San Francis tells gay bathho, "Wele back!" :: Bay Area Reporter

Contents:

• GAY BATHHOE EROS TO OPEN S NEW TENRLO LOTN FOR PRI WEEKEND
• SF GAY SEX CLUB EROS REOPENS NEW LOTN
• GALLERY: SAN FRANCIS GAY BATHHOE HISTORY, IN FLIERS [NSFW]
• SAN FRANCIS TELLS GAY BATHHO, "WELE BACK!"
• THE BT GAY BARS SAN FRANCIS
• GAY SEX VENU RETURN
• TWO PANMIC YEARS LATER, GAY BATHHOE ZONG BACK ON THE DOCKET IN SF
• SAN FRANCIS SUPERVISORS LIFT GAY BATHHOE PROHIBNS
• REOPENG SAN FRANCIS'S GAY BATHHO
• DOORS TO BAY AREA GAY SEX VENU SWG OPEN
• SAN FRANCIS SUPERVISOR'S PROPOSAL MAY ALLOW FOR REVIVAL OF GAY BATHHO IN SOME NEIGHBORHOODS
• EROSSAN FRANCISMENUHOTELS · LUXURYHOTELS · MID-RANGE + BUDGETBARSDANCE CLUBSCISE CLUBSSNASLBIAN BARS & CLUBSON TODAYTOURSCY GUIGAY WEDDGSGAY MAPEROS

GAY BATHHOE EROS TO OPEN S NEW TENRLO LOTN FOR PRI WEEKEND

There is also a sex club, Eros, the Castro gayborhood, which had plied wh the aforementned l. The le change at a time when many LGBTQ+ neighborhoods -- and gay bars and bathho -- are beg cimated by the enomic nsequenc of the panmic. When the 30-year-old bathhoe and sna Eros left ’s old home on Market Street near the Castro December 2021, the cy's only remag gay sex club said they had a new home led up.

San Francis's last remag gay sex club is reopeng s doors time for Pri weekend. After vatg their former space on upper Market Street December, Eros's owners began remolg and movg to their new home, where the gay Bulldog Baths had operated the late 1970s and 1980s.

Eros is not a tradnal gay bathhoe that do not have locked rooms. "We have been able to weather the cris of AIDS and STIs, the dg crisis, and we fd ourselv the only gay mercial sex venue to rema bs post the COVID-imposed closur, " said Rowe, referrg to the closure 2020 of SOMA sex club Blow Buddi. They did so at the urgg of gay District 8 Supervisor Rafael Manlman, who had led the earlier ph to allow bathho to aga operate the cy.

SF GAY SEX CLUB EROS REOPENS NEW LOTN

It pav the way for gay bathho and other adult sex venu to open the Castro, Tenrlo, and most of South of Market whout the need to receive approval om the planng missn. A dog groomer and kennel g the name of the old gay bathhoe had operated the space followed by an artist llective prr to Eros takg over the lease. To unrstand the eply felt antagonism around bathhoe closur, ’s helpful to unrstand the role the baths played the liv of gay men.

In the early 1980s, as AIDS began to cimate the gay muny of San Francis, a battle broke out over the role that gay bathho might play the spread of HIV.

On the other si stood the gay bathhoe proprietors, San Francis AIDS Foundatn, the San Francis Human Rights Commissn, a handful of polis, the gay prs, and most — but certaly not all — of the gay muny. To unrstand the eply felt antagonism to closg the baths, ’s helpful to unrstand gay history and the role the baths played the liv of gay men the world over. But the post-Stonewall 1970s, gay life me kickg and screamg out of the closet.

GALLERY: SAN FRANCIS GAY BATHHOE HISTORY, IN FLIERS [NSFW]

Gay magaz proliferated; gay bs thrived; gay artists and micians began achievg mastream succs.

SAN FRANCIS TELLS GAY BATHHO, "WELE BACK!"

Acrdgly, as gay men stopped nyg their sexual urg, the bathho thrived. No wonr then that when the Cy wanted to close the bathho, was seen by many as an anti-gay, anti-sex — an attempt to drive all back to the closet. Gay civil liberti, of AIDS hysteria vs.

