THE CAMPY VAUDEVILLE PERFORMANCES THAT, IRONICALLY, SET THE STAGE FOR DRAG
At the turn of the 20th century, female and male impersonators were thrilling large crowds on vaudeville stages across the U.S., unknowingly becoming precursors to contemporary drag—even though crossdressing offstage was illegal.
Julian Eltinge was one of the most notorious female impersonators. As historian Sharon Ullman wrote in 1995, Eltinge “reigned as a prince of vaudeville from 1909 to the early twenties.” Eltinge didn’t perform femininity as caricature—he fully transformed on stage, acting out a near perfect illusion of what womanhood represented at that time. “It was Eltinge's artistry—the perfection of his mimicry—that signaled to his audience that their most basic understanding of gender could be deceptive,” Ullman wrote. In contrast, most other performers used their acts to mock femininity and gender fluidity.
While Eltinge and his contemporaries dazzled in lace dresses and lavish makeup on stage, crossdressers offstage were widely persecuted. The ironic twist, of course, detailed in Clare Sears’ book Arresting Dress: Cross-Dressing, Law, and Fascination in Nineteenth-Century San Francisco, was that the same men arresting people for crossdressing in public would often spend their freetime catching family-friendly Eltinge performances. “It’s reprehensible in the eyes of the law,” wrote Lew Sully, a Chronicle reporter based in San Francisco, of crossdressing. Meanwhile, the same writer heralided vaudeville impersonations.
When artists weren’t performing, their gender identity and sexuality were subject to scrutiny, often forcing gender impersonators like Eltinge to double down on their masculinity in public. Today, there’s no way of knowing who among them, if any, may have been privately queer. Still, regardless of intention, these caricatures played an undeniable role in setting the foundation for contemporary drag culture, and, in part, broader queer liberation. As Ullman points out, “Female impersonation onstage may have provided the opportunity to develop the codings by which to identify these secret signs of gender dislocation.”
—Anya Zoldeziowski
01/22
TITLE:
Gay Liberation Needed the
Civil Rights Movement
BY:
Michelle Garcia
TITLE:
Spying Before Stonewall: How the FBI Secretly Tracked Gay Activists in the 60s
BY:
Eric Cervini
TITLE:
How Pride Evolved From an Anti-Police Action to a Brand Sponsored Parade
BY:
Nico Lang
TITLE:
At STAR House, Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera Created a Home for Trans People
BY:
Sessi Blanchard
TITLE:
Queer People Found Inventive Ways to 'Marry' Long Before It Was Legal
BY:
Calvin Kasulke
A zine by Jeffrey Cheung of Unity Press
ME AND YOU EXPLORE TOGETHER
The moniker “Unity” covers almost everything that multidisciplinary artist Jeffrey Cheung creates. As Unity Press, he and collaborator Gabriel Ramirez make and distribute zines. At Unity Mart, they print those zines on risograph machines while also hosting free printing days for queer youth of color and generally inviting community in to make art. Via Unity Skate, their queer skate crew that welcomes skateboarders of all levels, they hold skate days in cities across the world and have gifted dozens of custom-painted decks to young skateboarders. All the intersecting branches of Unity are a mouthful, but in practice, they only make sense. The overarching spirit—which also shows up in Cheung’s artwork of often nude, queer bodies interlocking one another—is to be yourself, join in, and make whatever you want.
To create your own copy of Me and You Explore Together download the zine, print a copy, color it in however you want, then fold it into a little booklet following the accompanying PDF instructions. Learn more about zinemaking here.
DOWNLOAD
Changing the world relies, in large part, on the ability to envision a new way of life, even when it feels impossible.
This Pride, we’re focusing on the many ways in which queerness inspires us to invent. Queer people—particularly queer people of color—have long been expressing identities without blueprints, finding resources and family where there were none, and building platforms when no one would listen. QUEERS BUILT THIS champions that ability to change what we value in the world. It looks back on queer people’s history of DIY initiative, highlights LGBTQ people who are changing the ways we live and think today, and invites us all to envision the future we want.
Read the full editor’s letter here.
A look back on just a few of the countless things that queer people have made over the decades.
1920s
“SURVIVAL LITERATURE”:
EARLY LESBIAN EROTIC PULP FICTION
With titles like That Other Hunger, The Delicate Vice, The Evil Friendship, and The Odd Girls, lesbian pulp novels of the 50s and 60s were certainly not subtle in their prurience. Although mainstream publishers allowed the risqué novels to circulate, due to the strict obscenity laws of the time, the female characters had to be punished for their indiscretions and offenses against heteronormativity in order for the books to make it to print. To get past government censorship, any lesbian characters needed to give up her “wicked” ways by the end of the book and settle down with a man, or else lose her child, her job, or even her life.
“You could be as lecherous and steamy as you wanted,” said Saskia Scheffer, an archives coordinator at the Lesbian Herstory Archives in Brooklyn, “but you could not give them a happy ending.” Still, when these books were being produced, “they were among the only places where lesbians could read about themselves,” Scheffer added. That’s why the archivists at Lesbian Herstory Archives label them “survival literature.”
— Oriana Leckert
1950s
TRANSVESTIA:
THE FIRST TRANSGENDER JOURNAL
Transvestia was the first long-running trans-authored publication concerning transgender subject matter in the United States, even if many of its readers and contributors would not have used the word “trans” or “transgender” to describe the work contained therein. Published first as an underground newsletter in 1952 and then as a magazine from 1960 to 1980, the periodical featured a mix of non-sexualized cross-dressing content, ranging from social commentary and practical guides to first-person narratives, including many by its publisher, Virginia Prince.
Born in Los Angeles in 1912, Prince began making contact with other transvestites while living in San Francisco in the 1940s, where she was a postdoctoral researcher at UCSF who secretly cross-dressed on her own time. One of those individuals was Louise Lawrence, a “pioneering transgender community organizer,” per Susan Stryker’s Transgender History, who maintained an extensive correspondence network with trans people all over the world. Prince stayed connected with that network long after she left San Francisco, and in 1952 she and a group of transvestites in Long Beach distributed two issues of the Transvestia newsletter—“arguably the first overtly political transgender publication in U.S. history,” according to Stryker—to a mailing list largely made up of correspondents from Lawrence’s network. Eight years later, Prince mailed out the first issue of Transvestia magazine. She was forced to cease publication in 1961 after a federal investigation into obscenity distribution left her on probation, unable to cross-dress in public or use the mail for “indecent purposes.” But after her probation was lifted in 1962, Prince picked right back up, publishing Transvestia without any more legal problems for nearly two more decades.
While Transvestia was the first major periodical covering trans issues from an authentically trans perspective, it’s important to note who it represented. Prince and the rest of the all-white Long Beach group that published the Transvestia newsletter in 1952 were “middle-class adherents to the most narrow ideals of mid-century white femininity,” according to historian Jules Gill-Peterson. As such, they tended to argue for the social acceptance of transvestism by way of differentiating themselves from decidedly less desirable groups like homosexuals, transsexuals, and drag queens. Still, despite its limited vision, Transvestia’s importance cannot be overlooked, nor should its shortcomings as we build our own trans-authored projects in the present.
—Harron Walker
1952
THE LEATHER CLUBS THAT
TRANSFORMED GAY LIFE IN AMERICA
Born out of motorcycle clubs that formed post WWII, leather culture has been around since the late 1940's and is characterized by its members preferred fashion: leather vests, caps, and chaps paired with jeans—emulating the style of Marlon Brando in the 1953 film The Wild One. The first gay leather bar in the U.S. was Gold Coast, which opened in Chicago in 1958. Just a few years later, The Tool Box opened in San Francisco's SoMa neighborhood. The bar became the subject of one of the first mainstream representations of the subculture, immortalized in a two-page photo in a 1964 article in Life magazine titled "Homosexuality in America."
