Anita Bryant, Orange Juice spokeswoman and gay rights advocate, dies at 84

NEW YORK: Anita Bryant, former Miss Oklahoma, a Grammy-nominated singer and a prominent advocate of orange juice and other products who became famous in the second half of her life for her open opposition to gay rights, has died. She was 84 years old.

Bryant died on December 16 at her home in Edmond, Oklahoma, according to a statement from Bryant’s family published Thursday on The Oklahoman news website. The family did not provide a cause of death.

Bryant was from Barnsdall and started singing at a young age, and was just 12 when she hosted her own local TV show. In 1958, she was elected Miss Oklahoma and soon began a successful recording career. Her hits were “Till There Was You”, “Paper Roses” and “My Little Corner of the World”. A lifelong Christian, she received two Grammy nominations for Best Sacred Performance and one for Best Spiritual Performance for her album “Anita Bryant… Naturally.”

In the late 1960s, she was one of the artists who joined Bob Hope on his USO tour for troops overseas, sang at the White House, and performed at both the Democratic and Republican national conventions in 1968. She also became a highly visible sales spokesman, her Florida orange juice ads carried the slogan: “A day without orange juice is like a day without sunshine.”

However, in the late 1970s, her life and career began on a completely new path. Dissatisfied with the cultural changes of the time, Bryant led a successful campaign to repeal an ordinance in Miami-Dade County, Florida, that would have prohibited discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. Bryant and her Save Our Children coalition, supported by the Rev. Jerry Falwell, among others, continued to oppose gay rights across the country, denouncing the “deviant lifestyle” of the gay community and calling gays “human trash.”

In return, Bryant became the target of much criticism. Activists organized boycotts of the products she promoted, designed T-shirts mocking her, and named a drink after her – a version of a screwdriver that replaced orange juice with apple juice. During a speech in Iowa, an activist stuck a pie in her face. Her career in the entertainment industry declined, her marriage to her first husband, Bob Green, broke up, and she later filed for bankruptcy.

In Florida, her legacy was questioned and perpetuated. The ban on gender discrimination was reinstated in 1998. Tom Lander, an LGBTQ+ activist and board member of the advocacy group Safe Schools South Florida, told The Associated Press on Friday: “She won the campaign, but she lost the battle on time.” But Lander also acknowledged the parental rights movement, which has spurred the recent wave of anti-LGBTQ+ bans and legislation in Florida led by conservative groups like Moms Against Liberty.

“This is very relevant to what’s happening today,” Lander said.

Bryant spent the latter part of her life in Oklahoma, where she headed Anita Bryant Ministries International. Her second husband, NASA test astronaut Charles Hobson Dry, died last year. A family statement says she left behind four children, two stepdaughters and seven grandchildren.