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HOW THE GAY STREET FAIR KNOWN AS DORE ALLEY BEME THE WARM-UP FOR FOLSOM
"On Sunday, LGBT folk — though primarily gay men the leather muny — will take over the two blocks of Folsom Street on eher si of Dore Street, as well as the alley self, for an afternoon of drkg, dancg, and open-air sexual viance. Drawg about 15, 000 people — pared to the 250, 000 or more who attend Folsom — Dore Alley tends to feel like more of a muny affair, and a (mostly) gay-male block party for both fetishists and lol gawkers the two fairs that occur eight weeks apart ed to be two unaffiliated events, though Up Your Alley has always been the smaller and arguably dirtier of the SFist's Joe Kura explaed this brief history a uple years back, the first Up Your Alley Fair wasn't held on Dore Alley at all, and happened on Augt 25, 1985. Leather 1985 Patrick Toner and Jerry Vallaire, who lnched as a fundraiser specifilly for gay anizatns and those addrsg the growg AIDS crisis — the first beneficiari were SF AIDS Fund, the Gay Gam, and Communy Uned Agast Vlence.
By 1993, Toner would be ad om AIDS, and the precursor anizatn SMMILE (South of Market Merchants and Individuals Liftyle Events) was now charge of both Gayle Rub has done history lectur about the fairs over the years for the LGBT Center and other anizatns, and as she explaed to SFist 2015, even though the fairs were not necsarily the money-makers they are now, the leather muny ntued to fund and support them as a means of keepg the culture alive. "Photo om Up Your Alley 2017 by DragomediaRub is referrg to the often clared ath of the leather muny, which has managed to endure as a gay subculture spe the fact that many of s early proponents are gone.