Individual | Inducted 2025
Jan Berger is a Chicago native whose involvement in the LGBTQIA+ community for more than 45 years has included healthcare, policy, community involvement, and sports. Starting in the late 1970s, Jan was a volunteer at Howard Brown Health Center, serving as a health provider, an early advisor, and a board member of the Women’s Initiative and the board of Howard Brown. As an out lesbian pediatrician in Chicago in the 1980s and ’90s, she had the largest pediatric practice for the children of gay and lesbian parents. She also led Illinois Masonic Medical Center’s programs of “Considering Parenthood” for the LGBT community. Over 500 “considering parents” went through the program. Berger served as an early member of the Mayor’s Commission on Human Relations Committee on Gay and Lesbian Affairs from 1993 to 1995 under Mayor Richard M. Daley. She has remained highly active in government and policy activities at the city, state, and national levels.
In the mid-1980s, Berger, along with Peg Grey and Jackie Fabri, began the idea of a women’s sports league in the women’s locker room at Marigold Bowl. This became the Gay Athletic Association (GAA) in 1985, with Berger as its first commissioner. Several years later, Berger started the Windy City Softball lesbian league, joining the men’s league with Jim Flint as the men’s commissioner. She was also the first Chicago representative to the North American Gay Amateur Athletic Alliance (NAGAAA), the national softball league, where she both led and played. Over the next 10 years, she led the women’s division of the Windy City Athletic Association and represented the WCAA at NAGAAA.
Berger transitioned to an active corporate career as founding CEO of Health Intelligence Partners in 2008. As an open lesbian senior healthcare executive, she has mentored many young individuals on how to integrate their LGBTQA+ life into a fulfilling and successful professional career. In 2019, she was recognized by Crain’s Chicago Business as a Notable LGBTQ Executive.