A heterosexual judge wh no gay advisory mtee termed what was an acceptable venue for men who have sex wh men. “Ltlejohn’s ballot proposal galvanized the gay muny opposn, ” renowned activist Cleve Jon told me. We all reasonably feared an anti-gay vote, a slippery slope that uld lead to who-knows-where?

Now HIV is, at least, ntrollable, allowg more gayns. Maybe they’ve learned to tst that gay men at the baths have enough rmatn, and self-teem, to take re of themselv whout Dianne Feste peerg over their shoulrs.

THE BT GAY BARS SAN FRANCIS

I thk, though, that we n at least celebrate the fact that a time-honored staple of gay culture will be given new life this fair cy. An extraordary, glimpse to the pre-AIDS gay sexual culture, "The Fairoaks Baths" is an exhib of Polaroids taken by Frank Melleno durg the sprg and summer of 1978 at the Fairoaks Hotel, a San Francis bathhoe.

There is no other llectn of photographs that so clearly visualiz this perd bathhoe imag and more will be on display at the Llie-Lohman Prce Street Project Space (tails below) and also clud are imag om the Fairoaks Pri Para float om that same Fairoaks Baths:Photographs by Frank MellenoPolaroids om a San Francis bathhoe 1978Llie-Lohman Mm of Gay and Lbian Art (Prce Street Project Space)127-B Prce StreetNew York, NY 10012July 12-13, Openg receptn July 11, 6-8 p. The gay revolutn was full flower -- sexy, charged wh self, admtg no shadows. He'd been a member of the '70s gay mune that went on to purchase and nvert a fad but wonrfully tact Victorian apartment buildg on the edge of a black ghetto to a gay bathhoe.

It lerally stood alone, at the tersectn of Oak and Steer streets, perched on a hill overlookg the lower Hay Valley district; an urban patch not yet gentrified by the cy's swellg ti of gay Boomers and some distance om the neighborhoods they typilly Fairoaks' existence was short-lived -- 1977 to 1979 -- but fondly relled by s patrons for a number of thgs. For one, was a racially clive place for gay men to have sex, unlike some of the cy's hot spots that were ls welg of people of lor. Members of the groups were enuraged by the offer of a ee locker to spend the eveng and this helped foster a more faiar and timate atmosphere than was mon other gay bathho of the era.

GAY SEX VENU RETURN

Many of those men, like a great number of Fairoaks patrons, are no longer alive -- taken by the plague of AIDS that would cimate the cy's gay populatn jt another few a strg of black pearls, San Francis's bathho adorned the cy wh a touch of louche glamour before they were officially closed October 1984.

Wh a historian's eye and gay activist's zeal, he ptured the agile, fun, and always fantastic life the Fairoaks Hotel. Freeman regnized the historil importance, rtored the imag and created the Fairoaks than a pictorial rerd of a bygone scene -- or even of passg strangers wh sticky feet -- the photographs open a door to a secret gay world of sexual enunter and sweet nocence the lik of which will never be seen aga. At the Fairoaks he worked as a DJ, and receptnist, and was a proud member of the Fairoaks "fay crew" om s ArmsTwo guys towels talkg near the snack bar the mon area of the Pri #1The Fairoaks float at the 1978 Gay Pri Para San Francis was a flatbed tck rated wh furnure om the Fairoaks lounge.

The hood ornament is wearg a Fairoaks T-shirt and straddlg a prott sign about the Briggs iative, which would have banned gay and "gay-sympathetic" teachers om classrooms California, and did not Pri #8Taken om the ont of the Fairoaks float for the 1978 Gay Pri Para, lookg ahead at the para and by-stanrs. He was a personal rrponnt wh Ana Bryant, disagreeg wh her ias on homosexualy. The Crisis lead to a prott by gay men who, a time when the AIDS vis was still not pletely unrstood, objected to the crackdown as a form of persecutn.

