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Bo Young
Category Archives: Books
Arts, Bo Young, Books, Community, Culture, Current Affairs, Dan Vera, Gay Wisdom, Poetry, Radical Faerie
Congratulations to Dan Vera: Letras Latinas / Red Hen Poetry Prize Winnter
April 27, 2012 Editors	Leave a comment
We (and by "we" I mean "I") are (am) proud to announce that my friend, Dan Vera, aka Managing Editor for White Crane, has been chosen as the awardee of the Letras Latinas / Red Hen Poetry Prize, for Latino poets who have already published at least one or two books of poetry. The inaugural judge for this prize was poet and Notre Dame professor Orlando Ricardo Menes.
Dan's winning entry, slated for publication in 2013 is The Guide to Imaginary Monuments. In addition to his White Crane Journal and White Crane Books duties, Dan is a DC-based poet, and also the author of The Space Between Our Danger and Delight (Boethuk Books, 2008).
Two manuscripts were selected, and their publication by Red Hen Press will be spaced two years apart, to give Letras Latinas momentum to promote and publicize the winning books, its authors, this new literary series.
The second award was given to William Archila's second book, The Gravedigger's Archeology, which will be published in 2015. His first book was The Art of Exile (Bilingual Press, 2009), a book that speaks to Archila's Salvadorean heritage and his immigration to the U.S. during the Central American civil war. He is based in Los Angeles.
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Celebrate Harry Hay's 100th Birthday This Saturday!
April 5, 2012 Editors	Leave a comment
Saturday, April 7, at 11 a.m.
A ceremony at the foot of the Cove Avenue Steps on Silver Lake Blvd. recognizing the site as a historic place by the City of Los Angeles. The dedication of "The Mattachine Steps" (which lead up to the house where pioneer gay activist Harry Hay founded the Mattachine Society in 1950) will be followed by a Radical Faerie-hosted picnic in an adjoining park overlooking the Silver Lake Reservoir (east side). Then, at 2:30, a book signing and reading of Stuart Timmon's newly updated biography "The Trouble with Harry Hay" at nearby Stories bookstore, 1716 Sunset Blvd. (in Echo Park).
Sunday, April 15, at 2:00 p.m.
The ONE Culture Series will host a panel discussion about Harry Hay's life and times. Film clips, literary readings and lively talk will be followed by refreshments in the Archive's garden. There is a suggested donation of $5. The ONE National Gay & Lesbian Archives is located at 909 W. Adams Blvd. (near USC). 213-741-0094 for further information.
Bo Young, Books, Gay History, Gay Wisdom
Gay Lives by Robert Aldrich
March 30, 2012 Editors	Leave a comment
Robert Aldrich, a professor of European history at the University of Sydney, has compiled eighty biographical sketches of LGBT people from ancient to modern times in his new book, Gay Lives, released stateside this week by Thames & Hudson. He told a local paper:
"It's hard to talk about gay and lesbian history without covering the Christopher Isherwoods and the Harvey Milks and all of that, but once you move past that, it's interesting to learn how there were people involved in same-sex activities in all walks of life – the book has a lesbian nun, a criminal, painters, explorers… I wanted to take a lot of less well-known figures from across continents and around the world to show diversity, because in many ways diversity is the theme of the book."
The handsome, heavy book includes 56 color illustrations and 72 in black and white.
Aldrich's previous book is Gay Life & Culture: A World History.
Arts, Books, Community, Friends, Radical Faerie, Religion, Travel
The Book of Monks
May 13, 2011 Editors	Leave a comment
Received this from our friend Joel Singer:
For the past few months the muse has kept me happily busy in the electronic darkroom.
I am thrilled to announce the publication of THE BOOK OF MONKS, a series of 31 photages in a
limited edition of 50 hardbound copies, numbered and signed (electronically). They are being printed and shipped by Apple in the U.S. The price is $100 per copy with 50% of the post printing costs benefitting the BIG JOY documentary film project.
I have been making photages for the past twenty-five years. Recently, on a memorable journey to Laos I photographed Buddhist monks in the World Heritage city of Luang Prabang where there are a number of monasteries. The monks have now been absorbed into images I had taken over the years, particularly during the past decade in New York City.
To order your copy please respond to: joel@joelasinger.com
Send your check payable to Joel Singer to: 524 Franklin Street, Cambridge, MA, 02139
Many thanks for your support. Joel
Ancestors, Arts, Bo Young, Books, Community, Culture, Elders, Friends, Gay History, Gay Wisdom, Gay Wisdom Events, History, Jesse Monteagudo, Literature, Men, Politics, Radical Faerie, White Crane Books
Jesse's Journal
The Fire in Moonlight: Stories from the Radical Faeries
On Labor Day Weekend, 1979, 200 men gathered in the Arizona desert for the first Spiritual Conference for Radical Faeries. Called forth by Harry Hay (of Mattachine Society fame), Hay's partner John Burnside, Don Kilhefner and Mitch Walker, this first of many Gatherings created a development that spread around the world and combined elements of gay liberation, feminism, environmentalism, new age spirituality and the counter-culture. Thousands of gay and Bi men (later joined by a few women) met in out of the way, rural Gatherings and Sanctuaries, creating a very loose network that defied the LGBT community's tendency toward assimilation and institutionalism. Creative spirits like Will Roscoe, James Broughton, Andrew Ramer, Toby Johnson, Dan Nicoletta and Charlie Murphy became part of this sub-culture. It was Hay who coined the term Radical Faeries: both Radical (as to the root) and Faerie having to do with gays' spiritual and cultural traditions rather than "radical" politics.
