Franko Guillen, known to many as Franceska, began his involvement in fundraising and community activism in his hometown of Stockton, California. Since moving to San Diego three decades ago, he has continued with his community involvement. In San Diego, he has been instrumental in the Latino/a GLBT movement and heavily involved in HIV/AIDS work in Tijuana. A columnist covering the “Latin Scene” for the Gay and Lesbian Times, Guillen initiated of the first Latin drag show in a major club in San Diego and is a continuing presence among female impersonators and activists in San Diego’s GLBT and Latino GLBT communities.

“I started fundraising when I was 18, using my brother’s ID to go into the only gay club in Stockton,” Guillen recalled. “Three illegal immigrant kids had drowned and I wanted to raise money to help send their bodies back to Mexico. So, I went to The Gay 90s and told the owner how much I needed. He said, ‘Franko, you know you’re effeminate enough, why don’t you dress up as a girl and you can do a couple of numbers; we’ll charge a cover and I’ll give you whatever you need to make up the rest of the money.”

With his mother doing his makeup, his father finding him a second-hand wig and the whole family pitching in to help him find a dress, Guillen had his first gig as a female impersonator. He raised enough to send the bodies back to Mexico. And, with that, Franceska — the name was his mother’s idea — was born.

Guillen moved from Stockton to San Diego in 1981 with high hopes for a more integrated Latino and gay and lesbian community.

“I lived in an all-white neighborhood in Stockton,” Guillen recalled. “So I came to San Diego thinking that I would be closer to Latin America, but I found that Latinos were very secluded and isolated. They weren’t coming up to Hillcrest and North Park. They were whispering, because people would get angry if they heard them speaking Spanish.”

Seeing this tension between Anglos and Latinos in the gay community led Guillen to become active in educating Anglos and others about Latino concerns and about the Latino presence within the GLBT community.

“Me being what I am, I would educate the people who got angry, giving them a little bit of history, reminding them that [the city they lived in] used to be Mexico.”

But while Guillen’s activism has often been centered around Latinos, specifically because they haven’t always been well represented in the community, he thinks the really important issue for the GLBT community is respect.

“I just wanted people to respect people,” he said. “Whether they were White, Black, Hispanic, Jewish or Christian; I wanted to correct the way in which people were misrepresented and oppressed. And you don’t have to be Anglo to oppress.”

And it’s not just respect for other people that is central, according to Guillen. We all need to respect ourselves and the world around us.

“You need to get to know yourself before you can help the community,” he said. “I don’t compromise my integrity; my father told me the only thing we poor people have is our integrity, so don’t compromise it.”

A commitment to integrity and respect has been the driving force of Guillen’s activism.

“I don’t belong to any organization, I belong to myself,” he said. “I don’t do what I do for publicity or recognition; I do it to help and to teach people respect.”

In this, he is continuing the tradition of a long line of female impersonators.

“Female impersonators were always out front doing fundraising, they were at the forefront of fundraising for HIV, and before HIV was around, trying to teach respect. Now when there are a lot of fundraisers with $250 a plate dinners, there are a lot of people who can’t afford that, but female impersonators are still doing our fundraising.”

It isn’t important to Guillen that he is recognized publicly for what he does, however he does think that it’s the people at the local level, the local activists and fundraisers, such as female impersonators, who deserve more recognition than they sometimes get.

“You know, I travel a lot and a lot of people are asking why San Diego Pride has Esera Tuaolo as grand marshal of the parade. Here’s a guy who made hundreds of thousands of dollars a year in the closet and then he comes out and he’s a hero. There are a lot of heroes right here in the community in San Diego who should be honored.”

But whether we always recognize the people we should or not isn’t as important as that we continue to teach one another respect, educate each other and take care of one another. That’s part of why Guillen is so particularly passionate about Las Memorias, an AIDS hospice in Tijuana that serves a mixed population of men, women, heterosexuals, gays and bisexuals. It’s important to Guillen that people not forget about HIV/AIDS. “It’s so important that people realize that it can be much worse in someplace like Mexico without many of the resources we have here.”