Author: lsmith13

Citations and Sources

Posted on by lsmith13

Gay Community Center, Issuing Body. “Seattle Gay News.” (Seattle, Washington), 1976.

Hill, Chrystie. “Queer History in Seattle, Part 2: After Stonewall.” Queer History in Seattle, Part 2: After Stonewall, November 28, 2003. https://www.historylink.org/file/4266

Mckenna, Kevin, and Michael Aguirre. A brief history of LGBTQ activism in Seattle – seattle civil rights and labor history project. Seattle Civil Rights & Labor History . Accessed March 18, 2022. https://depts.washington.edu/civilr/lgbtq_history.htm.

“1980s – 90s · Queen City Comes out: Exploring Seattle’s Lesbian and Gay History · Outhistory: It’s about Time.” outhistory.org. Accessed March 18, 2022. https://outhistory.org/exhibits/show/queen-city-comes-out/challenges-triumphs/1980s-90s.

Millman, Zosha. “Exploring Capitol Hill’s Oldest Gay Bars, and Their Future.” seattlepi.com. Seattle Post-Intelligencer, September 14, 2017. https://www.seattlepi.com/seattlenews/article/Exploring-Capitol-Hill-s-oldest-gay-bars-and-12180702.php.

 

Partial transcription of interview audio

Posted on by lsmith13

Lilly: What was your coming out experience like? 

John: Well… its, it was actually pretty easy. It didn’t happen until about 1988 so it uh wasn’t bad because I had moved to Seattle by that time, so I was surrounded by people who were really open minded and accepting. I had met some other gay people at that point so uh it wasn’t terrible ya know it happened pretty smoothly. I mean of course there was denial at the time (laughter) I think I was bi for about a week (laughter) if even that long and then it was just ya know yeah okay I’m gay.  So, it didn’t take very long after I moved to Seattle, so and yeah like I said it was.. It was pretty easy once it happened. It wasn’t a great time to come out cause it was the late 80s.. So, it was the height of the AIDS epidemic and ya know things were bad. Gay people were getting fingers pointed at them for a lot of things (laughter) at that point. So, um it was kind of mixed, the coming out was easy but it wasn’t exactly the best time to do it so… 

Lilly: Did you experience a lot of back-lash from that at all?  

John: No, not personally. Like people I had known for years that I had known as a teenager and stuff they were all kind of like “Well we kind of already knew that” and I was like “Well why didn’t you just say so ya know (laughs) did you have to make silly jokes couldn’t you have just said just be gay. But anyways ya know…  

Lilly: Did you know, like did part of you know when you were younger? 

John: Well I.. I mean I knew after a point growing up. I definitely did not have words for it when I was younger, and I definitely didn’t know.. I knew I was different in a lot of ways anyway. Cause I was.. Really smart and kind of… very introverted, so I got picked on a lot when I was a kid at school. Thankfully my folks helped me with things like that ya know and taught me valuable lessons like words have no power unless you give it to them. Ya know and so ya know I think that’s where I developed my humor defense, ya know I make inappropriate jokes about anything if I feel uncomfortable (laughs) that’s just how I am. 

Time 9:10-18:20 

Lilly: What was the gay community in Seattle like at that time, in the 80s-90s? 

John: Oh boy, that’s a good question (laughter) Umm it was pretty well established uh so uh it was and I’m sure that in larger urban areas it’s still this way, but it was the gay community it was very cliquey and so um, but uh it was interesting because it was a time when people were a lot more politically active than they are now. And so, there was a lot more going on, and we were still fighting for basic civil rights like the ability to work (laughter) and things like that just to even be recognized as people. So, it was an interesting time.  

Lilly: Were you active in that part of the community? 

John: Um well other than paying attention to what was going on and making sure I voted for the right people, no. The only time I ever actively protested, and everything was when a guy named Lon Mavon who tried to enact.. he came up from Oregon actually to Washington and was trying  to enact a bunch of anti-abortion laws and anti-LGBTor anti-LGB laws there was no T at the time (laughs) we were still just three initials. Anyway, and uh so we protested outside the church eh was speaking at uh and there ended up being another protest and uh that was it. He ended up not getting anywhere politically in Washington and so he never came back. And so that was fun.. That was fun (laughter) 

Lilly: What brought you to Eugene? 

