Author Archives: Kevin Allen

YYC Pride Roundup

Phew. Queer history was popular during Calgary Pride 2024!

The Calgary Gay History Project was featured in The Scene (twice) and on CityTV. A couple of podcasts dropped featuring interviews with Kevin Allen: Late in ’88 and Passing Time With Craig.

To round things out, we hosted gay history walks, a book signing at the Pride Festival, and Pride at Shelf Life Books, which featured history, poetry, and drag.

Pride at Shelf Life Books: Kevin Allen, Dogiichow, Osmo Cis, Skylar Kay and Bret Crowle on Sept 4, 2024.

If you missed the sold-out Involve: Stonewall & Carousel event last year, Lawrence Interior Design, just released a video which documents the conversation between Jason Brooks, Martin Boyce and Lois Szabo.

Martin Boyce and Lois Szabo in conversation at Involve: Stonewall & Carousel

Finally, until September 23rd, catch the pop-up exhibition about the LGBT Purge at the Central Library. The Canadian government investigated thousands of 2SLGBTQI+ employees, military personnel, and members of the RCMP during the Cold War. Many of these employees and personnel were forced to resign, ruining lives and careers. But they fought back, and survivors won a major class action lawsuit against the government in 2018. The exhibition “Love in a Dangerous Time” is an appetizer for the Canadian Museum of Human Rights’s large-scale museum show in Winnipeg next year.

David Robert Van Norman forced to resign from the RCMP after being labelled homosexual in 1964. Photo: Elenore Sturko.

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The YYCGayHistory Collection Launches

It is with delight, wonderment, and gratitude that we announce the launch of the Calgary Gay History Project Collection at the University of Calgary Archives.

Image by Andy Nichols, 2024, University of Calgary Archives Photographs, Libraries and Cultural Resources.

This now publicly accessible collection consists of published material, photographs, audiovisual material, ephemera, and other material related to the Calgary Gay History Project. This includes magazines, business directories and informational brochures, material from sporting events such as Western Cup, Outgames, and gay rodeos, show logs and audio recordings of radio shows, material from theatrical events such as Fairy Tales Film Festival and Third Street Theatre performances, as well as other 2SLGBTQ+ issues and concerns.

Dr. William Bridel, Archivist Kim Geraldi, and the Calgary Gay History Project’s Kevin Allen exploring the collection. Image by Andy Nichols, 2024.

The collection has been gathered from many community organizations and donors, including: Calgary Outlink, Calgary Pride, Kevin Allen, Stevie Lee Anderson, Jonathan Brower, Kelly Ernst, Matt Gillespie, Richard Gregory, Robert Lawrence, Terry MacKenzie and Kenneth Peach, Neil McMullen, Nancy Miller, Judy Moore, Pam Rocker, Gene Rodman, Joey Sayer, Michael Wright, and several anonymous donors.

Pride Flag with historic buttons donated by Richard Gregory. Image by Andy Nichols, 2024.

We thank all the donors to the collection who entrusted us with their materials over the past decade. We are grateful to Dr. William Bridel, a professor at the U of C (and queer historian himself) who facilitated the transfer of materials from Kevin Allen’s overloaded condo to the University. Finally, we thank archivist Kim Geraldi, who handled our collection so enthusiastically and tenderly.

William, Kevin and Kim looking at early Fairy Tales Film Festival Posters. Image by Andy Nichols, 2024.

A launch party for the Calgary Gay History Project collection is tentatively being planned for October. Our Past Matters—now future generations of researchers can explore queer Calgary’s storied past!

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Our Past Matters at Calgary Pride

In celebration of Calgary Pride 2024, we’re giving away a copy of Our Past Matters. Find it, in one of the inner city Little Free Libraries. {Maybe leave a book for someone else, while you are there!}

Look for Our Past Matters this weekend!

Kevin will be doing a book signing from 2-3 PM at the Pride Festival in Prince’s Island Park on Sunday, September 1st, hosted by Calgary Pride at their marketplace booth. Come by and chat about queer history. Book sales support the festival and Calgary Pride.

Finally, Celebrate Pride 2024 at Shelf Life Books on September 4th with a fun-filled extravaganza of local talent including drag performances by Dogiichow & Osmo Cis, literary readings by Skylar Kay and Bret Crowle, hosted by Kevin Allen.

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