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Bars and Nightclubs
This photo was taken at an unidentified Detroit bar shortly after Pierson and Purcell began their lifelong relationship. After World War II, they…
Centaur Films
Bars and Nightclubs
A one-time dancer at the Gold Coast in Detroit, Steve O'Donnell (lower left) migrated west and began a career in adult gay male videos. The popularity…
Bars and Nightclubs
Lesbian Melva Earhart purchased the State Bar in Flint in 1950 and it soon became a safe hang-out for a homosexual clientele. Its original location on…
African Americans
In 1961 Melva Earhart re-opened the State Bar on W. Kearsley Street in Flint. By the late 1960s it had become almost exclusively gay, and hosted…
Bars and Nightclubs
With a relaxing of laws against obscenity and consequent bar raids, gay strippers became a popular mainstay at several Detroit bars. Some even…
Bars and Nightclubs
This racy entry into Detroit's gay publications was short-lived, but provides important insight about early 1970s bar life, particularly the leather…
Businesses
Chuck Thompson bought Cruise Magazine from long-time owner Tony Rome in the late 1990s. Rome was a founding member of the Detroit Bar Guild. Here the…
African Americans
Born in Springfield, IL, Ellis grew up to host popular house parties for African American lesbians and gay men in Detroit during the 1940s and 1950s,…
Bars and Nightclubs
Despite the demise of disco in the late 1970s, large dance clubs maintained their allure among young gay men, lesbians, and bisexuals as places to…
Bars and Nightclubs
Karagas played host at his brother William's Woodward Bar in Detroit from its opening in 1954 until Andy's death at age 76 in 1997.