Pansy Craze: the wild 1930s drag parti that kickstarted gay nightlife | Mic | The Guardian

Contents:

• HOW GAY CULTURE BLOSSOMED DURG THE ROARG TWENTI
• BETWEEN WORLD WARS, GAY CULTURE FLOURISHED IN BERL
• HOW GAY BARS HAVE BEEN A BUILDG BLOCK OF THE LGBTQ COMMUNY
• THE PANSY CRAZE: WHEN GAY NIGHTLIFE LOS ANGEL REALLY KICKED OFF
• PANSY CRAZE: THE WILD 1930S DRAG PARTI THAT KICKSTARTED GAY NIGHTLIFE
• YOU COULD BE A GAY BAR RIGHT NOW AND NOT EVEN KNOW IT
• HOW THE MOB HELPED ESTABLISH NYC’S GAY BAR SCENE

HOW GAY CULTURE BLOSSOMED DURG THE ROARG TWENTI

The Begngs of a New Gay World“In the late 19th century, there was an creasgly visible prence of genr-non-nformg men who were engaged sexual relatnships wh other men major Amerin ci, ” says Chad Heap, a profsor of Amerin Studi at Gee Washgton Universy and the thor of Slummg: Sexual and Racial Enunters Amerin Nightlife, 1885-1940. By the 1920s, gay men had tablished a prence Harlem and the bohemian mec of Greenwich Village (as well as the seedier environs of Tim Square), and the cy’s first lbian enclav had appeared Harlem and the Village. Each gay enclave, wrote Gee Chncey his book Gay New York: Genr, Urban Culture, and the Makg of the Gay Male World, 1890-1940, had a different class and ethnic character, cultural style and public reputatn.

”At the same time, lbian and gay characters were beg featured a slew of popular “pulp” novels, songs and on Broadway stag (cludg the ntroversial 1926 play The Captive) and Hollywood—at least prr to 1934, when the motn picture dtry began enforcg censorship guil, known as the Hays Co. ” By the post-World War II era, a larger cultural shift toward earlier marriage and suburban livg, the advent of TV and the anti-homosexualy csas champned by Joseph McCarthy would help ph the flowerg of gay culture reprented by the Pansy Craze firmly to the natn’s rear-view mirror.

Durg the “Pansy Craze” om the 1920s until 1933, people the lbian, gay, bi, trans and queer (LGBTQ) muny were performg on stag ci around the world, and New York Cy’s Greenwich Village, Tim Square and Harlem held some of the most world-renowned drag performanc of the time. “They didn’t see a nflict between not beg openly gay at work and sort of only beg gay durg their leisure time, ” says Heap, addg that a person’s class was likely ditive of how you might participate gay and lbian culture at the time. “The were moments when workg class gay men and women uld more eely explore their sexualy, sir, and terts cross drsg, but probably no doctor or lawyer is gog to drs up drag at the events, out of risk of beg exposed.

BETWEEN WORLD WARS, GAY CULTURE FLOURISHED IN BERL

” In the mid ‘30s, productn s were put to effect that rtricted and prevented performanc of openly gay characters film or theater, and the followg s, thoands of LGBTQ people were arrted post WWII for equentg their own clubs.

Bars and ClubsNY Magaze rerds that the first “gay bar” New York Cy opened the, same-sex attractn beme a distct inty and nceptualizatns of "straight" and "gay" began to form throughout the 20th century, muni of like-md people also began to form.

This meant that tablishments that did serve people known or spected of belongg to the LGBT+ muny were closed down, which rulted a lot of gay bars and LGBT+-iendly tablishments were n by illegal anizatns and liable to shakedowns by the police. Unfortunately, for a lot of reasons - certaly datg apps, but also the 2008 recsn, risg rents, a wir atmosphere of acceptance that renrs LGBT+ bars and clubs val but not a necsy - gay bars and clubs are begng to disappear om the landspe.

HOW GAY BARS HAVE BEEN A BUILDG BLOCK OF THE LGBTQ COMMUNY

This Stonewall Factsheet, produced by NYC LGBT Historic S Project, Makg Gay History, New York Public Library, GLSEN, Natnal Parks Conservatn Associatn, and the Stonewall 50 Consortium, provis some answers to FAQs, and provis an excellent list of rourc for you to learn about the history of what is objectively the most famo gay bar LGBT+ history.

THE PANSY CRAZE: WHEN GAY NIGHTLIFE LOS ANGEL REALLY KICKED OFF

Juli’ Bar Manhattan may claim to be one of the olst gay bars the Village (though did not always operate as a gay bar), but is probably more famo for beg the se of the ‘sip ’ prott of 1966 that challenged the legaly of nyg service to LGBT+ patrons bars New York state. Whisnant:As early as the turn of the century, Berl's gay scene was attractg such notoriety that equently was mentned tourist lerature, liftg up the cy's gay scene as proof of the evils of urban life and the dangers of morny; them, Berl beme the untry's Sodom and Gomorrah put together, a sure sign of the land's the stag of Berl, the Tiller Girls showed off their legs, dancg a Rockett-style performance that amazed and tillated spectators.