In the article, the author warns, "homosexuals are discarding their furtive ways and openly admitting, even flaunting, their deviation. Homosexuals have their own drinking places, their special assignation streets, even their own organizations," and was not singular in its scare-mongering. Ironically, gay men across the country who saw the Life article flocked to San Francisco hoping to live the lifestyle described, and turned the SoMa neighborhood into a major hub for the leather community. As Scott Brogan wrote in the Bay Area Reporter in 2010, “The Tool Box became their Mecca."
The subculture was long dominated by men, though queer women eventually carved their own niche within it. In 1976, Dykes on Bikes—exactly what it sounds like—appeared for the first time officially in the San Francisco Pride Parade. Two years later, in 1978, Samois, the "the first independent lesbian SM group," was founded.
By 1984, with the founding of the famous Folsom Street Fair in San Francisco, the leather community created a space to have the largest gathering of its members, which still continues annually to this day.
—Alex Zaragoza and Ashwin Rodriguez
1950s
THE “FEMALE IMPERSONATOR”
PAGEANTS THAT MADE DRAG MAINSTREAM
Decades before Ru Paul’s Drag Race became a nationally televised phenomenon, “female impersonator” contests, as they were commonly known then, including Miss Continental, Miss Gay America, Entertainer of the Year, Miss Florida FI, Miss Gay US of A, and others thrived in bars and clubs around the country. One of the icons of drag pageantry was the queen Flawless Sabrina, who had a production company that ran 46 drag contests a year between 1959 and 1969 across the country. (Famously, John Waters muse Divine’s first time in drag was at one of Sabrina’s events.) Sabrina also immortalized pageant culture by starring in and narrating the 1968 documentary The Queen, which takes viewers behind-the-scenes at the 1967 Miss All-America Camp Beauty Contest.
While drag culture today is largely associated with cis gay men (although that’s long been gradually changing), early pageant communities were a true mix of gender identities, including trans women, “female impersonaters,” more traditional drag queens, and many whose identities flowed between categories at a time when there wasn’t always clear distinction between them. For many, the events were a chance to express themselves while building community with likeminded people.
In 2018, Mother Karina Samala, a trans activist who also produces Queen USA and Queen of the Universe, two transgender pageants, told VICE about her first pageant, decades ago:
They asked me: “Come on join the pageant! The prize is a lot!” It [was] a reverse ball, where the male would come out as a male and be judged as a male, then someone would do their makeup backstage and then they’d be judged as a female, and whoever wins gets the crown. And it goes both ways. So, I won and was so excited and started dressing up in public! That started the whole thing. ... But I still couldn’t leave the house in makeup, because of my neighbors".
Drag pageants are still held across the country every year.
—Sarah Burke
1960s
Azalea: The Decolonial Magazine Ahead of Its Time
Azalea: A Magazine by Third World Lesbians was founded in 1977 by Joan Gibbs, who was soon joined by Linda Brown and Robin Christian. At the time, there was a surge in self-published lesbian magazines, but most of them failed to include writing and graphics by Black and brown lesbians. “Rather than complain, I felt we should publish our own magazine,” said Gibbs. She, Christian, and Brown, sought to publish writing by lesbians of color with a focus on perspectives outside of the white, North American, capitalist framework.
Early issues of Azalea included writing from Toni Morrison, Audre Lorde, and Zora Neale Hurston. But Azalea’s pages were open to all lesbians of color: The editors ran all submissions received from queer women of color, unedited. “We did that because we wanted to raise Third World lesbian and words without editorial comment,” said Gibbs. As Rodger Streitmatter notes in Unspeakable: The Rise of the Gay and Lesbian Press in America, every issue included the following note: “we print what You send us; anything that is important to ourselves Third World lesbians. We readily accept and welcome work from ‘newcomers’ as well as ‘regulars.’ One of our commitments is to publish 3rd world lesbian writers and visual artists whose work has never appeared in AZALEA.”
The last issue of Azalea was published in 1983.
—Alyza Enriquez
1977
JOSÉ SARRIA’S IMPERIAL COURT
AND HISTORIC RUN FOR OFFICE
An influential elder in the queer communtiy and important figure in Latinx LGBTQ history, José Sarria founded the Imperial Court System in 1965, one of the largest LGBTQ organizations in the world that still operates to this day. Sarria crowned himself Her Royal Majesty, Empress of San Francisco, José I, The Widow Norton, building the foundation for the Imperial Court System, which consists of chapters of the organization in different cities, each led by a hierarchy of members with noble titles. The grassroots non-profit network raises charitable funds for organizations and causes benefitting the LGBTQ community globally by holding lavish, fantastical fundraising balls. Today, there are 50 chapters in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico which have collectively raised millions of dollars for LGBTQ causes.
Sarria, who served in the Army during World War II, performed as a drag queen at San Francisco's famed Black Cat Bar and other Bay Area clubs and became an important advocate and activist for the gay community in San Francisco. During police raids in the 1950s, San Francisco officers would target drag performers under the guise of a city ordinance claiming it was illegal for a man to dress in women's clothing with the "intent to deceive." They would especially use this harassment tactic on Halloween night. To protect himself and other performers, Sarria distributed labels that read "I am a boy" that drag queens wore, so when approached by an officer they could prove there was no intent to deceive. This direct action led to the end of Halloween night raids by SFPD.
In 1961, Sarria ran for a seat on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, becoming the first openlay gay candidate to run for political office in the U. S. —a title many erroneously attribute to Harvey Milk. Sarria died of cancer on August 19, 2013. A grand drag funeral was held in San Francisco in his honor, with 1,000 attendees dressed in regal attire, per Sarria's final wishes. Sarria was a trailblazer for LGBTQ rights and has been honored for his service and dedication at the National LGBTQ Wall of Honor within the Stonewall National Monument at the historic Stonewall Inn in New York City.
—Alex Zaragoza
1961
STAR HOUSE: A HOME FOR TRANS
YOUTH AND STRUGGLING SEX WORKERS
“STAR was for the street gay people, the street homeless people and anybody that needed help at that time,” Sylvia Rivera said in a 1998 Interview with Leslie Feinberg.
Founded in November of 1970 by longtime friends Sylvia Rivera and Marsha. P Johnson, was an action-oriented collective dedicated to providing housing and support for homeless, queer youth and sex workers. Famously, the collective’s first home was an abandoned trailer parked in a Greenwich Village lot where, reportedly, at least two dozen youth slept and ate. One day, a truck began towing the trailer with youth still inside. Shortly after, Johnson and Rivera began looking for a more permanent home. They took up residence in a run-down 4-bedroom apartment in the East Village, which they christened S.T.A.R. House. With the help of other group members, they renovated the building, fixing the heat and electricity, and had plans to create a classroom, among other amenities. But before they could finish, the landlord––a mafioso who owned gay bars––evicted them before they got the chance to realize their plans.
S.T.A.R. collaborated with other groups like the Queens Liberation Front (QLF) The group firmly outlined in a manifesto they wrote in 1970 condemning homophobia, racism, and police violence. Although S.T.A.R. was short lived––only running until 1981 ––it served its community, providing immediate housing, food, and support by any means necessary. It’s said that both Rivera and Johnson continued doing sex work to ensure S.T.A.R. members didn’t have to. It was one of the first organizations to provide housing for queer and trans youth.
—Alyza Enriquez
1970
A GAME-CHANGING COALITION OF BLACK GAYS
The National Coalition of Black Gays (later known as the National Coalition of Black Lesbians and Gays) was established in 1978 by A. Billy S. Jones, Darlene Garner, and Delores P. Berry in Washington, D.C. and Baltimore to provide national advocacy and expression for the Black gay and lesbian community. The organization sought to fight against racism, homophobia, and other discriminatory actions against the Black and gay community, stress the beauty that exists in both communities, and build political power, partnerships, and cooperation with other organizations within the Civil Rights and Gay Rights Movement. The organization was groundbreaking in highlighting the needs and concerns of those at the intersection of both movements, where Black members of the gay community often found themselves lacking representation or at the center of discrimination due to racism and homophobia. Notable members included writer and activist Audre Lorde, Black feminist scholar Barbara Smith, and writer Joseph F. Beam.
