City Pride - Sydney

Following on from the Venice carnival we arrive at the actual day of Mardi Gras. For those who are unfamiliar with the origin of Mardi Gras, perhaps a little information may help. In medieval times Christians put aside several weeks of fasting and abstinence before important Christian festivals like Easter and Christmas. The most common terms for these periods are Lent and Advent respectively. Lent begins tomorrow, the day after Mardi Gras. In preparation, Christians would eat up all the food that they were going to deprive themselves of all the way up to Easter, especially meat. They would also celebrate with carnivals. Actually, “carnival” comes from a 15th century Italian term meaning “remove meat”, which implies the word was created specifically for Christian Mardi Gras celebrations. Today people have generally dropped the fasting element.

Perhaps the most famous Mardi Gras carnivals take place in Brazil and New Orleans, but undoubtedly the most famous lgbt+ Mardi Gras is that held in Sydney, Australia. This year’s Sydney Mardi Gras finished this past weekend. So, as a belated celebration, here is the latest entry in my “City Pride” series about Sydney.

The area I’ve concentrated on is just south of Sydney Harbour Bridge. Because Sydney has so much lgbt+ history it has been difficult to narrow it down to just 12 locations. Most of them may be known to a lot of Sydney citizens, but I have, as always, tried to find some lesser known locations, people or events that show the diversity of the lgbt+ culture in Sydney.

First of all, the area covered is in the Sydney Electoral District (except for a tiny bit of the bottom left hand corner of the map). The current MP for the Sydney electoral district in the New South Wales parliament is Alex Greenwich (b. 1980, into a princely dynasty from Georgia – the country, not the US state), who has been the representative since 2012. He was the first openly gay elected member.

The locations are listed from north to south.

1) Speaker’s Corner, The Domain

John Webster (1913-2008) was a regular speaker at Speaker’s Corner for over 30 years. His distinctive voice is remembered by many older Sydney citizens of all political ideologies, genders and faiths. His opinion on all these issues evolved over the years. Briefly married twice, he is also known to have had gay relationships. His ashes were scattered around the Speaker’s podium.

2) St. James’s Church

In the summer of 1836 Rev. William Yate (1802-1877), a British missionary fresh from New Zealand, was appointed chaplain to this church. It was while he was here that reports were made to the authorities of his homosexual activity with sailors and Maori youths. Yate protested his innocence, and no evidence of actual sodomy was proven. Nevertheless, he was dismissed and was sent back to the UK by December. He took with him Edwin Denison, the Third Mate he “befriended” on the ship that brought him to Sydney. He died as chaplain of the Mariners Church in Dover.

3) Sydney Town Hall

One of the locations that were part of the demonstrations that took place in Gay Pride Week 1973. On 15 September activists marched to the hall. Among the banners they carried was what I consider to be the world’s first lgbt+ community flag – a black flag with a pink triangle in the centre. Previous flags had belonged to specific organisations, but in Sydney this flag was adopted by all sections of the community. I write in more detail about the use of this flag here.

Currently, there are a record four lgbt+ elected members on the city council, Zann Maxwell, Matthew Thompson, Mitch Wilson and Adam Worling, all elected last October. Zann Maxwell was appointed the city’s Deputy Mayor.

This year is the 25th anniversary of the Sydney Olympics. At the end of each day of the torch relay there was a ceremony involving the lighting of a “community cauldron”. On the night before the opening ceremony the final leg of the relay went from Sydney Harbour Bridge and down George Street to the Town Hall. The last torch bearer was the world’s top female golfer at the time, Australia’s Karrie Webb, who lit the community cauldron.

4) St. Andrew’s Cathedral

One of the few non-political Australian state funerals took place here in 1986. It was to honour the Australian ballet dancer and choreographer Sir Robert Helpmann (1909-1986). He is most famous for his role as the Child Catcher in the film “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang” (a character invented for the film). Helpmann was the first in a long line of openly lgbt+ performers to play this character in its many theatre productions. These include Stephen Gately, Wayne Sleep, Paul O’Grady, Richard O’Brien, and The Vivienne.

5) Junction of William Street and College Street, Australia Museum

During WorldPride 2023, hosted by Sydney, many artistic expressions of lgbt+ culture were on display. One of the most unusual, located outside the museum entrance, was the Progress Shark, a huge life-size model of a great white shark dressed in a Progress Flag-inspired lycra swimsuit. Created by Sydney-based artist George Buchanan, the shark quickly became a tourist attraction and icon of WorldPride. Like many artworks created for the occasion it was taken down afterwards.