Among the 200 men who attended that first Faerie Gathering was author Mark Thompson. As Thompson remembers, the Gathering "was definitely a turning point in the burgeoning gay men's spirituality movement. In some ways, I felt that gathering in the Arizona desert was as historically important as the Stonewall riots had been a decade before. Both events signaled a significant refocusing of values and vision, helping to create a new leap forward in gay culture-making. I attended many Gatherings – mainly in the Western United States – for the next 20 years."
More than thirty years after attending that first Gathering, Thompson, along with Associate Editors Richard Neely (Osiris) and Bo Young, have assembled the first anthology by and about the Faeries. The Fire In Moonlight: Stories from the Radical Faeries, is published by White Crane Books / Lethe Press as part of the White Crane Wisdom Series ($25). "Since their sudden inception on a remote site in the American Southwest in 1979, the Faeries have grown like some exotic species of flora around the world," Thompson wrote in his "Introduction." "This book of many voices continues that early call – a call for freedom of mind, body and spirit from the petty, awful tyrannies of those who have tried every means to destroy us. It is about how being a Radical Faerie has changed a life." Among the contributors are Will Roscoe, Franklin Abbott and Trebor Healy.
Bo Young, publisher of White Crane Books, and Associate Editor of The Fire In Moonlight, began his involvement with the Radical Faeries in 1990, when he first visited the Short Mountain Sanctuary in Tennessee. As Young is quick to point out, "the organizing principle of the Faeries is consensus and the Faerie Circle . . . no leaders. Everyone is 'equidistant' from the center. No one person is out in front. . While the Radical Faeries are identified most often as a 'movement' it isn't something you join. It's a state of mind. If you say you are a Faerie, you are a Faerie. There are Faeries who are into drag and organic farming and wild fermentation and there are Faeries who are theatrical and there are Faeries who are living communally and there are Faeries that are eremitic. There are rural Faeries and there are urban Faeries."
In The Fire in Moonlight, Faeries past and present share in their Faerie experience. According to Jerry Berbiar (Jerry the Faerie), "the Radical Faeries were founded for gay men. The Gatherings were places where gay men could individually recreate themselves, create community, explore faggot essence and create their own culture, free from the dominant all-encompassing hetero viewpoint." "At the heart of the Radical Faeries is a recognition of and exploration into gay men's souls: our unique way of viewing, experiencing and being in the world," Joey Cain wrote. "I found myself in environments where my very sexuality, my embrace of myself as male and female, my determination that my sexual nature was both natural and magical, were honored and explored," recalled "EuroFaerie" Marco Shokti. "For a freaky little queer boy like me the Radical Faeries were the family I hardly dared to dream might exist," declared Pete Sturman, AKA Mockingbird and Pistol Pete. "The Faeries provided me with a safe environment to try all sorts of different things. I could split wood in high heels, bake bread in my underwear or run around covered in mud. I could laugh like a hyena or take a day of silence. They helped inspire me to become a musician and songwriter, a loud and proud queen troubadour."
One of the most interesting parts of The Fire in Moonlight is the book's "Faerie Glossary." According to Young (at left in photo), "a shared, unique language is one of the defining elements of 'culture.' The Faeries have a very definite and unique use of language and one of the chief motivations of the various traditions such as Sanctuaries is a 'time out of time' period in which the gay individual removes him (or her) self from the dominant culture and literally engage in 'coming to terms' with who s/he is." Hay challenged the Faeries to self-define, from which emerged a vocabulary which the editors believe required a Glossary. Many Faeries have taken "Faerie names;" spiritual or ecologically-inspired names in contrast to their "mundane, everyday names."
The Fire in Moonlight presents a mostly-positive view of the Radical Faeries. But there are dissenting views. "Improbable Faerie" Artwit, who was active with the San Francisco Faeries during the 1980's, is critical of a subculture which, like other gay tribes, favors the young and beautiful: "I have no desire to be a Faerie Mormon and make breakfast while the pretty ones sleep in and fuck," he said. Young admits that "one of the challenges we had was finding an African-American contributor. The Faeries are like any other part of this American society and suffers from the inherent racism of the culture. But that said, it is one of the few communities of which I am aware that actually attempts to address that." In short, "The Fire in Moonlight is not meant in any way to be a hagiography of the Radical Faerie movement."
Artwit is in the minority. As Thompson (in photo at right) put it, "once a Radical Faerie, always a Radical Faerie." "The Faeries are by no means a perfectly evolved group," Thompson admits, "but it definitely represents a quantum step in healing gay male relationships and community practice. The Radical Faeries may appear as a rather funky, insignificant tribe of social outcasts, but I have to state here for the record that nowhere have I encountered more intelligent, creative and beautifully self-aware gays in one place than at a Faerie Gathering. A Gathering is the antithesis of a typical gay ghetto environment. It is an intentional community – a destination on the inner journey, not some angry place of refuge. There is a lot of joy that comes from being a Radical Faerie."
"The strongest thing about the Faeries," Young notes, "is their commitment to community and their general awareness of and respect for history and tradition. Another strength is the creation of and maintenance of the Faerie Sanctuaries in their various manifestations," many of which are listed in the "Radical Faerie Resource Directory" found at the back of The Fire in Moonlight. On the other hand, Young admits that the Faeries' "generally perceived flamboyance tends to scare people away." The Radical Faeries, Thompson says, "claim no particular leaders (we say we are 'leader-full') so there is not a problem of domineering egos holding others in thrall. People like that quickly get invited elsewhere. The reverse of this is that sometimes chaos ensues and the group experience can rapidly devolve into incoherent confusion. Over the years, the Faeries have learned how to walk better in balance between these polarities."