TWO PANMIC YEARS LATER, GAY BATHHOE ZONG BACK ON THE DOCKET IN SF

That same doctor, Donald Abrams, who ultimately supported the closure of the bath ho but who is gay himself, said, "I saw both sis of the issue. The gay muny had achieved a lot of liberatn and a lot of promence San Francis over the seventi and on to the early eighti, and I thought that closg the bathho would really be a polil setback.

SAN FRANCIS SUPERVISORS LIFT GAY BATHHOE PROHIBNS

The Rch Street Baths, we thought we'd take a look back on some of the fliers om the plac, which were a primary sexual outlet for the cy's gay muny long before Grdr was even a possibily.

[Hat tips to Out History and Gay Tubs (NSFW)]. For the first time nearly four s operators of tradnal gay bathho n once aga seek perms to open San Francis. Those regulatns, when put to effect, rulted a facto ban on gay bathho San Francis, leavg rints to have to travel to such bs Berkeley and San Jose.

REOPENG SAN FRANCIS'S GAY BATHHO

Due to the COVID-19 panmic, the lone gay bathhoe left the Bay Area is Steamworks the East Bay and remas closed bee of the health crisis.

While gay sex clubs whout private, locked rooms ntued to operate the cy, most eventually closed their doors. Whether is signifint on the ground pends on if entreprenrs wh the visn and fancial paci and the savvy to open n and operate one of the, " said gay District 8 Supervisor Rafael Manlman of the liftg of the old bathhoe l.

DOORS TO BAY AREA GAY SEX VENU SWG OPEN

Many of the cy's gay bathho were loted the South of Market neighborhood on or near Folsom Street. So many gay-related venu, om bathho and sex clubs to bars and stor terg to leather fetishists, were loted the area by the 1970s that was known as the Miracle Mile. Allowg for the reopeng of tradnal gay bathho uld be a boost for lears of the area's Leather and LGBTQ Cultural District as they try to prerve the neighborhood as an LGBTQ enclave.

Wh life not expected to return to a sense of normalcy until late 2021, a gay bathhoe uld be ready to open jt as the health crisis fully subsis. The panmic has certaly affected many of the bs our area, " said Robert Goldfarb, a gay man who is the print of the SOMA LGBTQ cultural district's board.

SAN FRANCIS SUPERVISOR'S PROPOSAL MAY ALLOW FOR REVIVAL OF GAY BATHHO IN SOME NEIGHBORHOODS

He hop a gay bathhoe operator will e forward to open a lotn San Francis.

While he believ there are potential lotns to suate a gay bathhoe the Castro, Manlman told the B. Steamworks and San Francis's Eros are the last gay sex venu that were left to reopen when California Governor Gav Newsom gave the all-clear last week; San Francis's Blow Buddi and San Jose's the Watergarn were forced to shutter permanently due to the COVID-19 panmic.

But somethg that gay bathho and sex clubs offer that apps like Grdr lack is the -person experience, Jensen said, a difference that mirrors how much of society has lived for the past year and their reentry to physil teractn now. And AIDS had already begun ravagg the gay muny San Francis. The were snas and sex clubs where often newly liberated gay men would go to spend an eveng, or make a fal stop after a night of drkg or dancg — and historians say that SF's pneerg leather culture was alt a ath blow when the bathho at the time, there was no public-health nsens about whether bathho need to be closed, but had bee creasgly clear to cy officials that the cy's growg HIV epimic had at least somethg to do wh the ee-love and liberte sexual activi gog on the lol muny, and the bathho were one nex of 2020, Manlman proposed a repeal of the lol ordance that ma bathho — which were fed specifilly as munal baths or clubs which had rentable private rooms wh lockable doors — illegal.

EROSSAN FRANCISMENUHOTELS · LUXURYHOTELS · MID-RANGE + BUDGETBARSDANCE CLUBSCISE CLUBSSNASLBIAN BARS & CLUBSON TODAYTOURSCY GUIGAY WEDDGSGAY MAPEROS

"Durg the 1970s and early 80s, bathho were a fol pot of gay social life San Francis and were important muny meetg plac where iends would gather to share stori, or watch a live show, " Manlman said a statement. Prevly: Supervisor Propos Re-Legalizg Gay Bathho In San Francis.