Gay bars are disappearg. Their past holds keys to their future. - The Washgton Post

Contents:

• THE GAY WAY: HISTORY OF LBIAN BARS SOUTHEAST WASHGTON, D.C.
• GAY BARS ARE DISAPPEARG. THEIR PAST HOLDS KEYS TO THEIR FUTURE.
• D.C.'S BT GAY BARS AND HANGOUTS
• AT THE CLUB: LOTG EARLY BLACK GAY AIDS ACTIVISM WASHGTON, D.C.
• WASHGTON, D.C.'S HIDN GAY HISTORY IS UNVERED 'SECRET CY'
• LICHT CAFé, D.C.’S NEWT GAY BAR, IS A COZY, ART-FILLED U STREET HIAWAY

THE GAY WAY: HISTORY OF LBIAN BARS SOUTHEAST WASHGTON, D.C.

I cid I wanted to tell the story of Phase One [for my this], but I also wanted to tell the history of how other spac existed around Phase One, and why Phase One had managed to last for 45 me a b more about the history of “The Gay Way. RIP Gay BarsCi around the untry and globe have seen many of their most beloved gay and lbian waterg hol close down — often after the area's queer populatn dispers or the owner simply gets priced out. The above map and s acpanyg history tell the story of the bars, bookstor, group hom, clics, and church that have played sential rol DC's gay muny for the past half century.

Durg the 60s and 70s, as LGBT activism moved more to the public foreont, the number of gay bars grew throughout the District; also emergg this time were Guild Prs, which published gay travel guis, fictn, and a newspaper lled Gay Fom, as well as the Washgton Free Clic, which provid STD unselg to gay men. “Nowadays bars like Nellie's, one of the few notable gay bars to open sce 2000, are attend by straight people, and many bars whout the tentn of beg a gay bar wele and celebrate their LGBT muny. The data Kate ed to create the map is available through the Rabow History Project, an anizatn dited to llectg, prervg, and promotg gay, lbian, bisexual, and transgenr history DC.

Today, as bat ntue to surface about the need and sirabily of gay bars, one of the earlit gay-owned gay bars — Seattle’s Garn of Allah — has surprisg lsons about the history of gay bars and their likely War II is creded for a sea-change LGBTQ+ life. Perhaps was experienc such as the that spired the postwar spread of somethg that until then had been que rare: bars jt for gay people had long ngregated, and not always furtively, but almost always alongsi straight people.

GAY BARS ARE DISAPPEARG. THEIR PAST HOLDS KEYS TO THEIR FUTURE.

For example, one 20th-century gay man relled, “I have a iend who was a teacher, who was a snob, still is, and he would only go to hotel bars, never would go to the other bars.

Straight people terracial relatnships, Black jazz micians and Asian people unwele many other clubs also found a home mixed gay-straight crowd meant the Garn of Allah was out of step wh other gay bars openg the 1950s, which creasgly tered to eher gay men or lbians. And was a gay bar New York Cy, the Stonewall Inn, that is mythologized as sparkg the gay rights movement, when patrons fought back agast police opprsn radil polics that flourished the years after Stonewall often drew spiratn om revolutnary movements, spurng nightlife wh lls to e “out of the bars and to the streets! A later Mneapolis, the Gay Rights Lobby raised money and support for a printial ndidate out of the bar polics set the tone for the natnal LGBTQ+ movement: workg crementally wh the tablishment.

The reasons closed are faiar today: petn wh straight bars and technology that keeps people at the tactics troduced may jt be the key to gay bars’ survival today. Larry’s Lounge is a gay neighborhood pub, wh always-affordable drks, solid happy hour specials, mouth-waterg pub fare (see: sweet potato tots) and one of the cy’s iendlit pats (you n brg your dog, too!

D.C.'S BT GAY BARS AND HANGOUTS

In Febary 2016, the Washgton Bla noted an "unual flurry of activy" wh the openg of four new gay bars, the majory of which land the U Street/Shaw/Logan Circle area. “Whether ’s evotive pictn of gay life durg the tumultuo 1980s, pastakgly rearched bgraphy or elegant memoir, Whe’s work stands out across s as s ronance … for a multu of voted rears. This say asks, how did black gay men who were disloted om the center of AIDS service and public-health outreach (by discrimatn or by choice) the early years of the epimic receive rmatn about the vis’s impact?