"The Faeries," Thompson continues, "have a very significant role in the greater understanding of what I would call our core gay values. Because we are living so in the moment, the archetypal motifs of gay psyche are more keenly felt and expressed. This is one crowd that is not going to be assimilated into mainstream mythology, which is still a narrative of heterosexual dominance. Faeries are shape-shifters, makers of ritual and beauty, natural teachers, healers and soul guides. We walk between the worlds, the seen and unseen, and between the genders. It represents a more authentic vision of who we gay men really are inside." "For myself," Young adds, "the chief asset of most Faeries I know is that they understand a history of same-sex people and tend to see themselves as connected to that history. There are so many other aspects of what I think of more as a culture than as a 'movement' . . . the attraction to the land, the care of the land, the rejection of consumerist culture, the sense of humor. It is one of the ancient archetypes of same-sex people to be jesters, culture carriers, interpreters and teachers. The Radical Faeries are all of these. These have always been incredibly important to any vital society . . . and they always will be."
Ancestors, Arts, Bo Young, Books, Community, Culture, Dan Vera, Elders, Friends, Gay History, Gay Wisdom, History, Literature, Men, Politics, Radical Faerie, White Crane Books
The Fire in Moonlight – Lambda Literary Review
February 18, 2011 Editors	Leave a comment
From Lambda Literary Review
THE FIRE IN MOONLIGHT
Stories from the Radical Faeries
Edited by Mark Thompson
White Crane Wisdom Series
9781590213384, 309 Pages, $25.00
Mark Thompson's latest anthology, The Fire in Moonlight (White Crane), is a collection of first person accounts of the Harry Hay-inspired Radical Faerie movement. Hay, a co-founder of the Mattachine Society, joined forces with Don Kilhefner and Mitch Walker to start the Faerie movement in order to add a spiritual dimension to the (often dry) nuts and bolts world of emerging gay politics.
Inspired in part by the writings of Edward Carpenter and the Calamus poems of Walt Whitman, Hay saw the homosexual as much more than a creature fighting for rights in a hostile society. The homosexual, according to Hay, was a multidimensional being with roots in the mythic, a sort of alien spirit with special healing gifts for the world.
As Stuart Timmons notes in his introductory essay, "The Making of a Tribe," Hay once told a circle of 200 Faeries: "We Faeries need to stop saying, 'My consciousness is better than your consciousness.' That's heterosexist. No one person, no one group, no one ideology has the answer. You need a spirit."
Theologians may quibble with that relativist statement, insisting that if one truth is as good as another truth, then there's no truth anywhere. One thing's certain, however: You have to have spirit in order to "build." For Hay, this meant constructing a homosexual spiritual dimension outside the world of conventional religion.
In a 1975 edition of RFD, Hay wrote: "To be a true homosexual, is to be put at odds with home, school and society….We are so other that we have to learn early how to protect our very survival."
While this perspective may seem dated post-DADT, Hay was nonetheless insistent that a pronounced queerness was buried inside the homosexual's "stubbornly perverse genes." Hay's vision of a monastic-like collective of queer men of all ages coming together in friendship circles for a process of "shedding the ugly green frog skin of hetero-imitation" started with the first Faerie Circle in Colorado in 1979.
Called "A Spiritual Conference for Radical Faeries," at that Labor Day event hundreds of men (the gatherings would later include women) participated in mud baths and neo-pagan, quasi-Native American rituals like circle hand holding, chanting, and taking turns speaking to the circle while holding a Talking Stick. Many of these ad hoc talks were spiked with references to Aliester Crowley as well as Hay's own take on what it means to be "queer" and "other."
In these free-love pre-AIDS gatherings there was ritualized group sex as well as individual couplings. As Timmons observes, "In selecting fairies as a role model for gays, [Hay] combined logic with inspiration to surpass the medieval Mattachines—to a pre-Christian time and beyond human limits."
With its emphasis on aspects of Native American culture and worship of the earth, the early Faeries attracted gay men who had had enough of the dead end clone life in the urban gay ghetto.
At the second Spiritual Gathering for the Radical Faeries in 1980, in Estes National Forest above Boulder, Colorado, faerie names were adopted and the emphasis on paganism was enhanced. As contributor Carol Kleinmaier notes, besides a denial of spirit-body and male-female duality, Faerie spirituality "was sourced in… the celebration of sacred sexuality, Wicca, paganism and shamanic traditions."
As one would expect, highly eclectic and a diverse range of spiritual references as well as divergent opinions about the Faerie experience mark these essays.
Allen Page, for instance, writes that during the first gathering he "asked the Goddess (which Goddess he doesn't say) to show him why he needed to be there." Meanwhile, "a young man shook a rattle and stands up in a speckled dress." The philosophy was to embody masculine and feminine energies although one finds in many of these stories a distinct prejudice against patriarchy as well as an emphasis "to take the gifts of the Father back to the Mother."
Philadelphian Chris Bartlett (The Lady Bartlett) notes:
I like cultures that use rituals to embody choice: the Amish Rumspringa when Amish teens, following a year of exposure to the outside world, choose to join the Amish community (be baptized) or are shunned. Another example is the bar/bat mitzvah when young Jews choose to take on the responsibilities of adulthood. The investiture of a priest in various religions is another moment of powerful choice. When participants in a culture choose to embrace that culture, they become full actors, as opposed to full recipients.
In Faerie circles, identification with the feminine is assumed. It would not be unusual, for instance, for the males in a circle to cry while listening to reports of the rape of a female friend of a member. Since Radical Faeries spanned all age categories, older men were respectfully called elders and were regarded as purveyors of wisdom, even if that "respect" ended at the bedroom door. Wisdom cannot compete with beauty when it comes to a good lay.
