Opened in 1999 and designed around a Hollywood theme, the 22 units were named after former movie stars including Marilyn Monroe, Clark Gable and Lucille Ball.

Surprisingly until last year, unknown to the gay residents, a separate wing was used exclusively as a recluse for members of wealthy families suffering from mental illnesses!

Mike Huff, who has owned the property for the past two years and comes from a family of builders, has given the property six months to sell. Failing that, he plans to convert the building into up-market condominiums as he feels that there is still a property boom in the area comparing the city’s

renaissance to that of Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. in the 1960s.

“There’s a small explosion getting ready to happen, and it’s going to shock and surprise everyone,” Mr Huff said.

Bereaved Mr Paolino feels that he would like their relationship to be acknowledged. “In two or three hundred years when that name is there, I want someone to know that this person loved this person.”

“It really hurts because I really feel that they’ve tossed me aside and tossed my feelings aside and my love for a person aside and that person’s love for me aside,” he told the station.

The cemetery comes under the Catholic diocese of Providence who have the final say on headstone inscriptions with a view to “to uphold the dignity of the cemetery”

Mr Paolino said that he wasn’t asking the Catholic church to recognise gay marriages, but his love for his late partner and if the diocese failed to reconsider his inscription request, he would consider transferring Justin’s remains to a cemetery in Massachusetts near where the couple married.

In 1996, 65 per cent of Americans opposed same-sex marriage and 27 per cent supported it according to The Pew Research Centre’s poll. The independent research organisation latest poll released yesterday conducted on 1,405 adults between 8th and 12th March found that 51 per cent opposed same-sex marriage and 39 per cent supported it. Only two years ago as gays and lesbians were marrying in San Francisco, a Pew poll found 63 per cent of Americans opposed the right of same-sex marriages and 30 per cent in favour of it.

“In 2004, (same-sex marriage) was an emotional issue that struck a very deeply rooted chord in a lot of people,” said Michael Dimock, associate director of the Pew Research Centre for People and the Press. “It is still an issue — a lot of people who opposed it then still oppose it now. But a lot of people who opposed it then were in an intense environment and either feel less strongly or feel that people can do what they want to do.”

Support for the rights to adopt was held by 46 per cent of the interviewees as against 38 per cent in 1999 while sixty per cent of the respondents believed that gays and lesbians should be able to serve openly in the armed forces.

“It indicates people are changing,” Mr Dimock said. “They’re becoming more open and tolerant, and we also have a shift in generations, which has a big impact.”

Matt Foreman, executive director of the National Lesbian and Gay Task Force in New York said “I think people have thought more about gay families in the last two years than in the previous 30,”

The survey also commented on the decrease in the number of respondents who said they “strongly oppose” same-sex marriage which has decreased from 42 per cent in 2004 to 28 per cent this year, with the largest decreases amongst senior citizens, republicans and religious moderates.

Despite support for gay issues carried out by independent polls, there has been no increase in the support from the USA’s voters on referendums on the issue of legalisation of civil partnerships where 13 states have passed constitutional bans on same-sex marriage and least seven other states will vote in November.

Unfortunately The Family Research Council, a conservative Christian lobbying group in Washington, D.C. failed to return a phone call, and a representative from the evangelical Christian organization Focus on the Family declined to comment on The Pew Research Poll.

Charles Franzke and James Thideman owners of Cactus Canyon Campground, claim to have endured seven years of torment including their guests being shot at and having rocks hurled at them, a petition to close the campsite down from day one, and even a hog farm being opened nearby which polluted the campsite’s streams.

The case claims that their neighbours worked together “for the purpose of harassing, intimidating and disrupting the business of Cactus Canyon Campground and the rights of the owners to peacefully enjoy their property.”

“That is the whole crux of the harassment: that we are gay and that we run a successful gay business,” Mr Thideman said.

Those accused include Ricky Moon a federal employee at the Mark Twain National Forest Service, Carrie Moon, Dan Fish of Fish and Sons Lumber and a member of the Ava Church of the Nazarene, Shannon and Trish Watterson of Show Me Real Estate also a member of the Ava Church of the Nazarene.

“From my perspective, the case is a land dispute at its heart,” said Brian Malkmus acting for Messrs Fish, Moon and the Wattersons.

Demographics Professor Jan Latten at the Statistics Netherlands (CBS) said: “There was an element of hype in 2001. Lots of people who had already been together for 30 or 40 years got married. The numbers peaked in 2002 when 1,838 same-sex couples tied the knot.

“After that it decreased. Everyone asked how this was possible because the opening up of marriage seemed to be so popular. It appears this peak was the ‘start-up’ effect. The figures in 2004 and 2005 were roughly equal.”

In the Netherlands it appears that children are still often the reason for getting married.

Interestingly there are no differences in the Dutch divorce rates between straight and gay couples however, lesbians tend to separate and divorce earlier on in relationships than gay men.

Professor Latten predicts that same-sex marriages have now stabilised with an estimated 1,200 ceremonies in 2006 being a similar figure to last year.

Approximately four thousand gay couples have tied the knot in Britain since the introduction of the Civil Partnership Act in December of last year.