Did the chicago school ever record visits to gay bars

It's really our hope that this will encourage people to do the same for their cities, because I think it's a really important document to have. For years, de la Croix wrote a column in the gay papers called Chicago Whispers, which later became a book of the same name, where he'd interview people about bars from as far back as the Prohibition era of the s and '30s.

Alfie's, circa Karlin got the idea for the book while reminiscing with friends about the gay bars in Chicago. Before Stonewall, that didn't exist.

Chicago Gay History

Of course, when [Mayor Edward J. Kelly] came along and found out about it, he closed it down. Helen Highwater was seen there opening her purse for the first time. Kitty Sheons was a bar in the Rush Street area that supposedly required guys to wear coats and ties.

So it's really important to document that history. So when Rick called me, I thought maybe we could do that, but I didn't just want to do a list. Raids on lesbian and gay bars became more frequent, and thousands of women and men were arrested, both in the bars and on the streets, for being inmates of disorderly houses (a label the authorities applied to lesbian and gay bars) or for violating the municipal ordinance against cross-dressing.

K9 Club, circa s To cover the pre-Stonewall establishments, de la Croix had to do some digging through the archives. Green Mask Tearoom, circa s. He'd been the entertainment editor at various publications for 25 years, so he had a lot of knowledge about the local bar scene.

It was a speakeasy, and it did advertise in the paper. After I came out in I heard about bars in Chicago that were either gay bars or were gay bars only at night. To flesh out those stories, Karlin knew he needed to collaborate with another journalist on the project.

Blue Dahlia, circa A lot of the book's charm comes from funny stories from bar owners and regular customers, written in the style of Karlin's gossip columns going back towhere he kept readers up-to-date on the local drag queens and performers. I'd make up these characters and I'd write about them.

I wanted it to be more than that. He remembered the name of it, but he couldn't remember the address, and of course it was a speakeasy, so I couldn't look in the phone book.

Forgotten Chicago Discussion Group

There was no gay Catholic group, none of that stuff. Last Call Chicago documents the role gay bars — and played in the local LGBTQ+ community. Before he could write the story as a journalist, he had to prove that this speakeasy, the K9 Club, actually existed.

For a brief but wild time in the twenties and thirties, an openly gay culture thrived in Chicago—a period historians call the “Pansy Craze.” Nightclubs and cabarets drew crowds of. If you're really broke, head over to Berlin on Thursday night, where they have cent drinks and a dollar cover.

A new book by Rick Karlin and St Sukie de la Croix documents the Windy City's LGBTQ+ bar community going all the way back to Prohibition. Sure enough, he searched the paper and found old advertisements for the bar. I found this old writer [who] wrote books about anarchism in Chicago, and I said, 'What was the scuzziest newspaper in ?

By continuing to use our site, you agree to our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use. Along with vintage advertisements and detailed records of where the bars were located and when they were in operation, it documents personal stories from the people who found refuge and community with these businesses, many of whom died decades ago.