John: Oh uh work again actually. I had gotten laid off in Seattle, had to go to school for a year to get a piece of paper that said I could do the job I had been doing for twenty years. (laughter) and when that was all over with the job market in Seattle was really competitive and most people getting hired were a lot younger than I was and my friend Walter was living here in Eugene and had been for a little while and he said I could stay with him and look for work here and so that’s what bought me to Eugene, was free room and board. (laughter) 

Lilly: What has your community in Eugene been like? 

John: Ohh.. not bad. It took me a little while to establish, cause I only had one friend here when I first moved here and uh so it took me a while to get used to that. Because most of the time.. Most of the friends I had met in my life, I had met either incidentally or through other people. And so it was, I was, being an introvert anyways ya know I was not the most social person when I moved here. So, it took a while to build but it happened (laughter) and it’s been pretty good.  Ya know I’m not really active in the gay community or anything here of course there isn’t really, I haven’t really noticed that there is any real gay community here. Ya know there are gay businesses and the gay bars and stuff but unless it’s ya know the festival once a year you don’t really see the gay community out doing things.  

Lilly: Less activity? 

John: Yeah.   

Lilly: What has your experience working with the HIV alliance been like and what brought you to being involved with that? 

John: Oh wonderful actually, I love the HIV alliance. And I was there in the first place because I am a client um and that’s what got me in the door. But then After I quit working here in Eugene, I started volunteering with them and uh I’ve been doing it ever since. So, I mostly work on a client advisory committee I helped to start a little over 11 years ago and I’ve been working on that ever since. Its fun, I like it. Its not as active as it used to be because we don’t have the event planning and stuff going on that we did ya know people just aren’t socializing (laughter). 

Lilly: Is that a difference from pre-pandemic? 

John: Yeah (laughter) yeah but I still, I’ve been doing a newsletter with them for about ten years and I still do that all the time. Ya know we still have our monthly meetings and make sure the lines of communication are still there.  

Lilly: How do you feel.. the representation of the HIV community and the alliance, has evolved since you were younger compared to now? It’s a big question. 

John: Uhhm yeah well, I have only been in Eugene for 15 years, so I know the history of the alliance, but I don’t know the evolution of the alliance. The only thing that I’ve noticed is that it’s gotten a lot bigger in the last ten years. There’s a lot more people being served, uhh for some reason the HIV alliance of Lane County is now the HIV alliance of Wetsern Oregon, we take care of clients in every county accept two.. I think and plus we have some services over on the East side of the mountains also, so it’s gotten a lot bigger so. Which is a shame cause that means more people are getting HIV but at least these days it’s a manageable disease, it’s not a deaths sentence.  

Lilly: What was your experince like previously when it was more of an impactful diagnoses? Well not that its not impactful but- 

John: Right, well I think I uhh  know what you mean. What was my experience like? Well, when I first was diagnosed it was a death sentence so ya know he told me sometime in the next year that I would end up getting sick and dying and I didn’t and that was it. That was thirty years ago and Im still here. Um so it was weird (light laughter) It took a friend of mine and I and sitting in a park for several hours to try and convince myself I wasn’t going to croak. And as far as how it’s changed these days, these days like I said earlier, it’s just a manageable disease now. It’s not a death sentence, as long as people um take care of themselves, and they take their medications and keep the virus suppressed it’s not any worse than anything else. It’s still a very individual thing and each person is going to react to the virus differently it’s just not something that’s going to kill you anymore (laughter). So that’s a good thing. There plenty, there’s lots of treatments, ya know we’ve gone from taking handful of pills three times a day to ya know you can take a shot once a month ya know there lots and lots of options and also ya know they discovered that you can’t transmit it to someone else if your viral load is undetectable so that’s a good thing.  

Lilly: Yeah. So, you came into the LGBTQ community kind of in the midst of that, uh how do you think that impacted your experience? How did the AIDS epidemic impact your experience? 

John: Ohh gosh well I suppose there was a lot of fear and trepidation around dating and meeting people and being physical. Ya know because at first we didn’t have a lot of information to go on and ya know even by the time I came out it wasn’t until after that um they started clarifying sexual activity into risk level and ya know letting people know ya know certain activities were okay and certain activities weren’t and um that type of thing. So, at first things were kind of muddled and you weren’t exactly sure what you could really do, and you might still end up with HIV (laughter) and so that was really rough and you just kind of had to take what information was there and forge ahead and hope for the best.  

Lilly: Difficult to navigate.  

John: Yeah, Yeah and eventually it became easier to navigate and that’s why nowadays they call it safer sex not safe sex (laughter). 

