Celebrating Mary Leno
Mary invited me over for tea in 2021 to work through her massive collection of photos. About eight years ago now, a collective of feminist women came together to develop the Mapping Feminist Cambridge series, and I was in the final stages of completing the Central Square draft. Mary regularly documented protest graffiti through her walks in graffiti alley and at protests, later adding pins and t-shirts to the personal archive.
It felt important to honor Mary’s work as part of the series, given her dedication to so many local organizations, including the Cambridge Commission on the Status of Women, Cambridge Community Television (CCTV), and the Cambridge Women’s Center.
She walked me through the context of each photograph, as I pet her energetic dog, Bella, and she cracked jokes while scrolling through her laptop files. I watched her work through a similar comedic process in a recording of her talk for the History Project, “Out of the Archives: Documenting Protest Attire with Mary Leno,” where she shares her collection of photographs from protests around Boston advocating for racial and gender justice.
Some people grieve and process the violence of this country, or our personal traumas, with humor. Mary certainly did. Humor is connection; it’s an invitation to say, “we’re in this together.” It’s grounded in telling the truth, paired with empathy. She wrote her own obituary with that same style and sentiment:
“She was born and then she died.
So long, it’s been good to know you.”
The first story I ever remember Mary telling me ended with this acronym: SLUT. I knew I was in good company. Before Uber and Lyft added women-only driver policies to protect women from the horrifying rates of rideshare sexual harassment, Mary drove her friends and neighbors around through her “Senior Lesbian Urban Transport,” aka S.L.U.T.
This was a generous practice I learned about from many of the feminist women who provided rides to doctors appointments, abortion procedures, or simply to the airport when other means of transportation were unsafe. When you don’t have a family member with the means to drive you, or you can’t tell a family member why you’re going where you’re going, a woman with a SLUT-mobile steps in and becomes your family.
I’ve been estranged from my family for over a year and a half, and certainly en route to that decision for many years leading up to it. Lesbian elders, trans siblings, feminist activists, queer organizers became my chosen family.
Mary, especially, brought a warmth to my life that I was searching for. We talked about the similarities of our working class Northeastern Massachusetts families, both with origins in Nova Scotia — hers in Ipswich with the smells of the seashore wafting through her adolescence, and mine in Billerica and Tewksbury. There’s this Northeast, MA scrappy humor that immediately feels recognizable, and I picked up on it as soon as I met Mary.
“And as soon as I could be somewhat independent, I would leave as soon as I could. The meals, after dinner, after the dishes, I would leave until I had to come home again at night. I always managed to go someplace,” she said in a 2019 interview with Sarah Boyer for Boyer’s book, Coming Out, Becoming Ourselves: Lesbian Stories from the Boston Daughters of Bilitis, 1969-1999. Again, recognizable. Mary and I talked about this desire for escape at a young age - envisioning our lives beyond our original homes and towns, but we didn’t know there were others like us.
She originally moved to Cambridge because of its rent control policies, thanks to the activism of housing justice advocates, like Eviction Free Zone, who long protested the encroaching universities and biotech companies that have pushed poor and working class families out of the city for decades. In a biography of Mary’s life, Sarah Boyer writes, “She went to the rap groups at the Daughters of Bilitis in the Old Cambridge Baptist Church and found support from other lesbians; then Mary made her way to the Cambridge Women’s Center (est. in 1971) where she found her home. Among her many friends at the Center were Libby Bouvier and Judy Norris, two of the center’s founding mothers; they continue to be good friends to this day. Mary also met her partner Betty through a consciousness-raising group at the Center. They were together for 19 years. Mary attended the Women’s School, a collective of the Women’s Center, and took classes in Lesbian Literature and Self Defense, among many others. She was also an active member of the Cambridge Eviction Free Zone. In her day job, Mary was the program assistant at the Cambridge Commission on the Status of Women for over 20 years. She worked on a committee for programs in the city for girls and women on abortion rights, women’s health, and girls’ sports, and for several years conducted a monthly program on CCTV, (the city’s cable station) on topics about the women’s movement.”
Mary was an advocate for so many - a bold voice for social change and human kindness. At the conclusion of our tea time, Mary invited me to join her on her daily walk through Central Square, stopping in graffiti alley to check out the newest ink and discuss what it meant, pointing out anything with a meaningful message. We went on this walk three more times over the course of my knowing Mary. In 2021 and 2022, art for Black lives filled the walls. In 2024, on a chilly Fall day when Mary was the only one to show up for my queer history tour, we stopped for coffee at 1369 Coffee House; I nervously asked for her advice on a tour that I knew she could certainly write and lived firsthand herself; she encouraged me endlessly; and we walked through the alley a final time together.
