June 4, 2009 | Read Time: 2 minutes
Age at death: 54
Major philanthropy jobs: Mr. McFarlane was the first paid executive director of Gay Men’s Health Crisis, in New York. He also led Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS, a group that provides grants and raises money for AIDS services, and was a founder of Bailey House, which offers housing and other support services to homeless people with HIV and AIDS. Mr. McFarlane also served as Bailey House’s board president and most recently was executive director of the Gill Foundation, a grant maker in Denver that is one of the biggest philanthropies that supports gay rights.
How he made his mark: In 1981, long before most people knew about AIDS, he used his own telephone to set up the first hotline for people with symptoms. Recalls Tim Sweeney, a longtime colleague and executive director of the Gill Foundation: “I’ve said to people, he took a telephone, literally, and changed the course of a pandemic.” Marjorie J. Hill, chief executive of Gay Men’s Health Crisis, says Mr. McFarlane was instrumental in drawing attention to the disease in the early years of the epidemic. “Rodger was one of the first people to reach out to social-work institutions and other service providers and get social workers in to provide much needed services,” Ms. Hill says. She also credits him with being a mentor not only to her but to hundreds of others in the fields of gay rights and AIDS advocacy.
How he spent his early years: Mr. McFarlane grew up on a farm in rural Alabama and never finished college. He served in the U.S. Navy and was a licensed nuclear engineer who conducted strategic missions in the North Atlantic and far Arctic regions aboard a submarine.
Activities he pursued off the job: He was an avid athlete who participated in seven expeditions to the North Pole and in Eco-Challenges in Morocco and Fiji, where he captained an all-gay, mostly female crew. He wrote a much-praised book called The Complete Bedside Companion: No Nonsense Advice on Caring for the Seriously Ill, and co-produced The Destiny of Me, a play written by Larry Kramer that was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize.
How he died: Mr. McFarlane committed suicide, saying he could no longer take the suffering of debilitating back and heart troubles.
How he will be remembered: Mr. McFarlane, who was 6-foot-7, was brash, tough, funny, and above all unforgettable, Mr. Sweeney says.
Philanthropy award his friends would like to have bestowed: “If there was a Tony for organizing, it would have Rodger’s name on it,” says Ms. Hill.