6) 110 Bathurst Street

This is currently a modern multi-storey building home to various businesses, but back in the 1920s it was a residential area. This address was, for a couple of years, the art studio and salon of Australian sculptor and artist Dora Ohlfsen-Bagge (1869-1948) and her partner Baroness Helene von Kügelgen (d.1948). Although they lived in Rome most of the time, Dora revisited Sydney and produced many works for Australian clients. These included designing the ANZAC medal, and many sculptures that are now lost or destroyed.

7) 29 Pelican Street

In 1948 this address became the home of Iris Webber (1906-1953), described by local newspapers as “the most violent woman in Sydney”. She is a perfect subject for one of my “Extraordinary Lives” series. Condensing her life down to a few sentences has been difficult, but here goes. Iris was married twice and had at least two female partners. She shot three men (including her first husband, and killing another) but was acquitted each time. She was either arrested or convicted of assault at least 4 times (twice with a tomahawk). She was arrested many times for busking and begging, illegally selling alcohol, and robbery (with her then partner Vera). Iris’s last court appearance was for contempt of court in 1952.

8) National Art School, formerly Darlinghurst Gaol.

This old jail once housed several notable lgbt+ prisoners, the most well-known being the bushranger known as Captain Moonlite (Andrew Scott, 1842-1880). Born in Ireland, Scott can be said to have been a bit of an adventurer, travelling the world fighting as something of a mercenary before arriving in Australia in 1867. While living as a lay reader in a church in the gold fields, he was masquerading as Captain Moonlite, robbing a local bank agent. Caught and convicted, Scott met James Nesbit in jail and the two formed a relationship. After release he struggled to find work, and attacked a cattle station with his gang. Nesbit was killed, but Scott was captured and later hanged in the jail.

The current art school opened in 1921 has had many lgbt+ alumni and has hosted many exhibition by lgbt+ artists.

9) Green Park – LGBT Holocaust Memorial

This monument, designed by Jennifer Gamble and Russell Rodrigo, commemorates the many lgbt+ victims of the Nazis during the Holocaust. The pink triangle that gay prisoners were forced to wear has become an iconic symbol of gay rights in the 1970s. The Jewish Museum is located across the road to the north on Burton Street. In this year when we remember the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II it is essential we recognise diversity of opinion by people on all sides, without anger, hatred, or violence.

10) 301 Forbes Street – Qtopia

Sydney’s first permanent lgbt+ museum, said to be the world’s biggest, opened here in February 2024 in buildings that were originally Darlinghurst’s police station. As the police station it was where people arrested on homosexual charges were held in custody. This included a large number of participants in Sydney’s first Mardi Gras in 1978, people who proudly sport the name of The 78ers. Sadly, a sign of the times included police brutality against those in custody. The museum also has sections on AIDS, and a reconstructed AIDS ward from the neighbouring St. Vincent’s Hospital where many AIDS patients were treated.

11) Junction of Campbell Street and Little Bourke Street

On the night of 31 March 1962, the body of Frank McLean was discovered several metres south of this junction. He was one of several gay victims of William MacDonald, whom the media labelled as “The Mutilator”. MacDonald picked his victims up in gay venues, took them to a private location and murdered them, slashing their bodies and severing their genitals. He was sentenced to life imprisonment and died in 2015.

12) Taylor Square – The Rainbow Crossing

Sydney’s famous crossing was first established in 2013 for that year’s Mardi Gras. However, due to concerns that people standing on it to take selfies put them in danger of being run over, the city removed it. This sparked as spate of graffiti chalk rainbow crossing popping up across the city in protest. Thankfully, the city council realised the importance of such a statement of identity and repainted crossing in 2019.

William and John: Part 1) Childhood

The gatehouse of Nottingham Castle

Today is International Museum Day, and next month Nottingham Castle Museum and Art Gallery will reopen after two years of redevelopment. I worked at Nottingham Castle for seven years as a tour guide and gallery attendant and the owners of the castle, the city council, never showed any understanding of heritage. They even banned Robin Hood for a few years because he “set a bad example”! So I have little hope that the castle will be “improved” in any way. From what they’ve already shown us I expect and that everything is dumbed down to their level of intelligence.

