who's bayard rustin?

Nearly every major city has a street in it named Martin Luther King (street, blvd, ave, way, etc) but there is no Bayard Rustin street. And why should there be? Who is Bayard Rustin?

Bayard Rustin was one hell of an organizer who worked on defending the Scottsboro Boys, worked on forming the Congress of Racial Equality, protested prisons, boycotted buses, supported South African Resistance, aided Martin Luther King Jr and organized the March on Washington where MLK Jr gave his famous, "I Have a Dream" speech. However, little is retold of the heroics of Bayard because Bayard was gay.

I had never heard of Bayard before tonight when I attended my first class on the GLF taught by bandmate Dominic at PSU. It's a shame that there were only five people in the class because I think that more could stand to hear about him. After organizing for MLK Jr, Bayard was outed to the nation as a queer by a US Rep in an attempt to thwart the march. Bayard stepped back in order to not compromise the movement. Reports say that MLK Jr asked him to step back. They also say that Bayard was shocked because he just assumed MLK Jr would stand up against yet another form of repression. He didn't.

Towards the end of his life, Bayard resurfaced in the world of social justice but this time speaking out for the queers. He said, "When an individual is protesting society's refusal to acknowledge his dignity as a human being, his very act of protest confers dignity on him.”