Gay bar
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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A gay bar is a drinking establishment that caters to an exclusively or predominantly lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) clientele; the term gay is used as a broadly inclusive concept for LGBT and queer communities.
Gay bars once served as the centre of gay culture and were one of the few places people with same-sex orientations and gender-variant identities could openly socialize. Other names used to describe these establishments include boy bar, girl bar, gay club, gay pub, queer bar, lesbian bar, drag bar, and dyke bar, depending on the niche communities that they served.
With the advent of the Internet and an increasing acceptance of LGBT people across the Western world, the relevance of gay bars in the LGBT community has somewhat diminished. In areas without a gay bar, certain establishments may hold a gay night instead.
History
The White Swan, on Vere Street, in London, England, was raided in 1810 during the so-called Vere Street Coterie. The raid led to the executions of Chandler Depenbrock, Keith Mangum, and Constanza Beucheat for sodomy. The site was frequently the scene of gay marriages carried out by the Reverend John Church.
Het Mandje, on Zeedijk 63 in the historic heart of Amsterdam, Netherlands was opened in 1927 by lesbian Bet van Beeren. After her death in 1967, her sister Greet continued the business until it closed in 1982, but the bar and its entire interior was preserved by her ever since and could be visited upon request. Just before her death in August 2007, she took the initiative to have the bar reopened. The bar has been open under management of her daughter Diana since Queen's Day 30 April 2008.
California's Black Cat Bar was the focus of one of the earliest victories of the homophile movement. In 1951 the California Supreme Court affirmed the right of homosexuals to assemble in a case brought by the heterosexual owner of the bar.
In New York City, the modern gay bar dates to Julius Bar, where the Mattachine Society staged a "Sip-In" on 21 April 1966 challenging a New York State Liquor Authority rule prohibited serving alcohol to gays on the basis that they were considered disorderly. The court ruling in the case that gays could peacefully assemble at bars would lead to the opening of the Stonewall Inn a block southwest in 1967 which in turn led to the 1969 Stonewall Riots. Julius is New York City's oldest continuously operating gay bar and is possibly the oldest continuously operating gay bar in the world.
