San Diego's Gay Bar History | KPBS Public Media

Contents:

• A LOOK BACK AT HOLLYWOOD’S UNRGROUND GAY CLUB CULTURE OF THE 1970S
• WHY BEG “GAY THE ’70S NEW YORK AND L.A. WAS MAGIC” — AND HOW HOLLYWOOD HAS CHANGED (GUT COLUMN)
• THIS IS WHAT GAY LIBERATN LOOKED LIKE IN THE '70S
• SAN DIEGO'S GAY BAR HISTORY
• DISVERG THE “GAY LIFTYLE” THROUGH 1970S MAGAZ
• BEFORE THE CASTRO, POLK GULCH WAS SAN FRANCIS'S GAYBORHOOD
• TOP 10 GAY BARS PARIS

A LOOK BACK AT HOLLYWOOD’S UNRGROUND GAY CLUB CULTURE OF THE 1970S

New York's Lost Gay BarsWe've known for many years that too many of our cherished gay bars and clubs are shutterg, fallg victim to risg rents and the ubiquy of apps like Grdr and Scff. Manco’s crowd, which clud many gay men of lor, bellowed out the chos, refigurg the song’s addrsee as a new kd of Shore Commissn, ‘Free Man’ (1975)D.

-led dance spac that were exclive to gay men — ually whe, middle-class gay men — started to open Manhattan late 1972. Valento, ‘I Was Born This Way’ (1975)The first rerd to feature lyrics about beg an out-and-proud gay man me om the mil performer Charl “Valento” Harris, who released “I Was Born This Way” as an apparently one-off release on Gaiee.

” “The lyrics were perfect, ” she told me Summer, ‘I Feel Love’ (1977)Gay male dance crowds were drawn to rerdgs that featured Black female volists, often intifyg wh their emotnal exprsivens and strength the face of adversy, often to the surprise of the artists, who were ually gospel-traed.

WHY BEG “GAY THE ’70S NEW YORK AND L.A. WAS MAGIC” — AND HOW HOLLYWOOD HAS CHANGED (GUT COLUMN)

Patrick Cowley, ‘Mutant Man’ (1982)Patrick Cowley fed his reputatn as one of the world’s most progrsive synthizer players durg rerdgs wh the dis pneer Sylvter, cludg “You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real), ” perhaps the ultimate gay male anthem. ”A versn of this article appears prt on, Sectn D, Page 5 of the New York edn wh the headle: Sp Some Gay Dis.

Wt Hollywood has long been the rabow-draped pal of the gay muny Los Angel, but an article for KCET, cy planner Jam Rojas scrib the diverse and somewhat unr-the-radar gay dis circu of 1970s Hollywood. The popular dis formed rponse to prejudice wh the gay muny, as one of s founrs told LA Weekly 2015.

He scrib the rtrant and popular pickup spot as exemplifyg the, "quiet world of mastream gay whe culture.

THIS IS WHAT GAY LIBERATN LOOKED LIKE IN THE '70S

" In Lillian Farman and Stuart Timmons’s Gay LA, the thors scribe how rtrant staff ed to splash the bathroom floors wh ammonia—the smell enuragg patrons not to lger longer than necsary.

SAN DIEGO'S GAY BAR HISTORY

[KCET] Developers Will Save Parts of Historic Circ Dis But Raze Everythg Else [Curbed LA] Mappg Los Angel's Groundbreakg Role LGBT History [Curbed LA] The Past and Future of Three of LA's Historic But Threatened Gay Nightclubs [Curbed LA]. The most wonrful thg about those days was that the gay folks power lent a hand to young gay people tryg to get a foothold the bs.

There was a powerful work of olr succsful gay men like theatril agent Milton Goldman and entertament attorney Arnold Weissberger who troduced younger gay men to succsful showbiz typ at their betiful apartment on Sutton Place overlookg the East River. If he shone three tim, they lled the NYPD, who had a al wh the Mafia owners of the gay bars to arrt a quota of “faggots” each week. There was rampant homophobia by stud and work executiv and by some olr agents, notorly at CAA (though not Ron Meyer nor the Young Turks, several of whom were known to be gay).

DISVERG THE “GAY LIFTYLE” THROUGH 1970S MAGAZ

There emerged a whole layer of gay work executiv, wrers, stud executiv and agents, cludg Warner Bros. The notor Art Murphy wrote about movie gross Daily Variety and was very openly gay — he was close to every movie executive town.

Tommy Nutter, who was known for the betiful pipg on the cloth he signed for Mick and Bian Jagger, picked me up at a dis New York one night and I end up at Stigwood’s offic at 135 Central Park Wt, n by Peter Brown, who ed to be Tommy’s boyiend and who had worked for the very gay Beatl manager Brian Epste.

BEFORE THE CASTRO, POLK GULCH WAS SAN FRANCIS'S GAYBORHOOD

In the past few months, the Uned Stat has celebrated a few important ton the history of civil rights for gay Amerins: the signatn of the Stonewall Inn New York Cy as a Natnal Monument to Gay Rights and the first anniversary of the historic Supreme Court cisn to legalize same-sex marriage all 50 stat. Before the days of polil activism, beg gay was somethg one often kept to onelf or shared only wh a close circle of iends.

There had, however, been gay bars Dallas, datg back to at least the early 1950s (one of the first was Le Bof Sur Le To, later renamed Villa Fontana). The police raids and nstant harassment ntued through the latter half of the 1970s, when an anized and unified gay muny beme polilly active and took their plats to the urts. In the early days, they were the only plac where gay men and women uld socialize openly wh one another a “safe” environment where they were ee to be themselv.

TOP 10 GAY BARS PARIS

That was a quote om a Dallas Gay Polil Cc spokman a 1979 Dallas Morng News article on the emergence of Oak Lawn as the center of Dallas’ gay muny. It’s hard to overstate the importance of the safe meetg plac at a time when men and women were beg arrted and were losg their jobs simply bee they were gay.

* * * * *I wre regularly about Dallas history, and has been difficult to fd posive media acunts of Dallas’ gay muny before the 1970s. When a rear of my blog directed my attentn to an article on Dallas’ gay club scene of the 1970s — wh photographs! The article, “Big Dallas” by Jerry Daniels, appeared the May/June 1975 issue of Ciao!, a New York-based gay travel magaze.