At its height, the Coalition of Black Gays had chapters in Philadelphia, New York, Norfolk, Minneapolis, New Orleans, Atlanta, Chicago, Portland, St. Louis, San Francisco, Washington D.C., Boston, Richmond, and other cities. In October of 1979, the Coalition held the first National Third World Conference, coinciding with the 1979 National March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights. The National Third World Conference drew about 450 attendees, bringing together Black people and other people of color to form coalitions and openly discuss and form action plans tied to their goals. The Third World conference led to the creation of Becoming Visible: The First Black Lesbian Conferece, which was held in San Francisco the following year, and which is credited as being the first conference for Black lesbians. It also led to the formation of Howard University's Lambda Student Alliance, the first LGBTQ organization at an HBCU. NCBG’s publication, Blacklight, was the first African-American LGBTQ publication in the U.S.
The National Coalition of Black Gays officially disbanded in 1990 after several key leaders left the organization and operations slowly ceased.
—Alex Zaragoza
1978
UNBOUND FEET: THE ASIAN LESBIAN PERFORMERS THAT BROKE GROUND
In 1979, Kitty Tsui, Merle Woo, and Canyon Sam formed the Unbound Feet collective along with three other Asian American lesbian poets and performers in oaland, Caifornia. According to Breathing Fire: Remembering Asian American Activism in Queer History by Amy Sueyoshi, their shows were popular—drawing crowds of up 600 people. And as Sueyoshi writes, after performances, women would gather at the home of Zee Wong, which became a popular setting for lesbians of color to meet eachother, and later became the venue for a series of Asian lesbian community-building potlucks.
In 1981, the University of California at Berkeley ended Woo’s contract as a lecturer at the school. Woo accused the institution of descrimination, and wanted to use the collective as a platform to amplify her fight. But other members disagreed, eventually causing the group to disband. Still, in the short time that it was around, Unbound Feet helped catalyze the inclusion of lesbians in local feminist organizing and women of color in local lesbian organizing, helping Asian and Pacific Islander lesbian recognize how many of them were out there. “For Asian lesbians, the 1980s marked a time of momentous community building,” Sueyoshi wrote. “A burgeoning network of individuals created newsletters, held potlucks, and formed softball teams, coalescing into what sociologist Karin Aguilar-San Juan characterized as a ‘movement.’”
In 1984, for instance, a group of eight Asian-American lesbians in the Bay Area started Phoenix Rising, likely the first newsletter for Asian and Pacific Islander queer women. “In articles that shared both personal experiences and political philosophies, dykes, lesbians, and queers forged identities, developed livelihoods, and sought out partners,” according to the group APIQWTC. “Phoenix Rising defied stereotypes of quiet Asian women bound by strict families, immigrant values, and submissiveness.” The newsletter ran for 44 issues over the course of a decade.
—Sarah Burke
1979
THE NEWSLETTERS THAT
CONNECTED THE FTM COMMUNITY
Before the internet and social media made it easy to build communities across distance, newsletters were one of the primary ways that queer people shared experiences, resources, questions, answers, and recommendations for books and movies in which they saw a glimmer of themselves. Throughout the 1980s and 90s, this was particularly true for transmasculine people, for whom the path to self-actualization was largely uncharted and representation in nearly all spheres of life was virtually non-existent.
In Canada, there was Rupert Raj’s Metamorphosis; in Sydney, Australia, there was Boys Will Be Boys; and in San Francisco there was Lou Sullivan’s F.T.M. In each, editors and readers would converse via candid letters about sex, relationships, healthcare access, and more—conversations not so different than the ones queer and trans people are still having today.
As Chris Randle notes in a VICE piece on the topic: “There are more of us out there than we may well have imagined,” an editor wrote in the first issue of Australia’s Boys Will Be Boys. “Naturally, this is only the tip of a very isolated iceberg … It’s important that we share our thoughts, insecurities, excitement, fears, and knowledge.”
— Sarah Burke
1980s
ON OUR BACKS: THE MAGAZINE THAT SCOFFED AT FEMINIST PRUDISHNESS
As a reaction to what many felt was a deep strain of prudishness in the feminist movement at the time, On Our Backs was founded in 1984 as the first women-run, sex-positive, lesbian erotica magazine in the U.S. Throughout the 70s and 80s, there was a sharp divide between lesbians who downplayed talking about sex because they didn’t want it to define them in mainstream culture, and those who wanted sex to be celebrated and central to their identities. On Our Backs, which was published until 2006, was named in reaction to the long-running radical feminist (and often anti-porn) newspaper off our backs, which ran from 1970 to 2008. Over its 20+ years, On Our Backs published an array of groundbreaking and controversial erotic writing, often exploring social and political issues around lesbian sex and relationships, from writers like Dorothy Allison, Lucy Jane Bledsoe, Sarah Schulman, Thea Hillman, Jewelle Gomez, Patrick Califia, and Red Jordan Arobateau.
Nan Kinney, one of the co-founders of On Our Backs, wanted lesbians to have more than just written erotica, so in 1985 she also founded Fatale Media, the first company to make porn for women, which is still active today. Shadows, Fatale Media’s first release, promises “passion and spontaneity [that is] refreshingly genuine” from two women who are lovers both on-camera and off. A later Fatale film, Bathroom Sluts, was partially filmed at the LHA, “and in good lesbian fashion, the video ends with the participants proudly processing why they made it,” Scheffer noted.
—Oriana Leckert
1984
ANAMIKA AND TRIKONE: THE FORMALIZATION OF SOUTH ASIAN PRIDE
In May of 1985, a collective of South Asian lesbians in Brooklyn began publishing Anamika, a newsletter specifically geared toward South Asian lesbian and bisexual women—possibly the first of its kind. For its name, the collective chose the sanskrit word for “nameless” to comment on the lack of terms in South Asian languages for lesbian relationships. The content of the newsletter ranged from fiction to news. In 1986, two of the editors of the newsletter, identified only as Utsa and Khayal, said in an interview with Conditions magazine: “Through it we hope to connect with South Asian (Indian, Pakistani, Bangladeshi, Sri Lankan, Bhutanese, Nepali, Burmese and Afghani) lesbians living both in South Asia and other countries. Our network is growing.”
A few months after Anamika was started, Arvind Kumar in California started Trikone, a magazine for LGBTQ South Asians. According to a history of the magazine by Sandip Roy, who later became one of the magazine’s editors, Kumar would make copies of the magazine using the printer at his early Silicon Valley job. Eventually a community grew around the publication, both locally in San Francisco and in cities and small towns across India. “Years before smartphone apps and internet chat rooms,” Roy wrote, “the ‘pen-pal’ ads in this quarterly magazine mailed out of California were a way for queer Indians to find each other.”
Today, Trikone is known as the oldest South Asian LGBTQ organization. In addition to hosting a Desi LGBTQ helpline, it also offers community-building events and practical resources in several cities. The Trikone magazine published until 2014.
—Sarah Burke
1985
THE RADICAL ART OF THE AIDS CRISIS
As we remember it today, the AIDS crisis was as much a health crisis as it was a social and political one, highlighting the deadly inequality experienced by lesbian and gay people in the U.S. Much of that astute framing is thanks to the activist artists who corrected the narrative from gays seeing the consequences of a perverted “lifestyle” to the government killing its citizens through recklessness and willful ignorance. As Catherine Lord and Richard Meyer write in Art & Queer Culture, queer artists of the time “had to re-territorialize the diseased society they had contracted, to infect the society with their dissent, their self-representation, and their stubborn presence.”