Just as in any local city bathhouse, the young are attracted to the young, as the older and less appealing find themselves casting about for a bone or having to spend their nights alone, Trappist monk-style.
Artwit, for instance, writes that at one gathering he got lucky three times so that his "usual depression at being alone while the slender twinks slept in pairs was less severe." Highly critical of many in the Faerie community, Artwit states that "self righteous beliefs about food seem to be a hallmark of the Faeries. We used to joke in the kitchen about making 'Cream of Vegan' soup for our next meal."
Artwit also writes about the Faerie Drag Wars.
The first two Gatherings had that old rustic-northwest-jeans-and-flannel flavor and here come these queens from California doing wigs and make-up. So a small culture war was started at the Gathering, with the hosts deciding not to send the Call to California next year. "[But] over the years, wigs and makeup won and overtook whatever Heart Circles there were.
For Artwit, the Faeries main problem was making social problems into personal ones.
"I have no desire to be a Faerie Mormon and make breakfast while the pretty ones sleep in and fuck," he writes.
Editor Mark Thompson is to be commended for not editing out Artwit's less than flattering reminiscences. The inclusion of such criticism is a tribute to the Faerie generosity of spirit, although there's enough good stuff in this book to make Harry Hay proud.
As Berbiar (Jerry the Faerie) puts it, "We need queers who have radical askance alternative viewpoints to dominant cultural mores. May the Radical Faerie movement continue to play its role in providing a cauldron of change so needed in this ignorant and repressive world."
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Hide/Seek…Sane/Insane
December 2, 2010 Editors	Leave a comment
The Smithsonian has a brilliant show titled Hide/Seek exploring sexual difference in modern portraiture. It is a stunning show and the companion book by the same name is worth every penny. The range of artists and the sheer quality of the art on display is a once in a lifetime kind of show and I encourage anyone within visiting distance of our Nation's Capital to pay a visit to the Smithsonian.
Because, of course, this privately funded exhibit is under attack by the radical religious right again, this time in the guise of The Catholic League, the self-appointed Taliban of Catholic faith. And what exactly has them so exercised? A video by gay artist David Wojnarwicz titled A Fire in My Belly, mourning the death of his lover. Apparently there is an image in this video of the crucified Jesus's body, covered with ants. Now…it's not the sado-masochistic image of a man nailed to a wooden cross that upsets Mr. Donahue. It's the ants. His comment is that the Smithsonian wouldn't show Mohammed covered in ants, but Jesus? That's OK.
Really? Is fundamentalist radical Islamism who you really want to get in bed with Bill? … er, I mean associate with?
I digress. Herr Donahue goes on to — predictably I suppose — demand that Congress cease all funding for the Smithsonian because…and you can't make this stuff up…the regular Joe, the blue collar worker doesn't go to museums. I (Donahue) don't. They go to see WWF wrestling matches (really? all of them?) …and we don't ask for tax-support for wrestling.
To draw a parallel between wrestling…even legitimate wrestling, not even the comic book staged variety…and the Smithsonian is just so..what? Ignorant? Breathtakingly stupid? I'm sorry…it deserves a new word all its own: Goebbelsian (as in Joseph "tell-a-big-enough-lie-and-they'll-believe-you" Goebbels.) Just as a charitable explanation, one (wrestling) is a staged form of entertainment or sport. The other, (The Smithsonian) is an educational institution that preserves the culture and history of these United States. We fund one because it is in the interests of education. We don't fund the other because a) it makes a gazillion dollars on it's own, and b) it's stupid.
Oops. My bias slipped. Oh well. The Smithsonian, by the way, caved. Wojnarwicz's video has been taken down. But Herr Donahue is still demanding that funding for the museum be cut. If I could show it here, I would.
It is always almost chilling when The Roman Catholic Church (and let's not even begin with the pedophile scandal) cries about being "under attack," whines about "discrimination" …while they attack and discriminate and murder at will.
This man William Donahue should not be taken seriously. And yet "fair and balanced" has him on every news broadcast, making a publicity stink in the interests of his bigotry.
It's hard not to consider "second amendment remedies", ya know?
Hide/Seek is one of the most important, most ground-breaking gay-and-Lesbian-friendly exhibits to appear in any museum anywhere in a long long time. That it is in The Smithsonian…our nation's own museum…is all the more important. If you can possibly make the journey to visit and support this exhibit (which, I repeat, is privately funded...no tax-payer money is even connected other than the fact that it is in a government-funded building.) This is a visual history of LGBT people in the most lyrical form. Our ancestors. Our history. Our sacred texts and prophets (I'm looking at you Walt!) The most valuable thing that can be stolen from a people is their history. That's what Herr Donahue is trying to do. Rewrite history. Erase us.
He is, fortunately, a dying breed of homophobic, sex-phobic, good-ol' boy bigot. He will fail. But not if we don't fight back. Go to this show. Buy the book. Know …AND RESPECT…your history.
A 304-page catalog titled Hide/Seek Difference and Desire in American Portraiture has been authored by the exhibition co-curators, David C. Ward, National Portrait Gallery historian, and Jonathan Katz, director of the doctoral program in visual studies, State University of New York at Buffalo. The catalog will be published by Smithsonian Books and distributed by Random House; it will be on sale for $45. It is the perfect holiday gift for any gay person in your life. Maybe even you.
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August 16, 2010 Editors	Leave a comment
Stephen Wayne Foster is almost a Native Floridian. Though born in Virginia in 1943, he moved with his family to Miami a year later and grew up in Miami Shores. Foster studied at Miami-Dade College and the University of Miami, where he received a Bachelor of Arts in English with a minor in History. Now retired, Foster lives in an apartment in Coral Gables that he first occupied in 1975, having lived through almost a century of South Florida gay history and culture.
