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https://dailyprogress.com/obituaries/mayes-first-npr-chairmanoctober---october-anthony-bernard-duncan/article_26fd075c-cf06-5a20-ba69-414064c4344f.html

Mayes,First NPR ChairmanOctober 10, 1929 - October 23, 2014, Anthony Bernard Duncan

Oct 26, 2014 Updated May 1, 2020

Anthony Bernard Duncan Mayes, First NPR Chairman October 10, 1929 - October 23, 2014 Anthony Bernard Duncan Mayes was born in London, and would always remember enduring the horror of the London Blitz as a 10 year old boy. After completing a graduate degree in classical civilizations at Cambridge University in 1954, Bernard worked first as a high school teacher of Latin, Greek and history. He then completed training at the influential College of the Resurrection in Mirfield, and became ordained as an Anglican priest. Bernard emigrated to the United States in 1958 and became worker-priest and director of a student house attached to Judson Memorial Church in Greenwich Village and New York University. In 1960, Bernard moved to San Francisco, California, and held a small parish in the Diocese of California. In 1962, he founded San Francisco Suicide Prevention. Indeed, Bernard was the founding force behind the Suicide Prevention movement in America, launching in San Francisco the first of what would eventually become a network of over 500 community crisis centers. Founding San Francisco Suicide Prevention would retain pride of place for Bernard among his many achievements. In a city that was known for the highest suicide rate in the western world, he started a simple volunteer hotline using the code name "Bruce" and distributing matchbooks with the phone number in the bars of San Francisco's challenging Tenderloin neighborhood. He had a newsman's flair for publicity and was able to maintain constant visibility of the fledgling organization and its efforts to reach people who found themselves wanting to end their lives. He trained the organization's first volunteers and went with them to secure the first office in the basement of a Tenderloin apartment building--whose manager initially believed them to be an escort service. Having already come out as gay years before, Bernard also organized a sexuality study center for the Episcopal Diocese of California that was dubbed the Parsonage. The Parsonage was awarded the Episcopal Jubilee citation and later evolved into the present-day Oasis organization. Thus, through the tumultuous 1960s, 1970s and 1980s in San Francisco, Bernard was an important voice for compassion and cross-cultural understanding. One of Bernard's most important roles in life was that of a broadcast journalist and entertainer. Beginning in 1958 he worked as a journalist for the BBC and other networks, interviewing film stars, astronauts and other public figures. While attempting to report on the multi-racial Koinonia Farm community in Sumter County, Georgia, Bernard was confronted by the Ku Klux Klan. In 1968 Bernard helped organize the public broadcasting system in the United States, becoming first the founder of KQED-FM and Executive Vice President of KQED TV in San Francisco, then a co-founder and first working chairman of National Public Radio (NPR). Today, NPR attracts over 25 million listeners per week. Bernard then became a consultant for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting in Washington, D.C., advising universities and communities across the country. Meanwhile, he continued his work as a journalist, covering such events as the aftermath of the Milk and Moscone assassinations in 1978. Bernard was also prolific in the arena of radio drama, contributing scripts and performances to projects including Homer's Odyssey, the Agamemnon of Aeschylus and Plato's Phaedo, each adapted from the original Greek; and The Lord of the Rings, a 1979 radio series that he wrote and performed in as Gandalf. Bernard also received financial support from the National Endowment for the Arts for a dramatization of the life of Thomas Jefferson. He also recorded several books for Blackstone Audio Books and was often heard in The Black Mass, Eric Bauersfeld's series of dramatic adaptations for Berkeley's FM station KPFA. Invited in 1984 to join the English faculty of the University of Virginia (UVA) in Charlottesville, Virginia, Bernard took what would prove to be a twenty-year break from California. Winning the respect of faculty and students alike, Bernard was appointed assistant dean in UVA's College of Arts and Sciences in 1991, and then chair of the Communications Department, finally founding the Media Studies Program. He was awarded the Sullivan/Harrison Award for mentoring and received a commendation by the University Seven Society. Continuing his LGBTQ activism, Bernard also co-founded the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transsexual Faculty, Staff and Graduate Student Association at the University of Virginia, known as UVa Pride. On Bernard's retirement from UVA in 1999, the Serpentine Society, the University of Virginia's LGBTQ alumni association, began annually giving the Bernard Mayes Award to an alumna or alumnus who contributes positively to LGBTQ causes both within the University community and beyond. In later years, ever curious and engaged, Bernard continued his research on the role of faith in society. He also found a new role as a voice for LGBTQ seniors, joining organizations and giving press interviews about the challenges LGBTQ elders face. In June 2014, the California LGBT Legislative Caucus honored him at the State Capitol in Sacramento. Bernard's autobiography, "Escaping God's Closet: The Revelations of a Queer Priest," received the Lambda Literary Award for Religion and Spirituality. In the book, Bernard revealed why he ultimately renounced the priesthood and religion, and described the interdependence, interaction and endless exchange within the universe as the "Soup." For Bernard, the interrelationship of all things necessitated a particular ethic that he whimsically dubbed "Soupism." For Bernard, Soupism was derived from the belief that love for others, egalitarian government, universal education and respect for the planet and all that live upon it are critical for the continued health, well-being and survival of the human species. Bernard lived according to these compassionate values, and pursued them tirelessly in a lifetime of courageous storytelling, caregiving and leadership. He is survived by his many close friends all over the world, who loved him dearly. He is also survived by his former colleagues, and the unknown thousands of people who are alive today because of his work. Bernard's close friends invite those seeking to honor Bernard to give a contribution in his memory to San Francisco Suicide Prevention, KQED, or the Serpentine Society. Gatherings will be planned in California and Virginia later; interested persons are invited to contact Sandy Snyder at soupist@mac.com for information.