When AIDS struck, fine art was in the midst of a postmodern moment, caught up in Andy Warhol’s questioning of the original. But activists such as those at the center of ACT UP (the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power) pulled artwork out of the theoretical and put it to use. In 1988, a group of artist activists in New York City formed Gran Fury, an agit-prop collective aimed at making the government’s mishandling of the AIDs epidemic unignorable. The group worked closely with ACT UP, appropriating the language of advertising and mass media to broadcast their message to the masses. Gran Fury created fliers, posters, stickers, T-shirts, and billboards, thinking of their work more as means of dissemination than art practice.
Gran Fury’s most iconic piece is the “Silence = Death” poster, which reclaimed the pink triangle once used to mark homosexuals in Nazi concentration camps. The poster and symbol itself became a meme, showing up on T-shirts, flags, protest signs, buttons, and even an effigy of Ronald Regan hoisted outside of the FDA headquarters during an ACT UP protest.
Meanwhile, in California, activist Cleve Jones had developed another memetic artform, this one focused on mourning: the NAMES Project AIDS Memorial Quilt. At the time, many people who died from AIDS were denied burial because funeral homes and cemeteries refused to take them. But for the quilt, anyone could create a 3’ by 6’ panel for a loved one who died of AIDS. The first time it was exhibited, at the National Mall in Washington DC in 1997, it had nearly 2,000 panels and covered nearly the area of a football field. Today, it consists of more than 48,000 panels and remains the largest piece of community folk art in the world.
—Sarah Burke
1987
QUEERCORE:
THE GENRE THAT MADE PUNK INCLUSIVE
1985
As a young non-binary, gender-nonconforming, trans, or intersex person living in North America in the early 1980s, there were few places you could turn to for a sense of community. Gay men largely hung out with gay men, lesbians hung out with lesbians, and if your identity fell somewhere in between, it could be hard to feel like you fit in. By the middle of the decade, a small, radical subset of LGBTQ folks in the U.S. and Canada had grown fed up with that rigidity—and, in an effort to build a movement that was more inclusive, gave birth to a scene known as "queercore."
G. B. Jones and Bruce LaBruce are largely credited with laying the groundwork for the scene, beginning with the launch of their zine, J.D.s, in 1985. They printed anything and everything—found pornography, poetry, collages, diatribes—as long as it was inclusive, and as long as it was hardcore.
"We were fighting the gay mainstream by promoting no division between gays and lesbians, by being inclusive of queers of all races, ages, genders, and sexual persuasions," LaBruce told Dazed in 2016. “We were looking for alternative expressions of our queerness. We were anti-corporate, anti-capitalist, and against assimilation, so we gravitated towards punk.”
The punk scene of the mid-1980s was overwhelmingly macho, sexist, and homophobic—and so instead of trying to join it, folks like LaBruce created their own subculture. As more and more queercore zines sprung up across the continent, a number of bands started making queercore music. The genre sounded like punk on its surface, but it was driven by songwriting about sex, gender, and politics done by folks with presciently progressive ideas about all three. Arguably the scene's most pioneering member, and certainly its most acclaimed, is Vaginal Creme Davis.
Born intersex in South Central Los Angeles, Davis first came to prominence through an art-punk band called the Afro Sisters. She'd go on to form several others—including Black Fag, ¡Cholita! The Female Menudo, and PME—but she's done far more than just make music. Davis is a performance artist, a sculptor, a painter, a writer, an activist—a multi-multi-hyphenate who's dedicated her life to interrogating identity. She's made zines, directed films, staged performances, released albums, and written extensively for over 30 years about the confluence of race, gender, sex, class, and politics, inspiring a generation of folks who feel like they don't fit in just one box to embrace all of who they are. She continues to do so to this day. Speaking with Them in 2019, Tavia Nyong’o, a queer professor of performance studies at Yale, called Davis "the mother of us all."
“Especially for women, or black and brown folk, or trans and queer folk, this world is just not acceptable," Nyong'o said. "She doesn’t really tell you how to make [your own] world, but she’ll show you how she’s made her world, and give you the inspiration to do it yourself.”
—Drew Schwartz
BLK MAGAZINE: THE PRESCIENT PUBLICATION THAT CHANGED QUEER MEDIA
Alan Bell explained the mission of BLK Magazine in plain terms. "We needed a publication for the same reason that the Egyptians carve stuff on the side of walls. We need to say we were here," he told a local ABC station in 2019.
Created by Bell, BLK Magazine grew out of a lack of accurate news related to Black LGBTQ people, particularly gay men’s health. The publication started as a newsletter for the members of Black Jack, a Black gay men’s safer sex club that Bell also founded. But soon, it transformed into a formal publication and built a reputation "advocating for information about HIV for Black communities and a powerful advocate for political action," according to the African American Intellectual History Society. In Business, Not Politics: The Making of the Gay Market, Katharine Sender described BLK Magazine as "offering an alternative to the overwhelming whiteness of the gay press."
Michael Broder, journalist, author, and poet, wrote the July 1991 cover story for BLK, titled "High Risk, Low Priority," highlighting the disparity in the gay Black community was given the "double blind" treatment during the AIDS epidemic. Earlier that year, Broder had been fired from his job as an executive assistant after testing positive for HIV. His article in BLK made an impact, and "was later included in a packet of materials distributed to members of Congress by advocacy organizations as part of testimony on disparities in AIDS-related services among people of color," Broder said.
The cover of the July 1991 issue of BLK Magazine shows a Black man staring into the camera, with guns pointed at his head from both sides. "That was the same kind of bold imagery and language, as well as iconoclastic ideas, associated with Act Up and the work of QTPOC literary and artistic pioneers like Audre Lorde, Marlon Riggs, RuPaul, and many others,” Broder said. “Today we more or less take that level of aesthetic and intellectual confrontation for granted—but in those years of Ronald Reagan, Phyllis Schlafly, and Jesse Helms, that was radical."
BLK grew into a nationally distributed glossy magazine, and was published until 1994. Asked recently whether he feels the dearth of Black, gay media that BLK grew out of has sinxe been sufficiently filled, he said: “No matter how sympathetic or thorough the mainstream media is—and it often isn’t—there is no substitute for news produced by and for marginalized communities. Yes, there are online black LGBTQ publications and the Internet allows us to search for black LGBTQ information, but there’s always room for more. When is the last time you saw a story about black lesbians in Nebraska?”
—Ashwin Rodrigues
1988
THE ACTUAL GAYEST PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN
Joan Jett Blakk was the first openly queer person to run for President of the United States.
Though Pete Buttigieg's 2020 campaign was oft touted as the first presidential run by an openly gay man, and Fred Karger has asserted the title belongs to his 2012 presidential bid, the door had, in fact, already been kicked open by a pair of platforms decades earlier. On the floor of Madison Square Garden at the 1992 Democratic National Convention, draped in pearls, Joan Jett Blakk asserted herself as “the only drag queen Presidential candidate in the United States…bringing queer issues to the campaign.”
Blakk, the drag persona of Terence Smith, formally announced her candidacy for President at the Ann Sather restaurant in Chicago on January 17, 1992. During a Q&A, Blakk told reporters that she’d “lay [her] hand on an InTouch magazine” to take the Oath of Office. A birthday celebration for the candidate at the Berlin nightclub immediately followed the formal campaign announcement. There, the club’s M.C. noted the significance of the campaign, since millions of queer Americans “don’t have any representation in Washington that’s visible and that counts for [us].”
Blakk took to the stage to share her ideas, beginning with suggestions like making the FBI the “Fashion Bureau of Investigations” and the CIA the “Center for Intelligent Accessories,” but quickly changed tone. “You might think we’re joking,” she said. “Well, I’m sorry, but, I think the fact that the U.S. is the only industrialized country without national healthcare is a joke. I think the fact that some guys with friends in high places got away with opening savings and that were designed to steal from hard-working people, and survived with their testicles intact is a joke.”
