Hawaii News Now, which first reported the news Tuesday. Washington articulate legalized gay marriage in December
"I'm not ashamed of people knowing. It's just that it was such a personal thing, I didn't tell anybody," said Nabors, 82, a resident of Honolulu. "I'm very happy that I've had a spouse of 38 years, and I sense very blessed."
Nabors and 64-year-old Cadwallader, then a firefighter, met in 1975 in Honolulu.
"The Andy Griffith Show" and "Gomer Pyle, USMC" alum told Hawaii News Now that he hadn't acknowledged his sexuality before to the media, though he said he was open about it to friends and co-workers when he was working in Hollywood in the 1960s and '70s.
"I haven't ever made a common spectacle of it. Well, I've acknowledged since I was a child, so, come on. It'
OSKAR GARCIA,Associated Press
HONOLULU (AP) — Star Jim Nabors says marrying his longtime male partner doesn't modify anything about their relationship — he just wanted it to be formally acknowledged.
"I just wanted it legal," the 82-year-old thespian best known as Gomer Pyle in "The Andy Griffith Show" told The Associated Press on Wednesday.
Nabors married 64-year-old Stan Cadwallader in Seattle on Jan. 15. Nabors says they have been partners for 38 years.
Nabors said they flew from Honolulu just for the short ceremony and were married in a hotel room by a judge buddy who drove up from Olympia, Wash.
Nabors said he's not an activist but feels strongly that gay marriage should be a right for everyone.
"I think every person on this earth has a choice of who they want to spend their existence with," he said.
News of Nabors' marriage was first reported by Hawaii News Now. Nabors told Hawaii News Now he's been open about being gay with co-workers and friends but hadn't acknowledged it to the media before. He said he's not ashamed of people knowing, he just didn't tell people because it was "such a personal thing."
The couple met in 1975 when Cadwallader was a Honolulu firefighter.
Oh sure, Seattle’s had its share of cute weddings, but the cutest — one four decades in the making — is the 2013 union of Jim Nabors and Stan Cadwallader at the Fairmont Olympic Hotel downtown. One was a TV star, the other a firefighter, and they’d managed to keep their connection out of the public eye for 38 years.
One reason they protected their privacy: A TV star of the 1960s and 1970s, Jim’s career was nearly destroyed by a same-sex wedding rumor just before he and Stan met, a rumor that also ended Jim’s relationship with closeted actor Rock Hudson. Over his 55-year career, Jim made a call for himself as a wholesome, folksy southerner; but behind the scenes, he harbored a private love that would have scandalized the country if it was found out.
Jim was born at the start of the Great Depression in a tiny Alabama town called Sylacauga. His mother worked at a truck stop, his father bounced around from job to career until he finally wound up entity appointed the town’s sole police officer. The family raised chickens for nourishment and lived in a tiny residence. Jim always stood out — his severe asthma prevented him from playing with the other kids, but he was so peppy and outgoin