When Foster was 17-years old and in high school, he discovered gay history. "I came across Sir Richard Francis Burton's [in picture, left] translation of the Arabian Nights from 1880 which included a very long article about the history of homosexuality. But for many years I didn't know where else to look for it [gay history]. In 1969 I went to Washington, D.C. I went to a newsstand and bought a copy of GAY, the Jack Nichols publication. I took the issue home with me and read an article by Dick Leitsch of New York Mattachine about gay history in which he said that nobody was writing about gay history and that there was a need for this. So I felt that if anybody was going to do it I should do it."
"At that time I was still a student at the University of Miami. So I took a notebook and a pen and I went into the student library and saw thousands of books before me and I didn't even know where to begin. But on the very first day I came across a book written a century ago called The History and Development of the Moral Ideas by Edward Westermarck. And this contained a long essay about gay history and anthropology and it formed the structure for all of my research after that."
"My mother died in 1970 and I moved away from home. And my father died in 1973. At some point I developed a habit of going down every Saturday to the University of Miami and spending the whole day at the Library doing research. I also went to the public libraries, to the medical library, the law library, every important library in Dade County and collected a vast amount of information. Eventually I gathered notes from at least 5,000 books."
Though Foster realized that he was gay when he was 13, he did not come out til 1969 when he first met other gay people and discovered Miami's "gay beach" on 21st Street and Collins Avenue. That was a time when the Miami Beach police ("real bastards" in Foster's opinion) used the laws as excuses to raid gay bars and make gay folks' lives miserable in so many ways. For this and other reasons, it took time for Miami gays to get organized. When activist Frank Arango came down from New York in 1972, Foster remembers, he Awas dismayed to find that there was no political base so he had to create one. Word got out and we met at the house of Barry Spawn," another local activist. Out of this meeting was born the Gay Activists Alliance of Miami (GAA-Miami).
According to Foster, GAA-Miami met at Spawn's home for a while before moving to the Center for Dialog, an activist group connected with Miami's St. John Lutheran Church that Foster dubbed "the center for all radical activity in Miami." (Miami's MCC also met at that Church.) Its founders, all white men (except Arango), formed the Executive Committee: "The president of the group was Bob Barry. The Vice President was Barry Spawn, I was the Treasurer and Bob Basker [best remembered for his later work with the Dade County Coalition for Human Rights] was Secretary. Frank Arango helped us out but I don't think he had a position. And the reason that they gave me the position of Treasurer is because I had to take the money of the organization and put it in my own private banking account under my own name since I was the only person they trusted with the money," he says.
One of Foster's achievements during his GAA-Miami days was the creation of South Florida's first LGBT
library. Foster approached the Rev. Don Olson, pastor of St. John's Lutheran Church, and "asked him if I could use the room on the second floor. Olson gave me the go-ahead. He put some shelving into a small room on the second floor of the Center for Dialog and I took my private collection of books and publications and put them there. But three weeks later he came to me and said that he was embarrassed if straight people might walk past the open door of the library and see that it contained gay material so he wanted me to keep the door shut. I felt very insulted by that and I took all the material and took it home. So the gay library was the first one that we had but it only lasted maybe three weeks." This was a year before Mark Silber founded the Stonewall Library.
In 1972 GAA-Miami filed a class action suit against Miami Beach that led to the overturn of that city's law against cross dressing. Foster contributed to this victory by providing GAA-Miami with incriminating information about the Miami Beach Police Department that he had collected. Later that year Foster and other GAA-Miami members joined other activists to protest both the Democratic and Republican conventions that were being held on Miami Beach. To accommodate all the protesters, the City of Miami Beach opened Flamingo Park and let the protesters camp there. "There was a special area off to one side in the Park that became the 'gay area,'" Foster adds, one that attracted its share of queer notables.
One of those notables who visited Flamingo Park was Dr. Frank Kameny, whom Foster had met previously through their mutual friend Bob Basker. Dr. Kameny came to Miami for the conventions and Foster joined
him on a tour of the Park. One of the colorful creatures Kameny encountered in the gay section was "a somewhat overweight gay teenage boy known as Corky. He was in the gay area of Flamingo Park and he was persuaded to put on some sort of outrageous costume, complete with feathers. And he paraded up and down and some tourists stopped by to take pictures of him. And all of a sudden Kameny showed up and said, 'Corky! What are you doing? You are giving homosexuality a bad name! Take off those feathers!' I thought that was priceless," he laughs.
Unfortunately, GAA-Miami did not long survive the 1972 conventions. As Foster recalls, "the thing that killed it was simply that people were showing up during the conventions and then when the conventions went away and the antiwar demonstrators went away and the whole thing died down and returned to normal then the people lost interest." Foster himself lost interest when he "got into an argument with a member of the Executive Committee and resigned. And I sent them their money that was in my account. And they took the money and sent out an emergency letter to all 250 people who were on their mailing list, asking them to show up for an emergency meeting so they can get the organization going again. And they [the EC] showed up at the meeting place and waited two hours and nobody showed up. Nobody!" By the end of 1973, GAA-Miami was history.
After Foster left GAA-Miami, he "was involved in the creation of a gay student group at the University of Miami," which was also short-lived. Unfortunately, in 1974 Foster developed a severe case of agoraphobia, which discouraged his participation in Miami's growing LGBT movement though of course he kept up with new developments. (Foster has since recovered from his agoraphobia.)