After outlining her platform and before retreating backstage for a costume change, Blakk told supporters, “we’re putting the ‘camp’ back in ‘campaign’.” In ‘Notes on Camp’, Susan Sontag asserts that ‘camp’ can become ‘camp’ over time; that, “[we] can enjoy, instead of be frustrated by, the failure of the attempt.” While Joan Jett Blakk’s inability to drum up a significant amount of votes in the 1992 race left her candidacy largely out of the popular narrative of political history, the fact that she ran at all now seems now like the victory that matters.
—Christian Failla
1992
Lisa Ben’s career as a lesbian publishing pioneer began in an unlikely spot: sitting at her desk in 1947 as a secretary for an executive at RKO Studios in Los Angeles. Ben—her nom de plume, a homophone for “lesbian”—was informed that there wasn’t much work for her to do, but that if she were to knit or read, her boss would look less important. So, she decided to fill her time there with a top-secret personal project: Vice Versa, America’s first lesbian magazine. Soon after, Ben walked into the If Club, a dive bar popular with LA’s lesbians, and started handing out a dozen mimeographed, bound copies to the bar patrons. “When you get through with this, don't throw it away,” she told each recipient. “Pass it on to another gay gal.”
Ben was born in 1921, according to researcher Rodger Streitmatter, the daughter of northern California apricot farmers. In 1946, she began to recognize that she was gay and started visit lesbian bars in L.A. But they made her nervous, per Streitmatter: She feared the near-constant police raids that were common at the time and struggled to talk to women while anxiously keeping an eye on the door.
Vice Versa proved to be her way to create the community she’d always dreamed about. It was unusual in several respects: All the contributors used pseudonyms. The magazine didn’t publish the addresses of the bars and other gay establishments it wrote about. It didn’t include photos, illustrations, or advertisements, and it was never dirty. Instead, the magazine focused on book reviews for novels with lesbian themes, short stories and essays from contributors, gay song parody lyrics, and a lively letters to the editor section. It became, in a short time, a small paradise for dreamy, bookish, romantic women.
Only nine months after the magazine’s first issue, though, Vice Versa published its last: Ben got a new job at RKO and suddenly didn’t have the time or privacy to type issues. Besides, she told Streitmatter in 1993, it had done what she set out to do. "I was getting a little social life, too,” she told him, laughing. “Becoming a sly little minx. I was discovering what the lesbian lifestyle was all about, and I wanted to live it rather than write about it. So that was the end of Vice Versa.”
Ben was a woman of many interests: the ONE National Gay and Lesbian Archives have a collection of her papers, which shows that she was interested in the occult, “weird tales,” and science fiction, which she soon began writing herself under the pseudonym Tigrina. She also made folk music—the archives contain lyrics for songs like “I’m Gonna Sit Right Down and Write My Butch a Letter”—and was passionate about cat adoption. Ben died in December of 2015.
—Anna Merlan
JACKIE SHANE’S “ANY OTHER WAY”:
THE HIT THAT DEFIED STIGMA
There was never anyone else like Jackie Shane, the 1960s R&B singer who became as legendary for disappearing as for her performances. "Most people are planted in someone else's soil, which means they're a carbon copy," she told an interviewer late in her life. "I say to them, uproot yourself. Get into your own soil. You may be surprised who you really are."
Shane was born in Nashville in 1940, but would not tolerate the Jim Crow South, and chose Toronto as her home. It was there that she became a star, with her cover of William Bell's "Any Other Way" reaching number 2 on the local charts in 1962. It's an astonishing thing, in retrospect. Southern R&B circuits had long featured the gender-bending likes of Little Richard and drag performers, but Shane was something different, a straightforwardly trans singer who made some of the grittiest records of the era and ran a stage show that might, on a given night, have her proclaiming "This is the closest to Jesus Christ some of you will ever get!" from the stage.
She might have been remembered differently if she'd ever signed on with one of the major U.S. labels that showed an interest, or taken up George Clinton's offer to join Parliament-Funkadelic, but Shane had something else in mind: In 1971, she vanished. There were rumors that she'd been murdered, but she'd simply chosen to return home to be close to her mother, and to not live a public life.
A 2010 CBC documentary and a Grammy-nominated 2017 archival set from Chicago's esteemed Numero Group brought Shane back into the public eye. She was wary of publicity, but met on her terms, she was every bit the performer she was in the '60s, full of wisdom and stories from a life well-lived. In a 2018 VICE interview, she described meeting the draft board in a floor-length black dress and earrings. ("I had so much fun! It was so funny, because, first of all, let me tell you what you’re doing, military man. You’re taking innocent men and turning them into killers. Do you think that’s a thing you think you should be doing? Don’t look at me like I’m doing something wrong. You’re the wrong one. How dare you to do that!") She also described how it was that she'd put herself out as a trans woman at a time when that wasn't done. "I don’t know another way," she said. "I can’t go any other way than to go the way I go." She was as ahead of things as she always had been.
—Tim Marchman
1962
SIR: THE MORE RADICAL
ANSWER TO MATTACHINE AND BILITIS
Founded in San Francisco in September 1964, The Society for Individual Rights (SIR) was a gay rights organization that set the tone for LGBTQ organizing for decades to follow. While SIR’s predecessors, like Mattachine Society and Daughters of Bilitis, were more willing to assimilate, SIR took an aggressive approach to organizing and resisting state-sanctioned homophobia—the same approach that would be used in the pivotal Stonewall uprising just five years after SIR was founded.
SIR had four main objectives: the public affirmation of gay and lesbian identity, the elimination of victimless crime laws (e.g. anti-sodomy laws), to provide social services to gay and lesbian people in need, and to promote a sense of gay and lesbian community. The latter also set it apart from previous LGBTQ organizations. SIR employed inclusive and democratic organizing as a tactic, including putting on community events, like parties and art classes, despite the fact that other organizations shied away from such events due to the likelihood of police retaliation.
In 1966, ten years before California decriminalized same-sex intercourse, SIR opened the first gay community center in the country. Quickly, it became the largest gay and lesbian organization in the Unites States, amassing nearly 1,000 members in less than three years. In that time, SIR successfully fought back against police harassment, ran voter registration drives, held candidate forums, published a monthly magazine, and worked with the Public Health Department to educate the gay community about venereal disease.
Though the organization existed until the late 70s, SIR struggled to remain as relevant as it once was as LGBTQ organizations sprung up across the country in the aftermath of Stonewall. Still, it’s responsible for many of the organization strategies and tactics that made—and continue to make—LGBTQ advocacy organizations effective.
—Leila Ettachfini
1964
FANTASIA FAIR: “A SAFE SPACE FOR CROSSDRESSERS AND TRANSSEXUALS
TO GATHER”
"R & R & R & R…" the flyer reads. Those r's stand for "Relax, Regenerate, Recreate and Reflect"—all things the leadership of the Fantasia Fair, which had at that point been held annually in the gay-friendly town of Provincetown, MA for over two decades, hope its would-be participants continue to partake in.
Founded in 1975 in part by Betsy Shaw, Linda Franklin, and Ariadne Kane (the Fair's "Queen Bee" and founder of the Outreach Institute of Gender Studies as well), and still going to this day, the week-long conference is dedicated to allowing members of the trans community to have a place to explore their identities. Though it is the longest running such event in the world, the event's own website admits that much of the Fair's history has likely been lost to the sands of time. What is available, however, deeply reflects how much the discussion of trans issues and rights have changed over the past several decades. At the beginning, Fantasia Fair was an event mostly dedicated to creating "a safe space for crossdressers and transsexuals to gather" (along with their welcome partners). "Party every night, dance till dawn, talk endlessly with your house sisters, sleep late, bike thru the dunes, go whale watching, walk on the beach, enjoy lobster by the bay, shop, model in a fashion show, perform in a semi-professional show for a live audience, fulfill your fantasy of living a full week totally 'en femme,'" early literature declared. Photography was encouraged, though limited to Fair participants, and always required consent of the subject; nowadays, attendees who don't wish to be photographed are required to wear a button delineating such.