Time 20:40-23:00 

Lilly: What was that like for you? Having to figure things out on your own? 

John: Ohhh good question. Well I mean I suppose it was all a part of the adventure of coming out and ya know seeing all the different types of folks who were out there and what the atmosphere was like in the bars and stuff and ya know who are these gay people that I am now one of. (laughter) and so yeah it was different it was ya know at first it was a little overwhelming but then slowly but surely I got more comfortable but like I said the community could be very cliquey (laughter). 

Lilly: What was the bar scene like? 

John: Oh it wasn’t bad, it was good. Uh people were being real cautious so there weren’t all kinds of crazy antics going in dark corners of buildings and things like that. So ya know that was interesting, it was kind of- it was interesting because supposedly there wasn’t a lot of drug use but there really was (laughter). And so yeah there was an awful lot of sniffling in bathrooms I don’t know what that was about and a awful lot of people got colds in the middle of summer so yeah it was interesting um yeah. I don’t know it was uh.. I guess a good way to sum it up would be that it was exciting at least for me a twenty-something year old gay man who hadn’t been around gay people at all so yeah it was kind of exciting. Oh, and well I enjoyed uhh dancing anyway so I would go out to the dance bars (laughter). 

Lilly: Do you feel like there was something about like nightlife that facilitated that space for queer people? 

John: Well, that’s a good question, I suppose just being around a large group of like-minded people ya know there is strength in numbers, ya know you feel safe. Ya know it wasn’t you’d be outside out on the street and tried to catch a cab that you heard someone yell something nasty from across the street that you would go oh ya reality-bam! So, in that respect yeah it definitely lends to the idea of safety and comfort ya know you had a place you could be yourself.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

Living with HIV/ Seattle HIV History

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John’s was diagnosed with HIV in 1990 only a few years after coming out, amidst a near decade of social stigma surrounding the diagnosis. He remembers his early years engaging with the gay community to be confusing, with little knowledge on preventative safety practices. When discussing his coming out story, John states “It wasn’t a great time to come out cause it was the late 80s so it was the height of the AIDS epidemic. Things were bad ya know, gay people were getting fingers pointed at them for a lot of things.” John has now been living with HIV for over 30 years and has gone through a variety of treatment options. In our interview, he described the emotional side to his acceptance with his diagnosis and remembers spending hours in a park with a close friend working through the realities of his diagnoses. Today he has exceeded his doctors expectation by three decades and continues to receive successful treatment. In addition, he discussed the change in available treatment options and prevention options available for people today in comparison to the early years of his diagnosis. ” We’ve gone from taking a handful of pills three times a day to taking a shot once a month, ya know there is lots and lots of options.”  

Between the lack of available knowledge for safety protocol, the limited treatment options, and the backlash of misinformation and demonization of the queer community, the AIDS epidemic shaped a complex set of challenges for the LGBTQ community. Seattle had its first reported case in 1982 and had lost 3,500 lives by the year 2000. Seattle was, however, at the forefront of recognizing and addressing the epidemic. As early as 1983, Seattle’s city council had commissioned funds to go to HIV/AIDS research. Continuing throughout the 1980s, Seattle had a variety of grassroots organizing working to create more resources for the HIV/AIDS community. These included the North West AIDS Foundation in the mid 1980s, People of Color Against AIDS Network in 1987, Seattle’s chapter of the nation-wide organization ACTUP in 1989, and the Bailey-Boushay hospice house in 1992. 

Although Seattle had several treatment facilities available for the AIDS and HIV community, John himself struggled to find proper treatment while in Seattle. In our interview, he addresses that he had a private practitioner which he received treatment through but struggled to find relevant assistance within the community. John credits the Eugene HIV alliance for helping him receive thorough care and for the efforts to give available care to the HIV and AIDS community through out Lane County.

 

Seattle Gay Nightlife History

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For John, moving to Seattle opened up an opportunity for him to find a community with other LGBTQ people and find spaces to freely express his identity. In our interview, John references his own lack of knowledge surrounding gay relationships while looking back on his sex education in school. He stated “It was always Dick and Jane but never Dick and Dick or Jane and Jane.” Like many queer communities, nightlife facilitated a space to explore his sexual identity during this time. The city had a hub of queer-centered bars which provided an arrangement of different environments to choose from. John named a few of his favorites to be the Brass Connections, a gay dance bar, Neighbors, a self-described “everyone” bar but, as John recalls, had a large gay customer base, R Place, which provided everything from dancing to pool tables, and occasionally the Seattle Eagle, which was a dive bar that catered to the leather kink community. He does explain how there was a level of separation within the gay and lesbian bar scene stating, “It wasn’t like there was some line in between the two groups or anything… but the girls did their things, and the guys did their thing, and you know, never the two shall meet, so to speak. We came together for parades and that sort of thing, but you didn’t see guys hanging out at the Wild Rose, and you wouldn’t really see women hanging out at the Seattle Eagle.”  John describes his time at the bars to be “exciting” being that he got to be around like minded people and explore his identity.

