Gay Icons and History: October 2010
Happy Halloween, my lovely friends
Filed by Gloria Brame, Ph.D. | October 30, 2010 4:00 PM |via cuteoverload.com Thought I'd spread a little puggish holiday cuteness and use this opportunity to tell readers (and editors and colleagues!) just how much I love you guys, and how very deeply honored I feel that I get to...Read More
Time Magazine, 1979: Gay history memorabilia
Filed by Gloria Brame, Ph.D. | October 29, 2010 10:30 AM |Does anyone remember this piece or cover? It's stunningly sad that the same cover could probably still run today, 31 years later, and some people would think the question is fresh and want to debate the point. But is there...Read More
Sweet and Silly Soldiers: 1930s photo
Filed by Gloria Brame, Ph.D. | October 28, 2010 11:30 AM |A delightful pre-World War two shot of a group of young German soldiers having fun with fig leaves....Read More
Let's Have A Toga Party! 1962 Halloween photo
Filed by Gloria Brame, Ph.D. | October 27, 2010 2:30 PM |Amazing private photos (from an estate listed on eBay) of a gay/drag costume part in 1962! In those days, prints were dated when they were developed (not shot), so this was probably a Halloween hoe-down. And what a night it...Read More
Grim Remembrance: Gay Nazi prisoners photo
Filed by Gloria Brame, Ph.D. | October 26, 2010 4:30 PM |My parents were Holocaust Survivors (Polish Jews), so any and all material about that episode in human history always catches my eye. This image popped up on my radar the other day, showing gay prisoners at Sachsenhausen. It is one...Read More
Lovers or Goofballs? Vintage dancing men
Filed by Gloria Brame, Ph.D. | October 25, 2010 9:30 AM |I keep finding strange private shots of men dancing, which is lovely. What would be even lovelier if is if I had a clue about what's going on. Unfortunately, about 90% of the stuff I post on Bilerico comes out...Read More
Lingerie Lady Love: Vintage lesbian fetish erotica
Filed by Gloria Brame, Ph.D. | October 23, 2010 4:00 PM |Possibly a little hardcore for the gentle Projectors, but so unusual I thought it had to be shared. Photo is from ca. 1930s, and part of a series of 1920s-1930s amateur porn photos I recently located, showing playful, frisky, happy...Read More
When Past Meets Present
Filed by Bil Browning | October 23, 2010 10:00 AM |Dr. Franklin Kameny, World War II veteran and lifelong civil rights activist, with West Point grad and former U.S. Army infantryman Dan Choi. The two activists seeking repeal of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" joined forces at the Smithsonian's National Museum...Read More
Adding The Voices Of Our Elders
Filed by D Gregory Smith | October 22, 2010 11:30 AM |I've worked with, lived with and am proud to have friends who are my LGBT elders. I love their voices of experience, of self-knowledge and humor. I also love the stories of desperate survival in societies and situations well beyond...Read More
Hard-Working Women: Depression-era photo
Filed by Gloria Brame, Ph.D. | October 21, 2010 11:30 AM |As always with vintage/antique photos, impossible to know whether people are what they seem to a contemporary eye. They could be a trans/lesbian couple; or they could be sisters or friends who performed manual labor. Either way, I think they...Read More
Stone Hot Butch: antique photo
Filed by Gloria Brame, Ph.D. | October 20, 2010 2:30 PM |Love this photo (and that suit!), and the look on his face -- a little shy and very intelligent. Seems to be early 20th century, possibly as late as the 1920s or 1930s....Read More
Last gay Nazi survivor speaks
Filed by Bil Browning | October 20, 2010 12:30 PM |This is a fascinating bit of LGBT history. Rudolf Brazda, the last gay survivor of the Nazi concentration camps, spoke with reporters recently and gives a personal glimpse into what it was like to wear the pink triangle. For all...Read More
Butch and Femme: 1932 photo by Brassai
Filed by Gloria Brame, Ph.D. | October 19, 2010 4:30 PM |Classic 1932 photo by the great Parisian photographer, Georges Brassai, of a lesbian couple at the infamous "Le Monocle," owned by Lulu of Montparnasse....Read More
Gender Play Party: Antique photo
Filed by Gloria Brame, Ph.D. | October 15, 2010 10:30 AM |I have no idea what's going on here. Could be a costume party but judging by some of the chaps in the back row, it certainly seems like they feel altogether at home in their garb. Not sure why the...Read More
The Castro: historic photo
Filed by Gloria Brame, Ph.D. | October 13, 2010 2:30 PM |An amazing, poignant and joyous photo of the 1979 Castro Street Fair, in those halycon pre-AIDS days when the cry rang out for Gay Liberation. I did not attend but, oh, I remember and, oh, how inspiring they were to...Read More
Queer Dog Indeed: antique photo
Filed by Gloria Brame, Ph.D. | October 12, 2010 4:30 PM |Just too cute not to share this late 19th/very early 20th postcard. Of course, queer had a very different connotation back then, but, gee, I kind of wish I could get this in a bumper sticker....Read More
1960s Gay Intellectual Life: Vintage magazine
Filed by Gloria Brame, Ph.D. | October 11, 2010 10:00 AM |Sometimes I think people today imagine that all of gay theory, activism and political debate didn't begin until Stonewall (or maybe even the Interrnet -- agh!). But, hard as it may seem to believe, your grandparents' and their grandparents' were...Read More
LGBT History Discovery: 1921 Memoir of Earl Lind
Filed by Gloria Brame, Ph.D. | October 09, 2010 12:00 PM |Very happy to share this fascinating piece of news, just announced on OutHistory.org. (via Transgender Memoir of 1921 Found) Five sections of the lost, third volume of memoirs by the pseudonymous individual who called himself Earl Lind, Ralph Werther, and...Read More
Beach Blanket Lesbian Bingo: Pulp cover
Filed by Gloria Brame, Ph.D. | October 08, 2010 10:30 AM |OK, here's my question: why would anyone want to escape? Looks like fun in the sun to me....Read More
A little known legacy in the LGBT community
Filed by Guest Blogger | October 08, 2010 8:30 AM |Editors' Note: Guest blogger Andy Szekeres is a political consultant from Denver who specializes on LGBT ballot measures and progressive candidates and causes. Americans for Democratic Action has been one of the most powerful forces in all liberal politics. For...Read More
Hot Bodies in Blind Alleys: Gay Pulp
Filed by Gloria Brame, Ph.D. | October 07, 2010 11:30 AM |Are they trapped behind chicken-wire? Is the guy on the right a robot? How does realism trap a person? Is this a psychological drama or a story about sex in an alley? What? Huh? "Anonymous" has a lot of explaining...Read More
LGBT History -- Theater Pioneer George Birimisa
Filed by Patricia Nell Warren | October 07, 2010 8:30 AM |Birimisa: Portraits, Plays, Perversions: The Work of George Birimisa, edited by Lanny Baugniet and Paul Sagan (Sweetheart Press, 2009). Our annual history month always brings out the faction that believes our real history started in 1969 with Stonewall -- that...Read More