"Fantasia Fair is designed to help the crossdresser feel comfortable living in the opposite gender role," a flyer from the Fair's 10th year declared. "Novices and those suppressing their femme self are urged to express and enjoy their alternative role, without fear, in a secure and understanding environment." These materials read slightly differently now, explaining that the week is for "the entire range of the gender-diverse community." Programming has shifted away from a primary focus on appearances towards the mental, legal, and activist sides of the trans experience as well.
But the core of Fantasia Fair remains very much intact. "For some it was simply a chance to get away," Glenda Rene Jones wrote of Fantasia Fair for The Journal of Male Feminism in 1979. "For others it was a chance to become a living human being."
—Kate Dries
1975
THE GAY GAMES: QUEER PEOPLE’S ANSWER TO THE OLYMPICS
Before Tom Waddell was a noted San Francisco physician, he was also an Olympic athlete. A staunch civil rights supporter, Waddell was at the 1968 Olympic games, where he placed sixth in the decathlon. More importantly, though, he vocally supported his fellow athletes, Black American sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos, who defiantly raised their fists while accepting their gold and bronze medals for the 200-meter sprint as a show of solidarity against racism, classism, and inequality.
A few years later, Waddell saw the need for solidarity among LGBTQ athletes, who had long faced stigma and descrimnation within sports. After joining a gay bowling league in the Bay Area, he decided to plan the first large-scale gathering of queer athletes of all skill levels. The Gay Olympics (later the Gay Games after the U.S. Olympic Committee successfully sued Waddell over the name), brought together thousands of LGBTQ athletes to run, jump, skate, twirl, wrestle, and throw with and against each other. The games came at a time when the LGBTQ community needed something to celebrate: The first event was held in 1982 in San Francisco, right at the beginning of the AIDS crisis. Waddell, who worked as infectious diseases doctor, was himself diagnosed with HIV, but still competed in the 1986 games, just a year before he succumbed to complications caused by the virus.
The Gay Games continue every four years, bringing in thousands of volunteers and athletes, regardless of skill level or sexual orientation, to cities around the world to celebrate athleticism and teamwork. "He wanted people to be able to be free, to come out and be themselves, and be able to play sports," Jessica Waddell Lewinstein, Waddell's daughter, said in 2014 to ESPN before the 9th Gay Games took place. "I think he would be blown away to see what has happened."
—Michelle Garcia
1982
TITLE:
Gay Liberation Needed the
Civil Rights Movement
BY:
Michelle Garcia
TITLE:
Spying Before Stonewall: How the FBI Secretly Tracked Gay Activists in the 60s
BY:
Eric Cervini
TITLE:
How Pride Evolved From an Anti-Police Action to a Brand Sponsored Parade
BY:
Nico Lang
TITLE:
At STAR House, Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera Created a Home for Trans People
BY:
Sessi Blanchard
TITLE:
Queer People Found Inventive Ways to 'Marry' Long Before It Was Legal
BY:
Calvin Kasulke
ARTIST:
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Mimi Zhu
Mimi Zhu is a queer, Chinese-Australian writer who grew up in Brisbane and Singapore and is usually based in Brookyln. They believe in the radical healing powers of the written word. They feel that there are two fundamental emotions, fear and love, and their work endeavors to dive into understanding and befriending them both. Follow them on Instagram.
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Broobs!
Broobs is a collage artist and photographer who uses inspiration from nature. His work is heavily influenced by botanical elements and classic color palettes. He is interested in bringing visibility to queer artists and activists and uses his platform to educate and illuminate champions of the queer community. Find more of Broobs’ work.
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Yétundé Olagbaju
Yétundé Olagbaju is an artist and maker currently residing in Oakland, CA. They utilize sculpture, action, gesture, and performance as through-lines for inquiries regarding Black labor, legacy, and processes of healing. They are rooted in the need to understand history, the people that made it, the myths surrounding them, and how their own body is implicated in history’s timeline. Find more of Yetunde’s work.
2020
Stamped on verso: "20th Annual Olympic Club Track & Field Meet at San Quentin prison, c. 1920." Photo courtesy of the California History Room, California State Library, Sacramento, California. Photographer unknown.
Sheet music featuring male impersonator Florence Tempest. Published by Harry Von Tilzer Music Publishing Company in 1917. Courtesy the JD Doyle Archives, via the Digital Transgender Archive.
A selection of “survival literature” housed at the Lesbian Herstory Archives. Photo by Saskia Scheffer.
Via Wikimedia Commons and the New York Public Library Manuscripts and Archives Division.
Photo of activist and Transvestia creator Virginia Prince. Photographer unknown. Courtesy of the Transgender Archives at University of Victoria Libraries.
A man wears leather fetish clothing during the annual Gay Carnival in West Hollywood, California, 1982. Photo by Frank Edwards via Getty Images.
‘Dykes on Bikes' from Sydney's Gay & Lesbian Mardi Gras. Left to right: Sarah Switch, Liz Hayes, Linda Dement, Teigan Redd, and Eddie. February 21, 1991. Photo by Bruce Milton Miller via Getty Images.
Jackie Shane. Photographer and date unknown. Courtesy of Jackie Shane and Numero Group.
Jackie Shane. Photographer and date unknown. Courtesy of Jackie Shane and Numero Group.
Chilli Pepper presenting Miss Gay Continental USA 1982. Courtesy of Chilli Pepper. Photographer unknown.
Karina Samala. Courtesy Karina Samala. Photographer Unknown.
Flawless Sabrina, later in life. Photograph by Zackary Drucker.
Society for Individual Rights (SIR) pocket lawyer guide. Circa 1964-1970. Courtesy of ONE Archives at USC Libraries.
Image courtesy of Joan Gibbs.
Fantasia Fair attendees, circa 1985-1989. Photographs by Mariette Pathy Allen. Courtesy of Allen and via the J. Ari Kane-DeMaios Papers in the Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America, Radcliffe Institute at Harvard University.
Fantasia Fair attendees, circa 1985-1989. Photographs by Mariette Pathy Allen. Courtesy of Allen and via the J. Ari Kane-DeMaios Papers in the Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America, Radcliffe Institute at Harvard University.
Fantasia Fair 1983 daily schedule of events. Courtesy of University of Victoria Libraries, Transgender Archives.
José Sarria performing at the Black Cat Cafe in San Francisco in 1996. Photo courtesy of the GLBT Historical Society.
Imagery from José Sarria’s campaign for San Francisco Board of Supervisors. Courtesy of the GLBT Historical Society.
Street Transvestites Action Revolutionaries at the Christopher Street Liberation Day March, 1973. Photograph by Leonard Fink. Courtesy of the The LGBT Community Center National History Archive.
Brochure for National Coalition of Black Gays. Courtesy the Digital Library of the Caribbean, via the Gay Freedom Movement Archives at the University of Florida’s George A. Smathers Libraries.
Brochure for National Coalition of Black Gays. Courtesy the Digital Library of the Caribbean, via the Gay Freedom Movement Archives at the University of Florida’s George A. Smathers Libraries.
The founders of the Unbound Feet Collective in 1981. Nellie Wong, Kitty Tsui, Merle Wong. Photo by Cathy Cade. Courtesy of Cade.
A 1993 edition of the Boys Will Be Boys newsletter. Image courtesy of the Sexual Minorities Archives.
Lou Sullivan. Courtesy of the GLBT Historical Society.
General view of athletes during the 1994 Gay Games at Downing Stadium in New York City, New York. Photo by Al Bello via Getty Images.
Photo by Saskia Scheffer. Courtesy of Scheffer and the Lesbian Herstory Archive.
