1928: Having been published in Paris the previous July, Radclyffe Hall’s The Well of Loneliness, the first major novel in English with an explicitly pro lesbian theme, is published in the U.S. Americans buy more than 20,000 copies of the book within the next month, making it a bestseller.
1919: In Berlin, Magnus Hirschfeld opens the Institute of Sexual Research. 1934: The Hays Code, a self-regulatory code of movie ethics, discouraging filmmakers from including frank depictions of sex and sexuality instituted by the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America (MPPDA), becomes mandatory. The code is nicknamed after the head of the MPPDA, former … Read More
1978: Following the recent gay rights defeat in Dade County, Florida,voters in St. Paul, Minnesota, vote to repeal their four year-old gay rights ordinance by a margin of 2 to 1. 1981: Former Beverly Hills hairdresser Marilyn Barnett files a multimillion-dollar “palimony” suit against tennis pro Billie Jean King, claiming the two had a lesbian … Read More
1980: CBS broadcasts an hour-long documentary entitled “Gay Power, Gay Politics” that alleges to be about the emergence of gay political clout in San Francisco, but instead focuses obsessively on more lascivious aspects of gay sexuality, making them seem like the focus of the entire gay rights movement. In one segment, close-ups track the arrival … Read More
1978: 1,500 gays and supporters rally on the steps of the state capitol in St. Paul, Minnesota, in support of the gay rights provision in the city’s human rights ordinance. 1989: In one of the Navy’s worst peacetime tragedies, a gun turret explosion aboard the U.S. battleship Iowa kills forty-seven sailors while the ship is … Read More
1977: The Advocate reveals that the CIA has been collecting information on some three hundred thousand people who have been arrested in the U.S. for committing homosexual acts. 1981: Premiering tonight on ABC, Dynasty, featuring gay character Steven Carrington, cat fights and more shoulder pads than have ever been seen on TV before. 2000: The … Read More