Foster's withdrawal from the political arena allowed him to return to his first love, gay history. By the late seventies, Foster had become a major contributor to the growing field of gay studies. Foster's "introduction as a gay historian" was an essay on Sir Richard Francis Burton. ["The Annotated Burton"] that appeared in the anthology The Gay Academic, edited by Louie Crew [ETC, 1978]. "At the same time I was helping Jonathan Ned Katz write his book Gay American History [Crowell, 1976]. I gave him very significant help." In his groundbreaking book, Katz gave credit to "Foster's inspired research assistance [which] led to the discovery of numbers of important documents." Through the years, Foster "helped many other gay scholars write their books. And my name is mentioned in at least thirty books, usually in the form of footnotes saying 'I wish to thank Stephen Foster for his help.' " Foster also contributed original essays and translations to the pioneer gay journal "Gay Sunshine."
Though Foster was never a member of the Gay Academic Union, he contributed to the GAU's periodical "The Cabirion," aka "Gay Books Bulletin" [1979-85]. Through the efforts of "Cabirion" editor Wayne Dynes, Foster contributed an article on gay communities for The Encyclopedia of Southern Culture [Edited by Charles Reagan Wilson and William Ferris, UNC, 1990]. Foster followed that achievement by writing, for the Dynes-edited Encyclopedia of Homosexuality [Garland, 1990], articles on such diverse topics as Adelswärd Fersen, Afghanistan, Sir Richard Burton, Ralph Chubb, Charles Fourier, Henry B. Fuller, Robert de Montesquieu, Pirates, Poetry, Travel and Exploration, Edward Perry Warren and Oscar Wilde. Though some of the other contributors to the Encyclopedia of Homosexuality used pseudonyms (which caused a bit of a controversy at that time), Foster is quick to assert that in this case, as "in all of my writing, I used my real name." All in all, Stephen Wayne Foster should be credited for some of the most notable contributions to our culture.
This is the second of a series of articles about the history of South Florida's LGBT community. The first one was a personal account of the Miami bar scene in 1974. I invite other veterans of South Florida's LGBT community in the 1970s and 1980s to share their experiences with us. You may reach me at jessemonteagudo@aol.com.
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Gay Historian Stuart Timmons Recovering, Will Help with Harry Hay Tribute
July 25, 2010 Editors	Leave a comment
You may remember Stuart Timmons as the co-author with Lillian
Faderman of the book Gay LA. As members of this listserv, you may also recall that about two and a half years ago, Stuart suffered a
massive stroke that left him at death's door for what seemed like a very long
time. White Crane was involved in raising the funds necessary for the additional therapy Stuart was going to need. We knew then it was going to be a long hard road to recovery.
So it is with no small amount of pride and joy we report that with the attention and loving care of his family, especially his
sister, Gay, and friends like as Mark Thompson – he's really made a remarkable
recovery! So much so that it looks like he's going to help with the
celebration of what would have been Harry Hay's 100th birthday. Nice to get
some good news!
Thompson, a member of the White Crane Advisory Board, and former editor at The
Advocate, sent this wonderful news about historian Stuart Timmons:
friends of author and community activist Stuart Timmons gathered last week
to celebrate his remarkable recovery from a major stroke two-and-a-half
years ago. Timmons, 53, is still wheelchair bound, but is now fully
mentally alert and with the ability to speak and move about with assistance.
He is expecting a return to his research and writing about GLBT
history and is especially delighted with the invitation
to participate in Centennial celebrations honoring the life and
work of gay movement founder Harry Hay.
two-day conference at City University New York and a major exhibition at the
San Francisco Public Library are in the planning stages, with other
cities soon to be included. Stuart wrote the award-winning biography on the
legendary gay rights leader, The
Trouble With Harry Hay, in 1990. Harry Hay was born on Easter
Sunday, April 7, 1912, in Worthing, England, although he lived many decades
of his life in Los Angeles.
Lee Mentley added:
is doing amazing well…, had a great lunch at "The Coffee Table" and he was
alert with full memory correcting us on our history and although speaking
slowly was participating in the conversation. Well on his way to full
recovery! He spoke with Joey Cain on the phone and will be on the planning
committee for the 100 Year Celebration for Harry Hay in San Francisco and
New York City. It was a joy to be with him!
of you gave support for Stuart's recovery, so we wanted to let you know
that it was money well spent. Stuart Timmons is a walking library of
GLBT history and of Harry Hay and John Burnside in particular. We need
him and we need his genius.
in the photo are: (left to right) Mark Thompson, Stuart Timmons, Robert
Croonquist and HRH Lee Mentley.
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New from White Crane Books!
June 28, 2010 Editors	Leave a comment
..Queering the Text:
..Biblical,
Medieval,
..and Modern
Jewish Stories
By Andrew Ramer
….with an
Introduction by Jay Michaelson
….and Afterwords
by Rabbi Camille Shira Angel
....and Rabbi Dev Noily
….. ..More
….. ..Order
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Gay Wisdom – Today in Gay History
The man who might have been the first gay king of America was born in Berlin on this date. PRINCE HEINRICH OF PRUSSIA was the brother of Frederick the Great who tried to have him made King of America. The fledgling U.S. even considered it during the period ruling the Article of Confederation, but, by the time the fickle prince agreed, the equally fickle American public had opted for the Constitution and a republic. And now Donald Trump.
Félix Rubén García Sarmiento (d: 1916), known as RUBÉN DARÍO was born on this date. A Nicaraguan poet, Darío has had a great and lasting influence on 20th-century Spanish literature and journalism. He has been praised as the "Prince of Castilian Letters" and undisputed father of the modernismo literary movement.
In 2012, Arizona State University Libraries acquired a privately-held collection of manuscripts created by Nicaraguan poet Rubén Darío.