Trikone members at the 1986 Gay and Lesbian Pride Parade in San Francisco. Courtesy of Trikone.
“Protesters hang an effigy of Ronald Regan at the headquarters of the FDA in 1988. Photo by Catherine McGann via Getty Images.
“Spectators look at the National AIDS Memorial Quilt on the Mall October 12, 1996 in Washington, DC. Photo by Evan Agostini via Getty.
Still from the documentary Queercore: How to Punk a Revolution. Courtesy Desire Productions.
Vaginal Davis and fellow members of the Afro Sisters. Los Angeles, 1986. Photo by Albert Sanchez.
A BLK Magazine cover from Issue 28, 1991. Courtesy Alan Bell, via the Oviatt Library at California State University Northridge.
Selected pages from BLK Magazine issue 28. Courtesy of Alan Bell.
Joan Jett Blakk’s Joan Jett Blakk for President, 1992. Photo by Marc Gellyer. Poster courtesy the GLBT Historical Society.
Selected pages from BLK Magazine issue 28. Courtesy of Alan Bell.
Selected pages from BLK Magazine issue 28. Courtesy of Alan Bell.
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Photos and ephemera in order of appearance, left to right. THEN— 1: Stonewall Celebrations, 1969. Photo by Fred McDarrah via Getty Images. 2: Christopher Street Gay Liberation Day Parade, 1971. Photo by Yigal Mann via Getty Images. 3: STAR At Gay Pride Day March, 1973. Photo by Fred W. McDarrah via Getty Images. 4: New York City Gay Pride Parade, 1982. Photo by Barbara Alper via Getty Images. 5: “I’m Circumcised” pin, 1980. Courtesy ONE National Gay and Lesbian Archives. 6: San Quentin inmate. Photographer unknown. Courtesy California State Library. 7: BLK Magazine cover. Courtesy Alan Bell. 8: Fantasia Fair schedule. Courtesy Transgender Archives at the University of Victoria. 9. Transvestia cover. Via Wikimedia Commons. 10. Klondike Saloon Button. Courtesy ONE National Lesbian and Gay Archives. 11. Dude City matchbook cover. Courtesy ONE Lesbian and Gay Archives. 12. Gay Liberation Day Parade, New York, 1971. Photo by Fred W. McDarrah via Getty Images. 13. The 1994 Gay Games. Photo by Al Bello via Getty Images. 14. Travel Lounge matchbook. Photo by Justin Sullivan via Getty Images. NOW— 1. Broobs Marquez, photo courtesy of the artist. 2. Yetunde Olagbaju, photo courtesy of the artist. 3. Jeffrey Cheung, photo courtesy of the artist. 4. Mimi Zhu, photo courtesy of @geupylovato. EVENTS — 1. Garden District matchbook, courtesy ONE National Gay and Lesbian Archives. 2. Jackie Shane, courtesy Numero Group. 3. Christopher Street Liberation Day parade, NYC,1970. Photo by Fred W. McDarrah via Getty Images. 4. The Leather Games button, courtesy ONE National Lesbian and Gay Archives.
Stamped on verso: "20th Annual Olympic Club Track & Field Meet at San Quentin prison, c. 1920." Photo courtesy of the California History Room, California State Library, Sacramento, California. Photographer unknown.
X
Sheet music featuring male impersonator Florence Tempest. Published by Harry Von Tilzer Music Publishing Company in 1917. Courtesy the JD Doyle Archives, via the Digital Transgender Archive.
X
1920s
A page from Vice Versa. Courtesy ONE Archives.
X
Lisa Ben in the 1940s. Photographer unknown. Courtesy ONE Archives.
X
1947
A selection of “survival literature” housed at the Lesbian Herstory Archives. Photo by Saskia Scheffer.
X
1950s
Via Wikimedia Commons and the New York Public Library Manuscripts and Archives Division.
X
Photo of activist and Transvestia creator Virginia Prince. Photographer unknown. Courtesy of the Transgender Archives at University of Victoria Libraries.
X
1952
A man wears leather fetish clothing during the annual Gay Carnival in West Hollywood, California, 1982. Photo by Frank Edwards via Getty Images.
X
‘Dykes on Bikes' from Sydney's Gay & Lesbian Mardi Gras. Left to right: Sarah Switch, Liz Hayes, Linda Dement, Teigan Redd, and Eddie. February 21, 1991. Photo by Bruce Milton Miller via Getty Images.
X
1950s
Jackie Shane. Photographer and date unknown. Courtesy of Jackie Shane and Numero Group.
X
Jackie Shane. Photographer and date unknown. Courtesy of Jackie Shane and Numero Group.
X
1962
Chilli Pepper presenting Miss Gay Continental USA 1982. Courtesy of Chilli Pepper. Photographer unknown.
X
Chilli Pepper presenting Miss Gay Continental USA 1982. Courtesy of Chilli Pepper. Photographer unknown.
X
Flawless Sabrina, later in life. Photograph by Zackary Drucker.
X
1960s
Society for Individual Rights (SIR) pocket lawyer guide. Circa 1964-1970. Courtesy of ONE Archives at USC Libraries.
X
1964
Image courtesy of Joan Gibbs.
X
1977
Fantasia Fair attendees, circa 1985-1989. Photographs by Mariette Pathy Allen. Courtesy of Allen and via the J. Ari Kane-DeMaios Papers in the Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America, Radcliffe Institute at Harvard University.
X
Fantasia Fair attendees, circa 1985-1989. Photographs by Mariette Pathy Allen. Courtesy of Allen and via the J. Ari Kane-DeMaios Papers in the Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America, Radcliffe Institute at Harvard University.
X
Fantasia Fair 1983 daily schedule of events. Courtesy of University of Victoria Libraries, Transgender Archives.
X
1975
José Sarria performing at the Black Cat Cafe in San Francisco in 1996. Photo courtesy of the GLBT Historical Society.
X
Imagery from José Sarria’s campaign for San Francisco Board of Supervisors. Courtesy of the GLBT Historical Society.
X
1961
Street Transvestites Action Revolutionaries at the Christopher Street Liberation Day March, 1973. Photograph by Leonard Fink. Courtesy of the The LGBT Community Center National History Archive.
X
1970
Brochure for National Coalition of Black Gays. Courtesy the Digital Library of the Caribbean, via the Gay Freedom Movement Archives at the University of Florida’s George A. Smathers Libraries.
X
Brochure for National Coalition of Black Gays. Courtesy the Digital Library of the Caribbean, via the Gay Freedom Movement Archives at the University of Florida’s George A. Smathers Libraries.
X
1978
The founders of the Unbound Feet Collective in 1981. Nellie Wong, Kitty Tsui, Merle Wong. Photo by Cathy Cade. Courtesy of Cade.
X
1979
A 1993 edition of the Boys Will Be Boys newsletter. Image courtesy of the Sexual Minorities Archives.
X
Lou Sullivan. Courtesy of the GLBT Historical Society.
X
1980s
General view of athletes during the 1994 Gay Games at Downing Stadium in New York City, New York. Photo by Al Bello via Getty Images.
X
1982
Photo by Saskia Scheffer. Courtesy of Scheffer and the Lesbian Herstory Archive.
X
1984
Trikone members at the 1986 Gay and Lesbian Pride Parade in San Francisco. Courtesy of Trikone.
X
1985
“Protesters hang an effigy of Ronald Regan at the headquarters of the FDA in 1988. Photo by Catherine McGann via Getty Images.
X
“Spectators look at the National AIDS Memorial Quilt on the Mall October 12, 1996 in Washington, DC. Photo by Evan Agostini via Getty.
X
1987
Still from the documentary Queercore: How to Punk a Revolution. Courtesy Desire Productions.
X
Vaginal Davis and fellow members of the Afro Sisters. Los Angeles, 1986. Photo by Albert Sanchez.
