Angels of Light, titledFemme Fatale: The Shocking Pink Life of Jayne Champagne, which opened at the Montgomery Playhouse. The first lesbian organization in North America, theDaughters ofBilitis (DOB), was founded in San Francisco on October 19, 1955 by four lesbian couples, including Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon. The following year, the group began publishingTheLadder, a monthly magazine that ran from 1956 to 1972. The first national lesbian convention, organized by the DOB, took place in San Francisco in May 1960. The Mattachine Society, the early homophile organization formed in 1950 by Harry Hay in Los Angeles, moved its headquarters to San Francisco in 1956, with Hal Call as president. In 1955, Call cofounded Pan-Graphic Press, which publishedThe Mattachine Review, The Ladder, and other homophile publications. He also founded Dorian Book Service, a gay and lesbian literature clearinghouse. One of the few gay men who spoke publicly about gay issues, Call frequently appeared on local television programs in the 1950s. In 1967, Call founded the Adonis Bookstore, the first gay bookstore in the U.S., in the Tenderloin, just months before New York’s Oscar Wilde Bookstore opened. The Adonis Bookstore, one of the first places to show pornographic gay films, continued until Call’s death in 2000 at the age of 83. On September 6, 1957, Allen Ginsberg, author of Howl, and Lawrence Ferlinghetti, poet and owner of City Lights Bookstore, were unsuccessfully tried on charges of selling obscene literature because of Howl’s descriptions of male homosexuality. Ginsberg had moved to the city in the early 1950s armed with a letter of introduction to Kenneth Rexroth, figurehead of the San Francisco Renaissance, who introduced him to the city’s poetry scene. Also, it was in San Francisco, in 1954, that Ginsberg met his life partner, Peter Orlovsky. 1961 was a banner year: Guy Strait startedLeague for Civil Education(LCE) to organize a gay vote in San Francisco and began publishing the first gay newspaper, distributingLCENews free in bars. Louis Randall Hogan, later famous for The Gay Cookbook, publishedThe Gay Detectiveusing the pseudonym “Lou Rand.” The novel provided a loosely fictionalized guided tour of postwar places and personalities, and was republished in 1965 as Rough Trade. José Sarria, a flamboyant, charismatic, and immensely popular waiter and drag performer at the Black Cat, kicked off his 1961 campaign for San Francisco Supervisor, becoming the first openly gay man to run for public office, and receiving 5,600 votes. “The Rejected,” the first television documentary on homosexuality, was broadcast by KQED on September 11, 1961. Originally titled “The Gay Ones” and later syndicated to NET stations, the sixty-minute program featured legal, medical, and religious experts discussing this “social problem.” Considered the first gay business association in the U.S., the Tavern Guildwas formed in 1962 by proprietors and employees of several gay bars in response to rising tensions between the police and gay people. This coalition helped unify and protect bars and bartenders by fixing drink prices, developing a phone network to track police raids, and setting up funds for members who were unemployed, and also organized fundraisers and charity events. March–April 2024 25 Two Gift Subscriptions For the Price of One! Use the envelope in the centerfold Or call 847-504-8893 Find us on-line at www.GLReview.org Use Code: 2for1
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