My links to Nottingham Castle merge with its lgbt heritage through Sir William Neville (c.1341-1391) who was appointed Constable of Nottingham Castle in 1381. I descend from his brother.

Sir William Neville and his partner, Sir John Clanvowe, has been mentioned on this blog several times over the years. To mark the 640th anniversary of Sir William’s appointment and the castle’s reopening I’d like to fill in some of the gaps in their story. Let’s start at the beginning and look at their childhood.

Sir William Neville was born in or around 1341 at Raby Castle, County Durham, into one of the most powerful, and ancient families in northern England. William was the fifth and youngest son of Sir Ralph Neville, 2nd Baron Neville of Raby (c.1291-1367), and his wife Alice (c.1300-1374).

The 2nd Baron, or Lord, Neville was an important courtier during the first years of the reign of King Edward III (the king who made St. George the patron saint of England). Several of Sir William's brothers also went on to become influential, and several of his six sisters married influential lords. William’s eldest brother John Neville (my ancestor), inherited the family title and was a soldier and ambassador. The next brother Alexander became Archbishop of York. William himself became a favoured courtier of King Richard II and received high appointments.

Sir William’s mother, Alice, was the widow of Lord Greystoke and a niece of the Mortimer family who had feudal links to Sir John Clanvowe’s family. Alice had a young son by Lord Greystoke who become 2nd Baron Greystoke when she became widowed in 1323, and he became stepson and ward to Lord Neville.

Our William Neville, being the youngest son of a large family, had little chance of inheriting much from his father's estates so Lord Neville, an ambitious man, came up with a plan.

By the 1340s it looked as if his ward Lord Greystoke, although married and in his 20s, would remain childless. Lord Neville seized the opportunity to ensure that the Greystoke estates would be inherited by one of his children. He entered into an agreement with Lord Greystoke whereby all of the Greystoke estates would be inherited by one of the younger Neville sons if Lord Greystoke died without children. William Neville was about 3 years old at the time and it’s likely that he was being considered as the Greystoke heir. Whichever of the sons inherited the Greystoke lands would be required to adopt the Greystoke name and coat of arms in place of Neville. This was common practice in a lot of aristocratic families. As it happened, Lord Greystoke eventually fathered a healthy son and heir in 1352, and Lord Neville's hopes of providing lands for his younger sons were dashed, and it looked as if young William Neville would be left penniless and landless.

That’s Sir William Neville’s family background. Now let’s look at Sir John Clanvowe’s.

There’s a great deal of uncertainty in establishing Sir John's parentage. His father may have been another John Clanvowe, a Knight of the Shire, a wealthy landowner elected by other landowners to represent Herefordshire in the English parliament of 1347-8.

I believe the family takes its names from Llanveau (or Llanedw), a hamlet near the Welsh coast just four miles east of Cardiff. To me the way the name Clanvowe is spelt obviously derives from the English pronunciation of Llanveau (the Welsh pronunciation of the double “L” sounds very much like “CL”). The first person to have used this English spelling seems to have been Sir Philip Clanvowe. I believe he was our Sir John's grandfather.

The Clanvowes had manorial ties with the most important family of the Welsh borders, the Mortimers. For several generations the Clanvowes had been hereditary bailiffs, the manorial estate managers, of the Mortimer's manor at Gladestry over the border in England, 22 miles from Hereford. Through this strong link to the manor I believe our Sir John Clanvowe may have been born in Gladestry in around 1341, making him the same age as William Neville.

It is not improbable that Sir William Neville and Sir John Clanvowe met when they were children. William's mother was the niece of the Mortimers, and the Clanvowes were bailiffs in one of their manors. During the 1340s and 1350s there would have been several gatherings and celebrations where the Mortimers, the Nevilles, and the Clanvowes would have been able to meet. It is known that tournaments were often held at Hereford Castle and they would be the ideal place for lords and their families to network and form alliances.

During their childhood William Neville and John Clanvowe were exposed to the Black Death, the biggest pandemic which ravaged Europe in the late 1340s. It is shown from medieval records that wealthy families had a better chance of survival than those from poorer backgrounds. But it appears that young William and John were also fortunate to survive because to their age. Analysis by Professor J. C. Russell in 1948 of a sample group of death records show that the young were actually the most likely to survive the plague. This has an echo in our present covid pandemic. Russell calculated that the highest mortality rate, unsurprisingly, was 46% among those over 56 years old. Children between the ages of 6 and 10, which included both John Clanvowe and William Neville, had the best chance of survival. The mortality rate for their age group was just 7%, the lowest of them all. The mortality rate for the 10 to 56 year old age group was 28%.