X
1985
A BLK Magazine cover from Issue 28, 1991. Courtesy Alan Bell, via the Oviatt Library at California State University Northridge.
X
Selected pages from BLK Magazine issue 28. Courtesy of Alan Bell.
X
Selected pages from BLK Magazine issue 28. Courtesy of Alan Bell.
X
Selected pages from BLK Magazine issue 28. Courtesy of Alan Bell.
X
1988
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Conversations and workshops that help us rethink the tradition of Pride and envision the future of LGBTQ culture.
Joan Jett Blakk’s Joan Jett Blakk for President, 1992. Photo by Marc Gellyer. Poster courtesy the GLBT Historical Society.
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EVENTS
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WATCH
TITLE:
At STAR House, Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera Created a Home for Trans People
BY:
Sessi Blanchard
TITLE:
How Pride Evolved From an Anti-Police Action to a Brand Sponsored Parade
BY:
Nico Lang
TITLE:
Spying Before Stonewall: How the FBI Secretly Tracked Gay Activists in the 60s
BY:
Eric Cervini
TITLE:
Gay Liberation Needed the Civil Rights Movement
BY:
Michelle Garcia
X
ARTIST:
DOWNLOAD
Mimi Zhu
Broobs is a collage artist and photographer who uses inspiration from nature. His work is heavily influenced by botanical elements and classic color palettes. He is interested in bringing visibility to queer artists and activists and uses his platform to educate and illuminate champions of the queer community. Find more of Broobs’ work.
X
ARTIST:
DOWNLOAD
Broobs!
Yétundé Olagbaju is an artist and maker currently residing in Oakland, CA. They utilize sculpture, action, gesture, and performance as through-lines for inquiries regarding Black labor, legacy, and processes of healing. They are rooted in the need to understand history, the people that made it, the myths surrounding them, and how their own body is implicated in history’s timeline. Find more of Yetunde’s work.
X
TITLE:
Donate to These Orgs to Support Black Trans People
BY:
Mary Retta
TITLE:
The Alpaca Ranch That’s Creating a Rural Utopia for Trans People
BY:
Janus Rose
TITLE:
11 Tiny Pride Floats to Help You Celebrate This Year
BY:
Rachel Miller
TITLE:
This 'Telefriending' Service Is Giving LGBTQ Elders Companionship When They Need It
BY:
Christobel Hastings
TITLE:
Black Trans People Need Critical Support and Care Right Now—And Forever
BY:
Nico Lang
EVENTS
Conversations and workshops that help us rethink the tradition of Pride and envision the future of LGBTQ culture.
A look back on just a few of the countless things that queer people have made over the decades.
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1947
VICE VERSA: THE FIRST KNOWN
LESBIAN MAGAZINE IN AMERICA
Lisa Ben in the 1940s. Photographer unknown. Courtesy ONE Archives.
A page from Vice Versa. Courtesy ONE Archives.
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TITLE:
Donate to These Orgs to Support Black Trans People
BY:
Mary Retta
TITLE:
Donate to These Orgs to Support Black Trans People
BY:
Mary Retta
TITLE:
The Alpaca Ranch That’s Creating a Rural Utopia for Trans People
BY:
Janus Rose
TITLE:
The Alpaca Ranch That’s Creating a Rural Utopia for Trans People
BY:
Janus Rose
TITLE:
11 Tiny Pride Floats to Help You Celebrate This Year
BY:
Rachel Miller
TITLE:
11 Tiny Pride Floats to Help You Celebrate This Year
BY:
Rachel Miller
TITLE:
This 'Telefriending' Service Is Giving LGBTQ Elders Companionship When They Need It
BY:
Christobel Hastings
TITLE:
This 'Telefriending' Service Is Giving LGBTQ Elders Companionship When They Need It
BY:
Christobel Hastings
TITLE:
Black Trans People Need Critical Support and Care Right Now—And Forever
BY:
Nico Lang
TITLE:
Black Trans People Need Critical Support and Care Right Now—And Forever
BY:
Nico Lang
About
02/26
01/22
THE CAMPY VAUDEVILLE PERFORMANCES THAT, IRONICALLY, SET THE STAGE FOR DRAG
02/22
VICE VERSA: THE FIRST KNOWN LESBIAN MAGAZINE IN AMERICA
03/22
“SURVIVAL LITERATURE”: EARLY LESBIAN EROTIC PULP FICTION
04/22
TRANSVESTIA: THE FIRST TRANSGENDER JOURNAL
05/22
THE LEATHER CLUBS THAT TRANSFORMED GAY LIFE IN AMERICA
06/22
JACKIE SHANE’S “ANY OTHER WAY”: THE HIT THAT DEFIED STIGMA
07/22
THE “FEMALE IMPERSONATOR” PAGEANTS THAT MADE DRAG MAINSTREAM
07/22
SIR: THE MORE RADICAL ANSWER TO MATTACHINE AND BILITIS
07/22
SIR: THE MORE RADICAL ANSWER TO MATTACHINE AND BILITIS
10/22
FANTASIA FAIR: “A SAFE SPACE FOR CROSSDRESSERS AND TRANSSEXUALS
TO GATHER”
11/22
JOSÉ SARRIA’S IMPERIAL COURT AND HISTORIC RUN FOR OFFICE
12/22
STAR HOUSE: A HOME FOR TRANS YOUTH AND STRUGGLING SEX WORKERS
13/22
A GAME-CHANGING COALITION OF BLACK GAYS
14/22
UNBOUND FEET: THE ASIAN LESBIAN PERFORMERS THAT BROKE GROUND
15/22
THE NEWSLETTERS THAT CONNECTED THE FTM COMMUNITY
16/22
THE GAY GAMES: QUEER PEOPLE’S ANSWER TO THE OLYMPICS
17/22
ON OUR BACKS: THE MAGAZINE THAT SCOFFED AT FEMINIST PRUDISHNESS
18/22
ANAMIKA AND TRIKONE: THE FORMALIZATION OF SOUTH ASIAN PRIDE
19/22
THE RADICAL ART OF THE AIDS CRISIS
20/22
QUEERCORE: THE GENRE THAT MADE PUNK INCLUSIVE
21/22
BLK MAGAZINE: THE PRESCIENT PUBLICATION THAT CHANGED QUEER MEDIA
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Mariah Lopez, a mentee of Sylvia Rivera, shares her vision for the future with protesters who had gathered at the Stonewall Inn on June 2nd to demand justice for Tony McDade, Nina Pop, and countless other Black trans people who have died in the hands of the police.
"RETURN TO THE ROOTS"
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TITLE:
How Tumblr's 'Am I a Lesbian?' Google Doc Became Internet Canon
BY:
Lindsay King-Miller
TITLE:
How Tumblr's 'Am I a Lesbian?' Google Doc Became Internet Canon
BY:
Lindsay King-Miller
TITLE:
How to Find an Incarcerated LGBTQ Pen Pal—and Why You Should
BY:
Nico Lang
TITLE:
How to Find an Incarcerated LGBTQ Pen Pal—and Why You Should
BY:
Nico Lang
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TITLE:
How Tumblr's 'Am I a Lesbian?' Google Doc Became Internet Canon
BY:
Lindsay King-Miller
TITLE:
How to Find an Incarcerated LGBTQ Pen Pal—and Why You Should
BY:
Nico Lang
TITLE:
Art-Punk Icon Vaginal Davis on Creating, Quarantine, and Rebellion
BY:
Brontez Purnell
TITLE:
Art-Punk Icon Vaginal Davis on Creating, Quarantine, and Rebellion
BY:
Brontez Purnell
TITLE:
Art-Punk Icon Vaginal Davis on Creating, Quarantine, and Rebellion
BY:
Brontez Purnell
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The collective @queerappalachia is fighting the idea that LGBTQ people only exist in cities and providing mutual aid for its rural community.
HOW QUEER APPALACHIA IS UNITING RURAL QUEERS