Deb Price’s debut column for The Detroit News invited readers to help her come up with a less awkward way of introducing her boss to the woman who, at the time, had shared her life for six years: “Surely, a little ingenuity will solve this problem. So tell me, America , how do I introduce Joyce?”
For the first time, a mainstream newspaper took the bold step of publishing a weekly column about life from a gay perspective. Price’s column was nationally syndicated from the beginning, reaching readers from Palm Springs to Rochester , NY . More than 850 columns have followed since that premiere on May 8, 1992 .
Together with Joyce, Price has written the story of the first column in the award-winning And Say Hi to Joyce: America’s First Gay Column Comes Out which was “Dedicated to all the gay readers who’ve put twenty-five cents in a newspaper box and found nothing reflecting their own lives inside.” The two made headlines in 2003 as the first gay couple to appear on The Washington Post’s “Engagements, Weddings & Anniversaries” page.