So, having survived childhood, next month I’ll look at the adult career of Sir John Clanvowe as he became a soldier and fought in the Hundred Years War. The month after that I’ll look at Sir William Neville’s career at the court of the English king.

The Godmother of Egyptology

Today is International Archaeology Day. Arguably the most influential archaeological subject is Egyptology. The names of ancient pharaohs and gods are household names. It has influenced everything from Napoleonic furniture to Hallowe’en costumes. Hundreds of films and books based on ancient Egypt are highly popular.

Last Hallowe’en I revealed how the curse of the Egyptian mummy was created by the most popular Victorian novelist, the bisexual Maria Correlli (1855-1924). The establishing of Egyptology as a separate science owes a great deal to another Victorian queer novelist, the openly lesbian Amelia Edwards (1831-1892).

Amelia Ann Blanford Edwards was the only child of Thomas and Alicia Edwards, a retired army officer and the daughter of an Irish barrister. Amelia was home-schooled by her mother and governesses and was a prodigious child, writing poetry and stories before she was 14 years old. She was also a very talented artist, a skill she would later utilise to illustrate her popular travel books.

Amelia’s popularity as a writer began long before her interest in Egyptology. Her fiction – novels and short stories – made her a celebrity to rival Maria Correlli (both outsold Charles Dickens). I’ll return to Amelia’s fiction writing in December, specifically her ghost stories, but for today let’s concentrate on her “Egyptian period”.

Amelia came from an era and social background in which well-educated, reasonably well-off ladies like herself would travel around Europe with a female companion. One year, 1873, she and a companion were in France during a particularly miserable wet summer, so they decided to head south to warmer climes and Egypt. Amelia was instantly entranced by the whole Egyptian culture. She sailed up the Nile with a group of fellow travellers to Abu Simbel (in its original location before being relocated block by block in the 1960s).

Amelia discovered a small chamber buried in the sand and proceeded to records its contents and draw the vivid wall paintings in her sketch book. Amelia wrote up her Egyptian experiences in published them in “A Thousands Miles Up the Nile” in 1877, containing many of her own drawings, including the one below of Abu Simbel. This book is probably the biggest best-seller she ever wrote.

As with the majority of European travellers to Egypt Amelia collected and bought many ancient artefacts, including several mummified hands. It wasn’t long, however, before she realised the danger of this popular “hobby”. In her book she wrote that many Egyptian site were being spoiled or destroyed by the actions of travellers and tourists and the neglect of local authorities.

At that time in Egypt’s history the country was in economic decline and couldn’t afford to pay for serious excavations and research. In 1882 Amelia banded together with Reginald Stewart Poole, the Curator of Coins and Medals at the British Museum, to found the Egypt Exploration Fund. Both were elected honorary joint secretaries. Donations trickled in and by January 1883 the fund was able to send its first expedition to Egypt.

One of the archaeologists to benefit from the Fund was Flinders Petrie, who would go on to become Britain’s greatest Egyptologist and founder of modern archaeological methods. He and Amelia became firm friends and in her will Amelia ensured that Petrie would be the first person to be appointed the first ever Professor of Egyptology.

The appointment has a very interesting back story. Amelia, being a woman in Victorian England, found it difficult to get support from the male-dominated academic and scientific establishment. She got no help from the British Museum other than the voluntary assistance from Reginald Poole. At the time of her death University College London was the only institution which offered and gave the same degrees to woman as it did to men. Amelia laid down in her will that £2,500 should go towards setting up a chair in Egyptology there – as long as it wasn’t held by anyone from the British Museum. Shortly before her death, when she became seriously ill, she added a clause stipulating that the post should not go to anyone over the age of 40. Flinders Petrie was 39 and the only experienced archaeologist who fit the criteria.

Apart from being hugely popular for her Egyptology, travel writing and ghost stories Amelia also enjoyed an equally hugely successful lecture tour of the USA in 1889-90. This raised a lot of money for the Egypt Exploration Fund.

Amelia spent her last years in a little village called Westbury-on-Trym with her partner and companion Ellen Drew Braysher (1804-1892). They were buried together in Henbury near Bristol, their graves later being designated Grade II listed status. Historic England, the country’s leading heritage organisation, placed the grave on their Pride of Place list of significant lgbt sites in 2016.

