The Journaling of Olsen 368

It listed events, meetings for gays and their parents, and other support activities. Had a long bar with a mirror behind it to reveal who came in and out the front door. John Kingsley, president of Hollywood Chamber of Commerce, and a local stationary store owner, began a campaign to close Bradley’s.
It was thus quite difficult for individual gay men to coalesce into a broader community. New to the West Hollywood LGBTQ scene is a concept called Hot Donna’s. After moving to the neighborhood in 2015 from San Diego, she says it immediately became clear there was nowhere she could go to meet queer women. But those spaces don’t exactly cater to queer women or trans and gender non-conforming folks.



It's a bit of a dive, in the best sense of the genre, serving cheap drinks and charging a low cover. An offbeat, quasi-diner that's open 24-7, Fred 62 (1850 N. Vermont Ave.) is in the heart of Los Feliz, within walking distance of the neighborhood's many offbeat vintage shops, bookstores, and boutiques. There's a good selection of beer and wine, and prices are excellent considering the high quality of the food. The late-night "Stoners and Drunkards Menu" is a big hit with clubbers after-hours. Strictly by the numbers, Akbar (4356 W. Sunset Blvd.) may not be the most popular bar in Los Angeles, but you could make a case that it has more devoted fans in the city's gay community than any other place in town.
Constructed in 1866 as La Plaza Abaja, Pershing Square is the largest park in Downtown Los Angeles. It was a meeting ground for gay men for much of the 20th century. The hotel is still open and operating, but no longer of specific interest to the LGBTQ community. The riot was said to have cause Main St. to be closed for a day. The "Palace Turkish Baths" originally operated as a straight venue, offering massages and Turkish Baths facilities, but it gradually evolved into a clandestine gay bathhouse.

Supreme Court’s 2015 ruling establishing the right of gay people to marry, said Murib. Civil rights leader Bayard Rustin, front left, accompanies Martin Luther King Jr., at a gathering in Los Angeles in 1965. Teachers studying LGBT history use primary and secondary sources on Rustin to learn how his sexual orientation influenced his work.
In 2019, the mural "Nostra Fiesta" by Rafa Esparza and Gabriela Ruiz was commissioned by the bar owners and curator Paulina Lara to be painted on the bar's storefront, to pay homage to the venue's Latinx, LGBTQ, and working-class clientele. The mural was featured in the multimedia exhibition at the ONE Gallery Liberate the Bar! Queer Nightlife, Activism, and Spacemaking, curated by Paulina Lara and Joseph Daniel Valencia. We invite you to use our commenting platform to engage in insightful conversations about issues in our community. We might permanently block any user who abuses these conditions.
We recommend a trip to the dance floor though — a good time is guaranteed. Mattson said bars serving working-class queer people are more likely to be pushed out by gentrification than those catering to middle-class and white gay men, he said. Gay bars survived the AIDS crisis, oppression and recessions, but the pandemic is driving bars out of business nationwide, especially those catering to people of color. Steve Terradot learned how to play pool in the back room at the Boulevard bar in Pasadena in 1981. He spent many nights there, relishing the feelings of safety and community the space provided. Steve Terradot is the owner of the Boulevard, a gay bar in Pasadena.

This year, as we reemerge into social spaces, there has never been a more important time to celebrate our most lasting gay bars and remember why, with so many other options for queer people nowadays, we should want to save them. The Gay and Lesbian Community Service Center , currently known as the Los Angeles Lesbian Gay Bisexual and Transgender Center, was established in 1972 by the Los Angeles Gay Liberation Front and the Metropolitan Community Church. Much like today, the GLCSC focused on providing human services for the local gay and lesbian community, especially housing services due to the dire housing crisis at the time. One important program they ran was the Gay and Lesbian Youth Talk Line, an anonymous service for youth to connect with the community and local resources. Other services were the Community Outreach and Education project, RAPS, quarterly newsletters, workshops, social outings, safer sex projectsand two important ones, the Women's Law Project and HIV Law Project. Outside, a group of women in all pink and matching cowboy hats arrive on the back of a bar bike.
“Gay men are sitting there having sex with each other in the seats while a giant screen is showing straight porn. There was no gay porn in Boston in the ‘60s — that started in the ‘70s,” Krone said. Ray Petri’s Buffalo movement, Versace’s campaigns by Avedon, 90s Jean Paul Gaultier – that era of pop culture rooted in that special gayness. Here, we speak with four intergenerational LGBTQ artists who reflect on the legacy and impact of Tom of Finland, and the Foundation’s work to uplift and celebrate queer sexuality.

Jalisco had 20 employees — Garcia, Hernandez and three bartenders, plus the drag performers and DJs, who were gig workers. At Jalisco, among the many economic casualties of the pandemic is Vanessa Antonely, a drag performer who specialized in lip syncing as Adele and Amanda Miguel. In an effort to save the bar, an online fundraiser has raised a little more than half of its $80,000 goal. Sergio Hernandez sits in a quiet dressing room where drag performers used to change when the New Jalisco Bar was in full swing before the pandemic closed the place.
So the GLF obtained a restraining order on the basis that it was a violation of their civil rights. When it opened in 1972, Jewel’s Catch One was the nation’s first black gay and lesbian disco. Since then, it has maintained a reputation as a historic landmark of LGBTQ+ nightlife. EBM powerhouse Das Bunker hosts some industrial and post-Goth music nights at Catch One that have traditionally welcome the more adventurous/alternative LGBTQ+ clientele.
During this renovation, they found it odd that the pipes they were uncovering were particularly large. They later discovered the upstairs had been a bathhouse called the Silver Saddle, and the pipes were so big because they were supporting steam rooms and other amenities. The weekly party was located at Basgo’s Dex Franco Disco in the Silver Lake neighborhood of Los Angeles. The event lasted till 1993, when it was raided by the Los Angeles Police Department’s Vice Division. Constituted a gritty liminal space oppositional to both the neighborhood’s largely men-only leather bars as well as the clean-cut bars of West Hollywood.

Whether 37% fewer gay bars is a lot or a little depends on where you stand. True, there are fewer of them now than at any time in the last 40-plus years. There were more gay bars during the depths of the AIDS crisis, even. On the other hand, there are still over 800 across 46 states, with new ones appearing each year. The Great Recession also hammered bars and full-service restaurants, pushing some vulnerable establishments to the edge.
Paul Hamel, a longtime customer who documented the bar’s annual Red Dress Party, an AIDS benefit that’s gone national, liked that Gold Coast catered to “neighbors not tourists,” including seniors who have fewer options for socializing in the city. An estimated 23% of men over the age of 65 live alone in West Hollywood, according to the city’s 2019 demographic report — triple the rate of Los Angeles County. Bowerman, a self-described “terrible dancer,” was surprised to find that he felt at home. Dancers can make or break WeHo hotspots, and let’s just say Fubar’s dancers will make your night. Widely known for the best go-go dancers in the area, Fubar has made history by hosting the longest running Thursday night party in the whole country. If that’s not enough to drive you in, they’re currently renovating and will soon be so much more.