“Free Palestine,” the walls cried. “Endless courage!” another painting read, shouting hope.
On July 29th, Mary spoke at an intergenerational lesbian coffee house hosted by Lesbos. I’m sure Mary was a huge fan of their work and newsletter, as it revives the grassroots, community-centered approach of so many early feminist and lesbian newspapers. She recounts her time in therapy “trying to be straight,” and the importance of seeing people like you.
“I had no idea there were lesbians and gay people out there to change the history or the reputation of us. When I heard about Stonewall, which I hope all of you know, I thought this is for me to finally feel good about myself and to want to get involved in it, and it changed my life, and I know a lot of lesbians. It really has made my life wonderful.”
Mary saw the Stonewall Inn Riots unfold in the news in 1969 and it changed her life. I learned about Stonewall forty years later, with that gut instinct that there must be something - there must be someone out there. I searched the textbooks of my high school library, finding one sentence about the riots, and let out a deep breath of relief.
Mary brought an umatched mix of humor, empathy, and encouragement to my life that I’ll forever be grateful for. She showed me what a future could look like, as a 20-something feeling lost in my politics and identity. She embraced everyone around her with such warmth and attention.
Last summer, my partner and I ran into Mary on Mass Ave in Central Square. She talked with my partner as if they were long-time friends, and invited us over for tea.
If you notice any errors or would like to add your own memories or resources to this article, please contact Kimm at kimmtopping@gmail.com. You can read more about Mary’s life below in this beautiful obituary.
“Mary M Leno, long-time resident of Cambridge, MA, died on September 4, 2025.
Mary worked hard for social justice. She was active in advocating for the LGBTQ community, low- or no-income people, women, and housing justice.
Her work for equal rights and dignity for the LGBTQ community earned her a special award from the Cambridge City Council at the city’s annual Pride Brunch. She was a lifelong lesbian.
She was a strong advocate of housing for all, and initially moved to Cambridge because the city had rent control.
She was a photographer and chronicler of social movements. For many decades she photographed graffiti, and later added protest signs and protest t-shirts. Her vast political button collection is archived at the Cambridge Public Library and Northeastern University.
Mary was a daily visitor to Graffiti Alley in Central Square with her step-dog Al and his successors Desi, Bella, and Rosie. One of her photos was chosen for the 2025 Cambridge resident parking sticker.
Mary worked for the Cambridge Commission on the Status of Women for 20 years. She was the cornerstone of Cambridge Women in Cable, a collective that produced programming about women’s issues, perspectives, and experiences, at Cambridge Community Television from the late 1980s to the early 1990s. She starred in a skit called Ladies Against Women Against AIDS with her long-time partner, the late Betty Furdon, and another friend, dressed as conservative older women discussing the AIDS epidemic. She initiated the weekly BeLive series Women in the Arts, Women in Labor, and Women in Health.
She was active with and volunteered for the Cambridge Women’s Center, the Women’s School, Food for Free, and the Eviction Free Zone. Mary took great pleasure driving her friends and neighbors places through her self-named Senior Lesbian Urban Transport (S.L.U.T.).
Mary was born on November 11, 1940, in Ipswich, MA, where she lived throughout her high school years. She loved the marsh and the seashore, as well as the Clam Box.
She would like to be remembered for having a good sense of humor and wrote her own obituary:
She was born and then she died.
So long, it’s been good to know you.
After living with her diagnosis of Alzheimer’s for many years, Mary chose to die in Switzerland with the help of Dignitas. Mary’s brother, Harry Leno, and her niece Penny Leno of Ipswich predeceased her. She leaves her family, including her niece, Heather O’Hare, and nephew, Lance Leno, of Ipswich, grandnieces Analise Leno of Ipswich and Abigail Dupray of Rochester, NH, grandnephews Arthur J. Harris of Rochester, NH, and Lance Leno Jr. of Charlo, MT, and her cousin, Cyndi Funchion, of Danvers, MA. She also leaves many friends, who will miss her terribly.
All are invited to a Celebration of Mary’s rich life on October 19 from 1–4 pm at Sonia at the Middle East Restaurant in Cambridge, 480 Massachusetts Avenue, entrance on Brookline Street. Donations may be made to Just A Start (justastart.org).”