The comprehensive collection contains hundreds of pages of Darío's poetry and other creative works. Several of the manuscripts are signed transcripts, written in Darío's hand, of some of his most important works including "Coloquio de los Centauros," two versions of "Los motivos del lobo" and "Canto épico a las glorias de Chile," a manuscript of 76 pages, which was one of Darío's first long poems.
The documents have already begun to alter the scholarship on Darío. The peer-reviewed "Bulletin of Spanish Studies," a prestigious academic journal from the United Kingdom, has published an article by Professor Acereda in its August 2012 issue based on letters found in ASU's collection. The article, "'Nuestro más profundo y sublime secreto': Los amores transgresores entre Rubén Darío y Amado Nervo," ("Our Most Profound and Sublime Secret: The Transgressive Love of Ruben Dario and Amado Nervo") reveals for the first time a secret romantic relationship between Darío and famed Mexican poet Amado Nervo (1870-1919.)
"The exact nature of this relationship is evidenced in a series of intimate letters exchanged between the two poets and they help us to better understand the respective works of these modernist authors, as well as to establish a rereading of certain texts," Acereda said.
David W. Foster, Regents' Professor of Spanish and Women and Gender Studies at ASU, noted that "the acquisition of such a collection, which has the possibility of suggesting a major revision in our understanding of Rubén Darío's sexuality, is only possible through the efforts of outstanding senior faculty like Acereda, who have the advanced (and often anonymous) contacts necessary for such material to become part of ASU's superb research collections."
CARY GRANT was born in Bristol, England on this date. Famous for his roles in such film classics as Philadelphia Story, North By Northwest, To Catch A Thief, Bringing Up Baby and Notorious to name just a very few) he was rumored throughout his time in Hollywood to be either gay or bisexual.
The evidence is varied and plentiful. He shared a home with the actor Randolph Scott for more than twelve years. Rumors ran rampant at the time that Grant and Scott were lovers. In 1957, Grant's English chauffeur claimed to have been in a sexual relationship with Grant. Grant immediately filed a lawsuit against him. The driver attempted suicide. In their biographies of Grant, Marc Eliot, Charles Higham and Roy Moseley contend that Grant was bisexual. Higham and Moseley claim that Grant and Scott were seen kissing in a public car-park outside a social function both attended in the 1960s. In his book, Hollywood Gays, Boze Hadleigh cites an interview with homosexual director George Cukor, who commented on the alleged homosexual relationship between Scott and Grant: "Oh, Cary won't talk about it. At most, he'll say they did some wonderful pictures together. But Randolph will admit it – to a friend."
In his memoir, the Oscar winning screenwriter Arthur Laurents indicated that Grant was bisexual, saying: Grant "told me he threw pebbles at my window one night but was luckless – I wasn't home. ... his eyes and his smile implied that ... he would have liked doing what we would have done had I been home. William J. Mann's book Behind the Screen: How Gays and Lesbians Shaped Hollywood, 1910-1969 recounts how photographer Jerome Zerbe spent "three gay months" in the movie colony taking many photographs of Grant and Scott, "attesting to their involvement in the gay scene." Zerbe says that he often stayed with the two actors, "finding them both warm, charming, and happy.
On this date the actor, singer, comedian, and humanitarian DANNY KAYE was born in Brooklyn, New York. Famous for his roles in such film classics as The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (1947), Hans Christian Andersen (1952), and White Christmas (1954), in the 1950s he was in a 10 year long relationship with Lawrence Olivier. Although many of his biographers have attempted to refute the claim, Olivier's widow, Joan Plowright has confirmed it, stating, "I have always resented the comments that it was I who was the homewrecker of Larry's marriage to Vivien Leigh. Danny Kaye was attached to Larry far earlier than I."
REV. JAMES LEWIS STOLL, M.Div.a Unitarian Universalist minister, born (d: 1994). Stoll was the first ordained minister of any religion in the United States or Canada to come out as gay. He did so at the annual Continental Conference of Student Religious Liberals on September 5, 1969 in La Foret, Colorado.
Born in 1936 in Connecticut, he was educated at San Francisco State University and the Starr King School for the Ministry in Berkeley, CA. In the words of his friend, Leland Bond-upson, Mr. Stoll took a flat in the Eureka Valley neighborhood in San Francisco with three other friends. In September 1969, Mr. Stoll went to the La Foret Conference Center in Colorado Springs to attend a convention of about 100 college-age Unitarians. On the second or third night of the conference, Stoll got up to speak. He told the assembly that he'd been doing a lot of hard thinking that summer and that he could no longer live a lie.
He had been hiding his true nature—from everyone except his closest friends. "If the revolution we are in means anything, it means we have the right to be ourselves, without shame or fear." And then he told the group he was gay, and it wasn't a choice, and he wasn't ashamed anymore and he wasn't going to hide it anymore. From now on he was going to be himself in public.
He led the effort that convinced the Unitarian Universalist Association to pass the first-ever gay rights resolution in 1970. He founded the first counseling center for gays and lesbians in San Francisco. In the 1970s he established the first hospice on Maui. He was president of the San Francisco chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union in the 1990's. He died at the age of 58 from complications of heart and lung disease, exacerbated by obesity and a life-long smoking habit.
The bisexual English novelist, archaeologist and travel writer BRUCE CHATWIN was born in Sheffield England. Chatwin's book include the travelogue In Patagonia (1977), The Viceroy of Ouidah (1980), on the slave trade in Benin, For The Songlines, on the power of Australian aboriginal music and On the Black Hill a novel on the relationship of twin brothers in Wales.