As well as leaving £2,500 to University College London for the chair in Egyptology Amelia also left them her personal collection of artefacts and library. They formed the basis of what is now called the Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology. Obviously, it is named after Flinders Petrie, or Sir Flinders Petrie as he became, but the museum would not exist at all if Amelia Edwards hadn’t given her collection to found it. It annoys me that the museum isn’t named after her.

The Petrie Museum has long been a place I have wanted to visit. Back in 2010 it produced a special museum trail called “Beyond Isis and Osiris: Alternate Sexualities in Ancient Egypt”. Although comparatively small in area the museum has thousands of items on display and the trail picked out 14 of them that illustrate the variety of sexual and gender attitudes among the Egyptians, from their ancient gods to Alexander the Great.

The trail originated in a series of talks given in February 2008 for LGBT History Month UK by John J. Johnston, who was a teaching assistant at University College London while studying there for a PhD in Egyptology. The talks proved so popular that Johnston formed them into the “Beyond Isis and Osiris” trail. Below is a video of Johnston talking about his trai. Johnston became Vice-Chair of the Egypt Exploration Society (to which the Egypt Exploration Fund had been renamed in 1919) shortly afterwards and held the position until 2015.

Perhaps when covid restrictions are lifted and we can move around freely once more I’ll finally make it down to London and visit the museum founded by Amelia Edwards, the woman known as the Godmother of Egyptology.

Heritage Spotlight: Flower Power To The Rescue

 Prospect Cottage and Derek Jarman’s Garden.

Six months ago it would have been inconceivable to visit any heritage site. With the pandemic lockdown heritage and leisure venues were among the first to be closed. Many people thought that the pandemic would be over by the end of summer and that everything would be back to normal.

Things may never get back to “normal” but one of the steps towards achieving this, taken to help the heritage and leisure industry survive, is the gradual reopening of many sites. Last week the UK held its annual Heritage Open Days. In previous years most heritage sites and museums have been free to enter, and many private heritage sites opened their doors for a couple of days. This year, of course, things are different. There were still celebrations for the Heritage Open Days but many places, including my old place of work, Gainsborough Old Hall, won’t reopen until next year.

The sites that have reopened have implemented social distancing precautions, though with parks and gardens this has not been so much of a problem. Back in January, even before the lockdown, it looked as if one garden in particular was going to be lost, and when the lockdown came into effect its future looked ever gloomier. This garden is of special importance to the lgbt community. It is Derek Jarman’s Garden at Dungeness in Kent.

Derek Jarman (1942-1994) was more well-known in the lgbt community in his lifetime in the UK than he is now. Many people of my generation will know his name and work, though younger generations probably don’t. He was always challenging cinematic norms when it came to depictions of sexuality and gender, leading to him being described as avant garde or the “enfant terrible” of British cinema. Today his films seem tame and harmless. Some of his most famous films are “Sebastiane” (1976) and “Edward II” (1991, based on a play by gay Elizabethan spy Christopher Marlowe).

It isn’t only the fact that the garden was designed and made by Derek Jarman that makes it notable but also the fact that it’s not your typical garden of lush greenery and vivid flowers. It is very much a product of its location, and in his lifetime it attracted a lot of media coverage, as well as being featured in a couple of Derek’s own films.

Derek Jarman’s Garden, and the old fisherman’s collage called Prospect Cottage where Derek lived for the last 17 years of his life, is located on a piece of vast shingle beach not far from an imposing nuclear power station. It is open to the elements, and wind gusts off the English Channel almost continuously. No tree can grow there.

Derek fell in love with the place as soon as he saw it in 1986, alerted by the “For Sale” sign. He made an offer to buy the property almost immediately and very soon moved in and began renovations – not a total modern make-over but a sympathetic restoration to bring more stability to the century-old structure. He once told a journalist that he bought it as a joke, but it is apparent that this quickly turned to a love of the place.

The surrounding shingle garden was virtually a natural wasteland. In fact, the National Trust lists it as a desert. Derek also set about livening up the surrounding beach with a garden. He had always had an interest in flowers and gardening, ever since his parents gave him a gardening book when he was 4.

