Hey guys!
Today’s post is one I have been working on for a while. While I do not remember ALL the places I found all these older photos, I would like to openly THANK all those people who posted them to various websites in the first place, should they happen to find themselves visiting my site. I truly think it is important to learn our history. We tend to get caught up in all our own drama and that crazy thing called LIFE but remembering that the others before us made our way of life possible. I do think that we have a long way to go to ensure that LGBTQ are able to be our genuine selves EVERYWHERE! However, on the way we should also remember and appreciate the struggle of those who came before us.
WAY back when I lived in San Francisco, I enrolled in some classes at the City College of San Francisco. Coming from a very small town, I was SHOCKED, AMAZED and DELIGHTED to see that they had a bunch of different classes in the Humanities Department that were centered around LGBTQ Studies. I think I took every one of them. They were so educational, and it was SO refreshing and freeing to be in a classroom full of people from all walks of life who were genuinely interested in learning about LGBTQ issues. Most, but not all, of the students identified somewhere in the LGBTQ spectrum… Yes, there were some straight people in the classes as well. I always loved it when we were talking about something that was considered by some to be “risqué” – you know like some sort of sexual fetish that even I, being a gay man, had never even heard of. I would watch the faces of the known straight students to see if I could see their reaction. Usually, they were cool with everything – and even joined in the conversations. One day in one of my classes we got on the topic of “Fisting”. I knew very little about it, but quickly learned MUCH more than I expected or really needed too, lol. There were a few classmates who were, shall we say, VERY knowledgeable about the topic. I am not one to judge ANYONES sexual escapades… and I always say, “Don’t Yuck My Yum!” which basically means, it may not be something that YOU would do, but don’t judge me if I do it.
San Francisco was the first and ONLY place where I have ever seen so much acceptance and freedom for people to be who they ARE and WANT to be. It took me a while to adjust to that once moving there, but I was able to “blossom” a little more than I would have if I lived back in the Midwest. I sadly moved away from the San Francisco area too soon before I was able to experience everything that I wanted to experience. I realize now that I totally took that freedom for granted. I would LOVE to be able to move back to San Francisco to finish what I started!
ANYWAY, where I was going with this, before I got sidetracked reminiscing, was that in one of my gay studies classes, we to a field trip to the GLBT Historical Society Museum. It was incredible and very eye-opening!!! If any of you get a chance to experience it, I HIGHLY recommend it! You can get an idea of what they have by visiting their website at: https://www.glbthistory.org/ Well, part of my tour included going through archive materials that included magazines from the golden years before porn magazines became popular. They were sold and marketed as “body building” magazines with fit, buff, handsome male models, sometimes they were naked, but not always. They always had a section in the back of the magazine where people would place classified ads. Kinda like a VERY early version of “hook-up” apps of today. I was amazed that someone would:
1. Write a personal ad.
2. Mail it to the magazine which was usually only published one a month.
3. Wait for the magazine to be published, hoping that your ad has made it into the magazine.
4. Wait some more for someone to respond – BY MAIL. People would not list their phone numbers – for obvious reasons.
That seems like SO much work just to meet someone!!! But for people who came from small towns, like me, where there were no gay bars or where you did not know if there were any other like-minded people in your area it was one of the limited ways to “get some” or perhaps meet the love of your life. I know that a lot of you probably had similar experiences. Remind me to tell you MY story about being gay in a SMALL town in the middle of nowhere…
That brings me to today’s post…
I have been seeing a lot of older photos, some porn, some not, but I thought that I would put together a post featuring these photos. Some of the more seasoned visitors to the blog may recognize some of the photos from their past. Some of the younger visitors to the blog, in my opinion, NEED to know how difficult it was for GLBT people at times. I thought this could be my way of helping to weave the two sides (older and younger) together. Or at the very least teach somebody something they did not know before.
I see some of these photos and wonder “what ever happened to them?” I am sure there are great stories out there… some tragic, some romantic, ALL important!
I would love to hear your thoughts on this post. Please share a comment or you can also confidentially e-mail me a message boyohboi@gmail.com if you don’t want to share it with everyone. I am truly interested in what you think.
I hope you enjoyed my little story and I really hope you enjoy some of the photos below…
Cheers,
Jason