By far the most famo was the Eldorado a nightclub whose ftive atmosphere attracted not only homosexuals but also artists, thors, celebri, and tourists wantg to admire a piece of "nt" Berl or tch a glimpse of someone Lbian Club SceneLbians uld also be found some of the bars that were voted mostly to gay men [and were] often seen the larger clubs of the 1920s, such as the Topp and the Eldorado. The atmosphere was generally refed; the lightg was soft and sentimental mic played the of the most famo was Chez Ma Belle Sor on Marburger Strasse, rated Greek-style and furnished wh private booths, where upl uld take refuge behd the gay bars, many of the lbian bars were segregated somewhat by class. They would s down to eat at tabl led wh flowers; the director, drsed a "gay velvet jacket, " would greet the guts and give a short dner, the tabl would be put away, and the orchtra would beg playg waltz and other lively dancg mic while the upl would dance through the night.

More specifilly, 's about gay Berl, the gay subculture that flourished Berl the era between World War I and the rise of the Nazis, when there were nightclubs and barets that tered to a gay clientele, gay-themed theater and films and gay-oriented publitns that were sold at ksks.

PANSY CRAZE: THE WILD 1930S DRAG PARTI THAT KICKSTARTED GAY NIGHTLIFE

They advertised all sorts of events, different kds of venu and they also attracted advertisers who were really appealg to a gay and lbian nstuency, and that's also really startlg, I We asked you to suggt a performer, a sger, that we uld listen to to give some sense of the mic people were listeng to then at perhaps some of the gay clubs. (SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)CLAIRE WALDOFF: (Sgg German) That was Claire Waldoff, a song picked for by Robert Beachy, the thor of the new book "Gay Berl, " which is about the gay subculture Berl the 1920s and early '30s, jt before the Nazi rise to was the law regardg homosexualy the '20s and early '30s Berl?

So was actually ma more dranian unr the Nazis 1935, and that remaed the law of the land Wt Germany until was fally reformed, startg the very-late So if homosexual acts were illegal Berl the '20s and early '30s, how did a gay subculture manage to flourish? And, of urse, people had nsensual sexual relatns private, so the law was difficult to what he fally end up dog - he cid that would be easier to simply observe and monor and, sence, keep tabs on spected homosexuals - spected vlators of the law - than to actually try to persecute them or prevent them om breakg the law. And what this meant practice was that the police partment, startg the late-1880s, simply tolerated all kds of different, you uld say, public acmodatns, bars, f; eventually, large transvte balls, where obv homosexuals, or, at least, obvly spected homosexuals, uld ngregate and there was a kd of homoerotic aternizatn, you uld say, that was allowed Berl by the late 1880s, and this permted the growth of a whole work of different kds of bars and rtrants.

It was somethg that really didn't exist the same way any other European Somethg really unual about how this law was enforced was that a partment lled the Department of Blackmail and Homosexualy was created to enforce the law. And so blackmail beme a huge the same police missner and then his succsors and really the entire police partment, regnized that the bigger problem was not homosexual nduct, but the way which the law self actually allowed for the practice of blackmail. And the two, then, were always closely I thk a lot of the people that the Department of Blackmail and Homosexualy went after were prostut bee the partment, though I terpreted, didn't really want to go after, like, the middle class.

YOU COULD BE A GAY BAR RIGHT NOW AND NOT EVEN KNOW IT

And the assumptn, too, I thk, was that prostut who make money the sex tra were also willg to make money through blackmailg the people they were - who were payg them to have that leads to, like, a whole other chapter the story, which was that there was a lot of prostutn, male prostut, gay Berl at the time.

So there were actually lots and lots of, we uld say, gay Nazi sympathizers who joed the SA, who joed the party, who were members of the movement, so to speak, and who also believed that bee of this figurehead, they would never actually be this was more or ls the se for the first year and a half until the summer of 1934. And so women were also, you know, of urse targeted and nsired absolutely send-class So what's the timatn of how many gay people were imprisoned durg the Third Reich, and how many died ncentratn mps and prisons?

And of urse, the late '70s to the '80s, the timat were much, much higher but they've sort of been pegged down as people have done more rearch and done some actual archival work to tablish those Durg the 1920s and the early 1930s, there were movements to try to liberalize the anti-gay law or to elimate the anti-gay law.

HOW THE MOB HELPED ESTABLISH NYC’S GAY BAR SCENE

And his theori had this credible cultural fluence, and a lot of people - people like Thomas Mann wrote, jt passg, how pervasive the ias about the Mannerbund actually anyway, what out of is this ia that there are actually really, really sort of virile, natnalist and, as you put , proto-fascist dividuals who also happen to be homosexual.

He thought that was probably an imbalance of male and female sex hormon that acunted for homosexualy or homosexual also then cid that one might be able to e sex hormon to fluence behavr and also ultimately to transn to a different genr. But 's certaly documented that there were both venu and different kds of anizatns that really tered specifilly to So now you're the procs of wrg another book lled "Long Kniv: Homosexualy In Nazi Germany. The prence of a lot of gay-intified, some s openly homosexual, dividuals who were volved the Nazi movement and who participated at least the early years and then up until the so-lled Night of Long Kniv - up until the assassatn of Rohm.

BEACHY: Well, you know, after pletg this book and after wrg about what I thk is really the birth of morn homosexual inty and homosexual rights activism, I have trouble unrstandg why Germans still regnize the Stonewall rt or rts at the end of the '60s 1969 as the begng of the morn homosexual rights I thk the Germans need to sort of honor their own history and regnize the importance of somebody like Magn Hirschfeld and the scientific humanarian mtee found 1897, you know, almost 70 years before the begng of the so-lled morn homosexual rights movement.