Tag Archives: Frank Kameny

Club Carousel’s Birthdate Found

Posted on March 14, 2024 by Kevin Allen | 1 comment

On the heels of the City of Calgary’s historic designation of Club Carousel, we discovered a remarkable NYC article written about the Club, six months after it opened.

It was titled Liberation Canadian Style and published in GAY, New York City’s third post-Stonewall gay newspaper. Started in December 1969 by Jack Nichols and Lige Clarke, GAY’s varied content featured articles written by some of the era’s most significant LGBT rights activists. In September 1970, author John Scarth reported on his trip to Calgary and his experience at the fledgling Club Carousel.

Sept. 28, 1970 issue of GAY. Source: https://www.houstonlgbthistory.org/

Scarth summarized the history of Club Carousel and described its opening night as Friday, March 20, 1970. Previously, we had only determined that it opened in March 1970, but not the specific date.

Another intriguing fact—new to us—was that renowned American Gay Activist Frank Kameny came to Calgary in 1968 to speak at the University. “If there’s a gay bar in this town, it’s gotta be at the bottom of that,” Kameny quipped about the Calgary Tower.

Scarth’s article about 1970’s Calgary is a time capsule for gay liberation. We include the entire piece here.

Club Carousel in NY Magazine Download

Finding new sources is a delight for historians. Enjoy—and Happy Birthday Club Carousel!

{Thank you to historian Maya Bilbao for letting us know about this article.}

{KA}

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Posted in Gay history

Tagged 1207, bisexual, Calgary, Club Carousel, Frank Kameny, gay, Gay history, gay liberation, Jack Nichols, John Scarth, lesbian, Lige Clarke, queer, transgender

CURED @ CUFF.Docs

Posted on November 25, 2020 by Kevin Allen | Leave a comment

Today the 8th Annual CUFF.Docs Documentary Film Festival opens and runs until December 1st. As per new pandemic restrictions the festival has moved completely online. If you like documentaries, this festival always delivers. Now they have a must-see film for queer history fans.

CURED takes viewers inside the campaign that led to a pivotal moment in the struggle for LGBTQ equality: the American Psychiatric Association’s 1973 decision to remove homosexuality from its list of mental illnesses. Combining eyewitness testimony with newly unearthed archival footage, the film reveals how a small group of impassioned activists achieved this unexpected victory.

“Suspenseful and furnishing a slam-dunk case about the landmark importance of this event, Cured is probably the best LGBTQ documentary of the year.” – Bay Area Reporter

Interestingly, there is a Calgary connection to this historical event. Rick Sullivan, a University of Calgary grad student and gay activist of the early 70s attempted a similar intervention. He met with local delegates to the American Psychological Association’s AGM to bring forward a motion to strike homosexuality as a mental illness from the DSM. The U of C delegates going to the convention declined to bring his motion forward. He says: “I remember being very stung by this at a personal as well as a political level.”

U of C Student and Calgary Gay Liberation Front co-founder Rick Sullivan in 1974

Brennan Tilley, CUFF’s lead film programmer says: “a common theme across many selections in CUFF.Docs this year is how stories are told and by whom. We have several films that feature subjects that define their own narrative. The inclusion of homosexuality in the DSM is an oft mentioned piece of history. What is rarely covered is how it came to be removed. The ultimate decision came four years after the Stonewall uprising. There is a stark contrast in the methods of these two events but they are closely tied stepping stones in the progress of LGBTQ rights. It is important to highlight how a landmark decision was reached through meetings, academic research, symposia, reviews, deliberations, and a vote. It also is much more entertaining than one might expect from a documentary about a scientific body altering a manual.”

An image from *CURED*: activists Barbara Gittings, Frank Kameny and Dr. Anonymous

{KA}

Gay is Good

Posted on December 10, 2015 by Kevin Allen | Leave a comment

Gay_is_Good The rallying cry of gay liberation throughout the 1970s, was in fact coined in 1968 by pre-Stonewall American gay rights activist Frank Kameny. Frequently found on placards and buttons, the slogan also made its way into famous liberation manifestos. Lesbian activist, Martha Shelley’s 1972 booklet, “Gay is Good” was, and still is, radical and explosive:

Look out, straights. Here comes the Gay Liberation Front, springing up like warts all over the bland face of Amerika, causing shudders of indigestion in the delicately balanced bowels of the movement.”

Gay is Good was heard in Canada also. The country’s first large scale political demonstration on Parliament Hill was on August 28, 1971. Despite the rain, over 100 activists marched and picketed. Toronto Gay Action’s Charlie Hill proclaimed Gay is Good during his historic speech in support of the “We Demand” brief submitted to the federal government a week prior.

Charlie Hill delivering demands in 1971. Click photo to see CBC footage of demonstration. Photo credit: Canadian Lesbian and Gay Archives.

Gay liberation made its way to Calgary in 1972 with the short-lived formation of a local chapter of the Gay Liberation Front. Calgary liberation activists mobilized around a more permanent organization in June 1976: the Gay Information Resource Centre (GIRC). In 1980 GIRC organized the first gay rights political demonstration in Alberta, with our very own “placard-waving homosexuals” on the steps of Calgary City Hall.

Gay is good.

{KA}