San Francisco
— A special three-part program series in April sponsored by the GLBT Historical Society will highlight the history of the Mattachine Society, founded in 1950 as the first enduring homosexual-rights organization in the United States.
The story will be told through episodes from a new podcast, "Mattachine: A Queer Serial," presented on three consecutive Thursday evenings. Each program will feature an audiovisual presentation of the podcast, followed by community-based historian Joey Cain interviewing Devlyn Camp, the Chicago-based creator, producer, writer and host of the Mattachine serial.
All three events take place from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m. at the GLBT Historical Society Museum at 4127 18th St. in the Castro District. Admission is $5.00; free for members. This series is cosponsored by the
Calamus Fellowship.
For more information, visit
www.glbthistory.org
.
Mattachine: A Queer Serial
Dawn of the Movement: From Henry Gerber to Harry Hay
Thursday, April 4
The first evening in the series features the Mattachine podcast episodes titled “Strange Sex Cult Exposed” and “The Call.” It covers the origins of the movement with Henry Gerber, a postal worker in 1920s Chicago, whose ill-fated attempt to organize homosexuals later inspired Harry Hay, a young communist in Los Angeles, to take up the cause in the late 1940s. Tickets are available online at
https://bit.ly/2VKkNsO.
Mattachine: A Queer Serial
To Be Accused: Government Crackdown & Homophile Resistance
Thursday, April 11
The second evening in the three-part series features the Mattachine podcast episodes titled “To Be Accused,” “The Lavender Scare” and “Diversified Individuals.” It will survey the Mattachine Society’s early years, the entrapment of one of its founders by the police and the State Department’s witch hunt for “sexual deviants.” Tickets are available online at
https://bit.ly/2H7kwwN.
Mattachine: A Queer Serial
Cracks in the Foundation: Splintering into Homophile Alliances
Thursday, April 18
The third evening in the three-part series features the podcast episodes titled “Are You Now or Have You Ever Been A Homosexual,” “People Like Other People” and “Silly Letters.” It will survey the rise in Mattachine’s membership and an attempted organizational coup by conservatives and an FBI informant. Tickets are available online at
https://bit.ly/2IURvWz.
ABOUT THE GLBT HISTORICAL SOCIETY MUSEUM
Open since January 2011, the GLBT Historical Society Museum (formerly known as the GLBT History Museum) is the first full-scale, stand-alone museum of its kind in the United States. Its Main Gallery features a long-term exhibition on San Francisco LGBTQ history, "Queer Past Becomes Present." Its Front Gallery and Community Gallery host changing exhibitions. The institution also sponsors forums, author talks and other programs.
The GLBT Historical Society Museum is a project of the GLBT Historical Society, a public history center and archives that collects, preserves and interprets the history of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people and the communities that support them. Founded in 1985, the society maintains one of the world's largest collections of LGBTQ historical materials. For more information, visit
www.glbthistory.org
.
