Out In The Mountains : Arts - The Gay Beginning

     When asked to review this book, my initial thought was "How in the world am I going to fit this into my already ridiculous schedule?" I took the book and brought it home, leaving it on my coffee table for a while, feeling guilty about agreeing to review it in the first place. That is, until a few days later when I opened it and started reading. The guilt left and was replaced by exhilaration as I was swiftly drawn back into the events that many of us feel marked 1969 as the year that launched the Gay rights movement. I couldn't put the book down.
      Even from the first few pages, I was finding myself reliving my teen-age years in Greenwich Village. I had arrived in 1963 and left in late 1967, two years before the events at Stonewall. The bars and clubs I went to were mostly on the east side of Sixth Avenue, not in the west village, but they all suffered from the same abuses by the police who were paid off and the mob that owned them. Author David Carter has well documented the part that Ed Murphy played in the running of the Stonewall for the mob. But his reputation earlier in the sixties when I hung out in the clubs was one of a low-level wiseguy who had done time in jail. And he was known for having murdered a 13- or 14-year-old boy he was involved with. This young boy had stolen something from Ed. When the boy just disappeared one day, it was common knowledge that he was dead. The bars were not safe, but they were all we had at the time.
     We might ask just what was so special about the events that led up to those six days at the Stonewall. Answer: They helped change and focus a splintered, politically impotent movement into a power to be reckoned with. Carter describes in detail the social and political conditions of the times in New York City. It was an election year, and it was well known that in New York lots of votes were to be had for "cleaning up the city." A concerted effort was being made to close down the gay bars, and there were no protections: it was illegal to serve alcohol to homosexuals. Both the police and the mob were free to abuse gay bar customers because most of the patrons felt there was no recourse, no place else to socialize.
     Carter's description of the bars is depressingly accurate. They were dark and dingy, the windows painted black to protect the anonymity of those who hid inside. They were always overcrowded with not enough fire exits. The drinks were watered down and expensive, and the bars were frequently visited by the NYPD who liked to arrive unannounced to intimidate the patrons and pick up their payoffs. They would show up at the door, and in seconds the lights would come on and the music and dancing would stop. People wouldn't even speak to each other while the police were there. We would just wait until the police left and the "danger" passed. Then the lights would be turned down and the music would resume until the next time. And there was always a next time. Carter's interviews with people who lived through these events gives witness to the oppression and damage perpetrated on the gay community in a time when you could be fired, refused service, or arrested for just being gay.
     Carter goes into great detail about the various political groups formed leading up to and after Stonewall. He chronicles much of the infighting that is a natural part of any movement trying to find a direction, and define its purpose and goals.
     Looking back from 2004, I can't help but wonder how different the world would be for all of us, if not for a disorganized group of folks who back in 1969 spontaneously said to themselves: "I'm mad as hell, and I'm not gonna take it anymore." It didn't appear to be such important an event at the time. There was no way to know exactly what was being planted in the consciousness of a community, but suddenly the back of the bus was no longer acceptable and a movement was transformed.
     Fortunately, the book also brought back lots of wonderful memories for me, like the time I lived at the Albert Hotel on University Place with my friend Upjohn (don't ask, it’s a long story), and late one night, in a club on east 3rd Street above the old firehouse, Brandy Alexander explained where and how everything gets tucked when dressing up in drag.
      For those who are too young to have lived through the years before Stonewall, Carter's book is a wonderfully accurate documentary of that period of gay history. As a community, we owe it to ourselves to know where we came from. If I can borrow a line, "It was the best of times and the worst of times." I really, really enjoyed reading David Carter's Stonewall and reliving the best of times.

Joel Rosinsky is a licensed alcohol and drug counselor with offices in Essex Junction and Burlington.

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