Steam Portland, Portland Gay Sna | Rabow Inx

Contents:

• I SPENT A NIGHT ONE OF PORTLAND’S LAST GAY BATHHO
• 1999 PORTLAND GAY HISTORY WALKG TOUR
• GAY BATHHOE EROS TO OPEN S NEW TENRLO LOTN FOR PRI WEEKEND
• THGS EVERY GAY MALE PORTLAND TRANSPLANT SHOULD KNOW
• GAY PORTLAND, OREGON TRAVEL GUI

I SPENT A NIGHT ONE OF PORTLAND’S LAST GAY BATHHO

But as a closeted teen, there was one facet of LGBT nightlife that terrified me the most: gay bathho are gay sex clubs.

1999 PORTLAND GAY HISTORY WALKG TOUR

To me, gay bathho—explicly sexualized spac—beme so outsi my fort zone that I feared their parkg Portland still has two bathho, and I wanted to check one I talked to my iend T, who ed to work at Hawks PDX on Southeast Grand Avenue and is a equent flyer over at Sandy Boulevard's Steam. (Women are generally disuraged om visg gay bathho, which is dntg if you're gay wh all-female iends.

Unlike my perceptn of the dis days of gay and the height of the HIV epimic, everybody at Hawks was ut about g proper protectn.

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

This gui to historic gay, lbian, and transgenr buildgs and lotns Downtown Portland borrows om a number of primary sourc, cludg Mut of the Portland Cy Council, Oregon Liquor Control Commissn rerds, Portland cy directori, Sanborn fire surance maps, and several early gay newspapers published the cy between 1970 and 1980 (The Founta, The NW Founta, The Northwt Gay Review, and The Cas Voice). Sendary sourc clu the first wrten acunt of Portland’s gay history William Holman’s “A Gay History: Lt We Fet, ” (The Northwt Gay Review, Special Issue, June 1977), hereafter referred to simply as “Holman, ” and Duane Frye’s acunt of The Mic Hall om the Gay Pri Program of 1993. Hart, transgenr novelist and physician, see The Incredible Life and Lov of the Legendary Lucille Hart (1976) and Jonathan Katz’s Gay/Lbian Almanac (1983).

THGS EVERY GAY MALE PORTLAND TRANSPLANT SHOULD KNOW

S., see: The Queert Plac: A Natnal Gui to Gay and Lbian Historic S (Henry Holt Co., New York, 1997).

Special thanks to the Oregon Historil Society, which provid many of the imag this gui, and to the Gay and Lbian Archiv of the Pacific Northwt for s fancial support. The olst ntug gay bar on Stark, operatg om the late 1960s until the 2000s unr var nam.

GAY PORTLAND, OREGON TRAVEL GUI

It is que possible that may have had a gay clientele even earlier that the late ’60s, bee Robert Snrs, who also owned the very gay Tel & Tel Tavern on Oak, attempted to open this se unr the name of The Mombo 1960, but the applitn for a dispenser class license was refed by the Oregon Liquor Control Commissn.

This suggts that perhaps the lotn was already attractg some gays back then. Although we have no fe evince that this was particular hangout for Portland’s gay men of the day, would seem que likely that at least some of the vice sndal fendants and their iends would have equented this tablishment.