A foUnD family

When Phil Stamper ’10 arrived on UD’s campus as a first-year student in the fall of 2008, he wasn’t really sure who he was — or who he wanted to be. But, as he navigated his first few weeks of classes and met new people, he said he began to feel a sense of belonging he never experienced in his hometown.

“[I] almost immediately started being honest about my identity and coming out to my new friends,” he said. 

Stamper, a music major at UD, is now a national bestselling author of queer books for kids and teens. He returned to campus last fall to speak about the important work of ensuring LGBTQ+ kids, teens and adults feel accepted. 

Students packed Sears Recital Hall to hear Stamper recount his time on campus, noting that when he moved into 110 Lawnview his junior year, it instantly became home. 

It wasn’t until he got an on-campus job doing public relations for UD athletics that Stamper realized he had a knack for writing. 

“Working media relations, writing press releases — that was the first time I thought, ‘Oh, I might be good at this,’” Stamper said. “And I had never really had that feeling before. It was something I had to learn by doing.” 

He took the $800 in graduation money gifted by relatives and moved to Washington, D.C., to work in nonprofit public relations. Inspired by books like The Hunger Games, he decided to start writing a novel of his own in the evenings.

“I know how to tell a story in 50 words, what’s another 5,000?” Stamper joked. 

He began writing his debut novel, The Gravity of Us, a present-day fictional retelling of the Space Race. From there Stamper kept writing, and his second novel, As Far as You’ll Take Me, draws influence from his time at UD. The novel follows a queer teen’s pursuit to become a professional oboist. 

“It brings in a lot of my music background and is a found family story, which is really important to me,” Stamper said. 

It mirrors the family he found when he came to UD and how they made him feel accepted.

“The more community I was able to build, the better I [felt] about actually fitting in overall,” Stamper said, offering this advice: “If your community is just the same people, expand it.” 

A version of this article appears in print in the Spring 2025 University of Dayton Magazine, Page 49. EXPLORE THE ISSUE — MORE ONLINE