How the Mob Helped Establish NYC’s Gay Bar Scene | HISTORY

Contents:

• RUNNG A GAY BAR THE 1950S
• THE GAY BARS AND VICE SQUADS OF 1950'S LOS ANGEL
• HOW THE MOB HELPED ESTABLISH NYC’S GAY BAR SCENE
• GAY BARS A HISTORIL 'REFUGE' FOR LGBTQ PEOPLE
• SF GAY HISTORY
• GIGI’S CELEBRAT 50 YEARS: THE OLST GAY-OWNED GAY BAR DETRO IS NOW A HALF-CENTURY OLD

RUNNG A GAY BAR THE 1950S

Back 1950s Hollywood, a hole--the-wall neighborhood gay bar offered an attractive mix of fizz, iends and fabulons.

Authori om the police to the alhol board preferred to keep gays om ngregatg anywhere, so she ma sure to not draw attentn. But then a Milwkee thor heard about and brought back to life the newly published "Gay Bar: The Fabulo, Te Story of a Darg Woman and Her Boys the 1950s. "In an terview, I asked thor Will Fellows to scribe what he disvered about gay life Southern California more than six s ago.

Will Fellows: Helen Branson had many gay iends the 1940s and 1950s, and she was an extraordary straight ally at a time when beg a straight ally of homosexuals was unheard of. It was a pretty groundbreakg book: by my timatn, the first book by a straight person that picts the liv of gay people posively. She was wrg this book when Senator McCarthy was still rantg and ravg about thgs, a climate of what we uld all ll homophobia -- great antagonism toward homosexualy and homosexuals, perversn and viants, and all that sort of stuff.

THE GAY BARS AND VICE SQUADS OF 1950'S LOS ANGEL

She really saw as a kd of public livg had a lot of gay iends she'd veloped sce her divorce the 1930s, and she had managed other gay bars for other owners. She was able to do thgs her own way, a way that created a hospable, iendly and vg atmosphere but still mataed safeguards agast problems wh law enforcement and htlers and people who were not necsarily out to treat her gay iends well.

A: At that time, there some gay men who their self-prentatn, bee of feelg so opprsed and beltled and beleaguered and trapped their liv, they kd of acted out almost wildly flamboyant ways, rryg on ways that were more than jt thentic exprsns of maybe an gree of effemacy on their parts. The kds of dividuals -- the screamers -- were really a problem for the early homosexual rights anizatns bee they were jt bad p.

Many lears of homosexual anizatns tried to distance themselv om the people, whom they viewed as excsively flamboyant typ.

HOW THE MOB HELPED ESTABLISH NYC’S GAY BAR SCENE

There's another thg that's a fascatg dimensn of homosexual thought at that time: even early gay rights anizatns were very tent on enforcg pretty tradnal standards of drs for men and women. Q: It's amazg how Branson discs issu that are still big today: Can gays have healthy long-term relatnships? When she realized that the men she found most appealg as iends when she was workg as a palm rear Los Angel the 1940s were gay, she beme really trigued by that.

But she pots out that gay men are real people who have a fascatg mix of thgs gog on their liv, wh var strengths and weakns. "The Brass Rail, which opened s doors Hillcrt 1960 (after apparently movg om downtown), is still a gay bar -- 's now known for s ethnilly diverse clientele -- and ss at the rner of Robson and Fifth. Durg the latter s of his life, gay bars went om rari San Diego to mon sights that serve a variety of typ of gay the past, kissg is most fely allowed.

GAY BARS A HISTORIL 'REFUGE' FOR LGBTQ PEOPLE

At the same time thoands of gay men found themselv California after World War II, and they were prented wh the problem of livg a life the midst of social disapproval and police reprsn.

Unr nstant harassment by the police, homosexuals risked social ostracism and loss of employment if outed. Most employers and ernment agenci barred homosexuals wh moraly cls and they were wily nsired to be secury risks. It was wily njectured that homosexualy rulted om emotnal trmas childhood, as is the se wh other mental illns, and that geics played ltle to no role.

On this basis the practice of nversn therapy took hold, wh wispread attempts to change people om homosexual to heterosexual (here are jt a few exampl om stunts at Oberl College Oh). Homosexuals had long been barred om employment feral jobs, a policy that was rerced 1953 by Dwight Eisenhower's Executive Orr 10450.

SF GAY HISTORY

A survey nducted as late as 1967 for a CBS documentary (see the full program or a shorter versn) termed that two thirds of Amerins viewed homosexuals wh "disgt, disfort, or fear" while a majory favored laws agast all homosexual acts.

In 1951 the California Supreme Court led that a bar uld not lose s liquor license bee tered to gay clientele. While this did ltle to advance the public acceptance of homosexualy, did allow gay bars to operate much of California.

GIGI’S CELEBRAT 50 YEARS: THE OLST GAY-OWNED GAY BAR DETRO IS NOW A HALF-CENTURY OLD

Some of the well-known gay bars of this time were the Hoe of Ivy and the Wdup Hollywood, and the Crown Jewel, Harold's, the Waldorf, and Maxwell's downtown Los Angel.

The more nservative group of the gay muny took pas to distance themselv om the "obv" crowd, believg that they perpetuated negative stereotyp and drew unwanted attentn. There were bathho and parks that were known to be more homosexual, and small groups held hoe parti and private engagements. It was this time that the term "homophile" was ed -- explicly to take the word "sexual" out of homosexual.

This termology placed the Mattach at the more acmodatg end of the gay spectm, vis a vis the "obv" homosexual. Divisns wh the muny would eventually e to a head the late 1960s, and the homophile label fell by the waysi as the gay muny asserted self more forcefully. Usg a large number of unrver officers who posed as gay man for purpos of entrapment, the Vice Squad harassed the gay muny L.