In the late 1980s, Chatwin contracted AIDS. He was one of the first high-profile sufferers of the disease in Britain and although he hid the illness - passing off his symptoms as fungal infections or the effects of the bite of a Chinese bat, a typically exotic cover story - it was a poorly kept secret. He did not respond well to AZT, and suffered increasing bouts of psychosis which included extravagant shopping trips around the auction rooms of London - many of which purchases his wife quietly returned.
With his condition deteriorating rapidly, Chatwin and his wife went to live in the South of France at the house that belonged to the mother of his one-time lover, the designer Jasper Conran. Chatwin died in Nice in 1989 at age 48.
The novelist Paul Theroux, Chatwin's one-time friend and fellow-writer, later commented on the memorial service in a piece he wrote for Granta, condemning Chatwin for failing to acknowledge that the disease he was dying of was AIDS. Lovers of the little black moleskin journals have undoubtedly read the story of Chatwin's popularizing of the books. The story goes that when the small bookmaker in Paris was going out of business, Chatwin bought out all of their stock to use on his travels.
Pierre Clermont, better known by his ring name PAT PATTERSON, is a Canadian former wrestler born on this date (d: 2020); He works for WWE as a "creative" consultant. He was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in 1996. He is credited by WWE as the first Intercontinental Champion.
Pat Patterson debuted in Montreal, Quebec in 1958 as "Pretty Boy" Pat Patterson, an effeminate wrestler who wore red lipstick and pink trunks and was accompanied by his pet poodle. Patterson wrestled frequently for affiliates of the National Wrestling Alliance throughout the 1960s, and was a ten time tag team champion in San Francisco with a variety of partners. His most famous pairing was with Ray Stevens, the two of them forming the heel tag team, the Blond Bombers. Also, in San Francisco, Patterson was a six-time United States Champion.
In 1970 and 1971, Patterson wore a mask during his matches, and would cheat by placing a foreign object under the mask to add power to his head butts. In 1972, Patterson turned baby-face, after feuding with Lars Anderson, who was managed by Dr. Ken Ramey. Later that year he teamed with Rocky Johnson and won the tag team championship. In 1975 and 1981, Patterson won the Cow Palace Battle Royal in San Francisco. In 1992, Patterson was accused of sexual harassment by former ring announcer Murray Hodgson. He was released from the company until the charges were dropped, when he was promptly rehired.
Patterson came out in 2008. He had been in the closet for over 50 years. His life partner, now deceased, Louis Dondero was on payroll with WWF for a while as a "counselor."
The Chilean journalist JUAN MANUEL ASTORGA was born today. Astorga is a major media personality having hosted radio, television and cable shows in his long and storied career.
In 2008, Astorga gave an interview to Caras magazine, which published its homosexuality . He chose to disclose his sexuality before he was outed by an attorney who was a member of the Fascist-connected Catholic order Opus Dei. The attorney attempted to extort money from Astorga by threatening to out him. Astorga beat him to the punch.
The Movement for Homosexual Integration and Liberation of Chile supported Astorga and condemned this kind of blackmail.
American poet, librettist and translator CHESTER KALLMAN died on this date (b. 1921) He is best known for his collaborations with W.H. Auden and Igor Stravinsky. Kallman studied at Brooklyn college and at the University of Michigan. In the 1950's he and the poet Harold Norse attended a reading given by W.H. Auden and Christopher Isherwood. The two had plans to seduce the British writers. Kallman and Auden hit it off. They stayed together for thirty-five years. Although at times a tempestous relationship, they were steadfast to one another to the end.
On this date the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday was officially designated and is now observed in all 50 United States. It would have happened sooner but Arizona being Arizona resisted the celebration.
On this date the RIGHT REVEREND GENE ROBINSON, the bishop of New Hampshire, and the first openly gay bishop of any denomination opened the inaugural festivities of Barack Obama's presidency when he gave the opening prayer at the Lincoln Monument. HBO, which had paid for exclusive rights to the event did not broadcast Bishop Robinson's prayer. So those watching the event live or later in replay would never have known it had occurred. Curiously, National Public Radio chose not to air the prayer live either. Of course in light of recent political developments this seems like small potatoes. But it was an issue at the time.
There was no record of Bishop Robinson or his prayer in images placed on the sites of Getty Images, the New York Times and the Washington Post. Very curious indeed.
After some lame excuses HBO later aired a complete version of the afternoon's proceedings with Bishop Robinson's prayer included. No good excuse was ever given by the inaugural committee. On an added note the Gay Men's Chorus of Washington also performed at the event but there was no chyron to identify the group performing (perhaps to not upset any viewers out there). A disappointing day of sorts.
In April 2009, Robinson made the OUT magazine Third Annual Power 50 list of the most influential gay men and women in the USA, landing at number 7.
In August 2009, Gene Robinson was a key speaker at the 2009 Greenbelt Festival, held in Gloucestershire, England. Here he delivered three talks, each garnering an attendance in the thousands, based not only on his views of Christianity and homosexuality, but also on human sexuality in general and the rights of LGBT members of society. The three talks were entitled "Homosexuality: What the Bible Says & Why It Matters", "Keeping your cool in the eye of the storm" and "Sexuality and spirituality: keeping them together". As well as these three talks, Gene Robinson made a big impact on some gay and lesbian festival-goers by leading them collectively in prayer on the second night of the festival as part of a small group. Robinson has retired and his latest book God Believes in Love: Straight Talk about Gay Marriage.
Undercover cops are working Dubai's chat rooms to bust gay men for trying to hookup online. The National reports that one 22 year old man is charged with prostitution, consensual homosexual sex, producing pornographic material, cross-dressing and insulting religion, while the second, an 18-year-old student, is facing prostitution charges. Homosexuality is illegal in the United Arab Emirates, and if found guilty both face a minimum of three and a maximum of 15 years in prison.