Bars and nightclubs have played an integral role in queer communities providing a space that allows queer expression and a level of safety from the outside world. Historically, nightlife has been functioned as a safe space for LGBTQ people to find a community and safely express their identities. Seattle’s nightlife scene has roots dating back to the 1890s. The Klondike gold rush made Seattle a destination for traveling workers and gave way to a tenderloin district that facilitated nightlife, gambling, and sex work for men on their way up the Western coast. The tenderloin, which is now known as Pioneer Square, would become the setting for queer nightlife for decades to follow, although it faced ups and downs of discriminatory legislation and law enforcement over the years. After the decline of the goldrush in the early 1900s, the city had escalated the criminalization of same-sex relations which continued through to the 1930s. Over this same time, the city experienced a massive influx of population as the city grew from under 4,000 to over 365,000 creating opportunities for new and diverse communities. When prohibition ended in 1933, the city gained several gay bars and clubs. These bars welcomed middle class gay and lesbians and were predominantly centered around the tenderloin district.

The second World War brought another downturn in Seattle’s gay nightlife as many of the gay men entered the military and many lesbian women entered the workforce. This continued with the suppression of queer people during the early Cold War Era which prompted the Lavender Scare. During this time homosexuality was seen as subversive behavior and was viewed as threat to American ideals.This was with the exception of the famous gay cabaret bar called The Garden of Allah which was open from 1946-1956. By the 1960s, gay nightlife was on the rise again. During this time bars and nightclubs were able to function safely by a system of bribery with the Seattle Police Department, which protected the clubs and patrons from police raids. This period ended with a public outing of the corrupt activity and trials of some participating officers.

In the following decades, Seattle emerged on the forefront of LGBTQ liberation. By 1973, the Seattle City Council passed the Fair Employment Practice Ordinance which gave gays and lesbians protection from workplace discrimination. Following shortly after, Washington repealed its anti-sodomy laws in 1976 and by 1977 the Seattle had announced its official “Gay Pride Week”. As the city pushed through more protective ordinance, the nightlife scene grew as well. The notable lesbian bar, the Wild Rose, which John mentions in his interview, opened in 1974. Even though the community was on the rise with support from city and state legislation, In 1978 an anti-gay and lesbian bill emerged called Initiative 13. Initiative 13 argued that gay and lesbian individuals were not considered a minority meaning they would not be granted anti-discriminatory rights. Luckily, this bill was not passed through with a voter rate of over 60% against the bill.

(Click on each photo to see larger image)

The photoset above shows three pages from a Seattle publication titled Gay News, published December 3rd 1982. In the papers you can see adds for bars, restaurants, events and local businesses. As well as a map of Seattle on the third page showing the addresses of gay bars and nightclubs in the area. One of John’s favorite bars, The Brass Connection is listed on Page 10.

Going into the 1980s the community experienced a shift with the rise of the AIDS epidemic, as the communities pushed forward community based treatment options for those living with HIV or AIDS. The Seattle queer community persevered. During this time, some of John’s favorite bars opened including the Seattle Eagle, R Place and the Brass Connection Lounge. Following through to the 1990s and into the 2000s, Seattle gay community and its nightlife scene continued to thrive.

The combination of queer nightlife and liberal politics, that created legal protections for LGBTQ people, enabled Seattle to become a destination for the queer community. Bars and nightclubs have been able to create spaces that blend the public and private spheres, enabling them to protect their patrons while providing a public space to socialize. This was relevant for John as he states that bars allowed him to explore the community. During our interview he laughed and said he was able to go into them and say “Okay.. who are these gay people that I am now one of?” This was something that he was previously unable to explore before his move to Seattle. The Capitol Hill neighborhood provided John not only with his favorite nightlife spots, but was also the location for yearly Pride events as the pride march would go up broadway and finish in Volunteer park which is on the North end of the district.