Fourth LGBTQ Site Designated Historic in San Diego
By Ann Jarmusch
November/December 2023

Benjamin Franklin Dillingham III. Courtesy Pat McArron, findagrave.com

The City of San Diego gained its fourth historic landmark associated with the LGBTQ civil rights movement when the Historical Resources Board designated the Benjamin F. Dillingham III House (“F” is for Franklin) on September 28, 2023. Dillingham (1945-2017) was Mayor Maureen O’Connor’s openly gay chief of staff and served on the boards of LGBTQ community and AIDS support groups, among others. He is credited with urging then-California State Senators Christine Kehoe and Toni Atkins to run for office as openly lesbian. The house, in the Sunset Cliffs area of Point Loma, is designated under HRB Criterion B for its prominent owner.

LGBTQ and other advocates want to see this home also designated under Criterion A, as a place of social and civic activism. As SOHO member and LGBTQ historian/activist Charles Kaminski told the HRB, he and others attended many political strategizing and charitable fundraisers for various LGBTQ and civic causes at Dillingham’s home. HRB staff responded that with more documentation of those events, they would write a report to the board recommending the addition of Criterion A at a future meeting.

You can read the designation report online.

Watch a video of the September 28 meeting on the City of San Diego Public Hearings' YouTube channel.

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