AT THE CLUB: LOTG EARLY BLACK GAY AIDS ACTIVISM WASHGTON, D.C.

Drawg on archival materials, oral-history narrativ, and close textual analysis, I show how racial and class stratifitn stctured Washgton’s gay nightlife scene the 1970s and early 1980s. Communy-based narrativ about the vis’s transmissn through terracial sex, upled wh public-health officials’ neglect of black gay neighborhoods AIDS outreach, stctured the black gay muny’s belief that the vis was a whe gay disease that would not affect them as long as they mataed separate social and sexual works anized around shared geographic lotns. The ClubHoe—DC’s most famo black gay and lbian nightclub—beme a key se of AIDS activism bee of s prr visibily as the center of Ain Amerin lbian and gay nightlife and as a lol venue for black lbian and gay activist efforts.

And although natnal media attentn ntued to foc on the impact of AIDS on whe gay men, the ClubHoe emerged as a lol se where the vastatg impact of the vis on black same-sex-sirg men was both regnized and felt. On several ocsns sce whe gay-owned bars like the Pier, the Way Off Broadway, and the Lost and Found opened the 1970s, DC’s Commissn for Human Rights ced them for discrimatn agast women and blacks. ” Many black gay men wnsed whe patrons walk to the tablishments whout showg ID, while black patrons were asked to show multiple piec of ID, only to be told that the intifitn was unacceptable for admissn.

DC’s leadg LGBT-themed newspaper, the Washgton Bla, reported the mayor’s reactn upon learng about the black gay muny’s experienc of racial discrimatn whe gay-owned tablishments: “Barry, who had not prevly met wh Black Gay lears, seemed surprised to hear about discrimatn by Whe Gay tablishments.

WASHGTON, D.C.'S HIDN GAY HISTORY IS UNVERED 'SECRET CY'

”[4] In an edorial the DC-based, black, LGBT-themed magaze Blacklight, Sidney Brkley, the magaze’s publisher and founr of the first LGBT anizatn at Howard Universy, noted how equently this had been happeng whe gay bars particular, “As Black Gay people, we know all too well about discrimatn ‘whe’ Gay bars. ”[5] Yet this practice, though occurrg often wh whe gay-owned tablishments, received ltle media attentn prr to black gay and lbian activist efforts to brg public attentn to the issue. But for many black gay Washgtonians, racial discrimatn whe gay-owned tablishments was not an issue, bee the majory of black gay social life existed outsi the clubs and bars.

In the feature story of the December 1980 issue of Blacklight, tled “Cliqu, ” the thor, who chose to rema anonymo, explaed how black gay muny formatn Washgton, DC, shifted om private social clubs the mid- to late ’60s to more public venu the mid-’70s and early ’80s, g “cliqu” to emerge based on shared social spac like church, bars, neighborhoods, and apartment plex. [6] While the persistence of facto forms of segregatn DC’s gay scene and the cultural stigma attached to homosexualy wh black muni did shape the formatn of discrete social and sexual works among black gay men DC, many of the men preferred to socialize based upon shared geographic spac and mon racial and class inti. In the mid-1970s, Washgton, DC, veloped a vibrant black gay nightlife scene, wh nightclubs and bars such as the ClubHoe, Delta Ele, Brass Rail, and La Zambra emergg var bs and rintial districts throughout the cy.

LICHT CAFé, D.C.’S NEWT GAY BAR, IS A COZY, ART-FILLED U STREET HIAWAY

”[7] The bar’s uptown lotn the middle-e, black rintial area of Columbia Heights distguished om more workg-class black gay tablishments, like the Brass Rail, which was loted downtown the “htler sectn near 13th Street and New York Ave.

[9] The rrelatn between the geographic lotn of black gay bars and the class of their clientele further reflected the racial and class stratifitn of DC’s gay public culture the 1970s and early ’80s. In 1987 the Washgton Post reported that AIDS s Washgton, DC, were distct om those plac like New York Cy that the majory were black homosexual and bisexual men: “In the district, half of the 693 reported s are black, while only 3 percent are Hispanic. But unlike New York Cy, where the vast majory of black and Hispanic victims are traveno dg ers or their sexual partners, 70 percent of black AIDS patients the District are homosexual or bisexual men, acrdg to statistics piled by cy health officials.