Derek’s first choice of plants for his new garden were roses. However, the shingle and sandy soil were not a suitable ground for the roses he chose to grow and they withered. Inspired by the surrounding landscape Derek selected roses which could survive in the soil as well as sea kale, red hot pokers, elder, poppies and rare orchids. Because the area is a conservation zone all the plants had to be grown from seed, not transplanted from another location, and no fences are allowed. In among the plants and pathways Derek set up small sculptures and erected pieces of driftwood. At first the locals thought he was building some sort of pagan shrine.

Derek and his partner Keith Collins tended the garden through Derek’s illness. Keith continued after Derek’s death and even after his own diagnosis of a brain tumour in 2018. This was when he decided to put Prospect Cottage and the garden into a trust to preserve it for the nation. Keith died before that trust was completed.

By the end on 2019 the cottage and garden needed to raise £3.5 million to ensure both were saved for the nation or it would go up for private sale in March. A fundraising campaign was formed by the Art Fund, the Tate, and Creative Folkestone. Many of Derek Jarman’s friends and celebrity fans urged the public to help.

When the lockdown came into effect there were fears that the target would not be reached in time. Thankfully, as the deadline approached the target was reached, and Prospect Cottage and Derek Jarman’s Garden were saved. Both will remain pretty much as they were in 2018 when Keith Collins died.

After Keith’s death the Garden Museum in Lambeth, Greater London, decided to mount an exhibition about the garden. Part of the interior of Prospect Cottage was reproduced and actual items from the cottage were loaned to the museum. The opening of the exhibition was delayed by the lockdown. The museum said that the delay actually worked in their favour because the exhibition was expanded to accommodate the new social distancing rules which meant that more items could be included.

The exhibition opened on 4th July and a relatively small number of visitors had the opportunity to see it. The exhibition closed yesterday. Thankfully, more people will be able to see the real thing down at Dungeness when it eventually opens to the public officially – a unique garden created by a unique film-maker.

80 More Gays Around the World: Part 15) A Price For Art

Last time on “80 More Gays”: Japanese shogun 39) Tokugawa Tsunayoshi (1646-1709) introduced a festival that originated in an ancient harvest celebration, while over in colonial America the similar Thanksgiving festival was being celebrated by Puritan colonists, including 40) William Plaine (d.1646), a colonist executed for sodomy and an ancestor of 41) Vincent Price (1911-1993).

It is very rare for any white American to be only descended from one Puritan colonist of the early 17th century. 41) Vincent Price, the star of many films who became a horror icon, is no exception. Not only is he descended from 40) William Plaine and several of the other New Haven colonial families but he is also a Mayflower descendant.

This year we commemorate the 400th anniversary of the sailing of the Mayflower and the Pilgrims to America. I’ll write more about the Mayflower Pilgrims and some of their lgbt descendants in September. Much research into Mayflower ancestry has been done by many genealogists over the years. In some respect discovering one of your ancestors was a Mayflower passenger is as much of a bonus for American family historians as finding a descent from royalty is for some of us Brits. Some American have both. But caution must be taken when going online to look for Mayflower ancestry. A lot of research is not based on actual sources and quite often even top professional genealogists have had different opinions.

At this moment in time the only Mayflower passengers that we can prove are direct descendants of Vincent Price are James Chilton (c.1556-1620), his wife (name unknown) who died with her husband in that first winter, and their daughter Mary (1607-1679). Legend says that Mary was the first person to set foot on Plymouth Rock. She married John Winslow, the brother of Mayflower passenger Edward Winslow, later the Governor of Plymouth Colony who approved of the death sentence of William Plaine.

Vincent Price

Vincent Price was one of quite a significant group of male and female Hollywood actors who were lesbian, gay or bisexual, a fact often known to the film studios and hidden from public knowledge behind “lavender” marriages. These marriages were usually arranged by the film studios with the full knowledge of the couple that one, or even both, of them was lgb. Many lavender marriages were arranged specifically to stop rumours in the press about an actor’s sexuality.

In Vincent Price’s case his bisexuality was easier to hide with a marriage. His first two marriages were not lavender marriages, though his last to actor Coral Browne in 1974, effectively, was. This is not to suggest that there was no genuine love between them.

It was Vincent’s daughter 42) Victoria Price (b.1962), herself openly lesbian, who ended speculation on his sexuality in 2014 when her 1999 book “Vincent Price: A Daughter’s Biography” was reprinted. After her father’s death Victoria was asked about his sexuality. Her biography referenced these rumours without really answering them. In an interview with “Boom” magazine while promoting her reprinted book Victoria gave the following remark: “I am as close to certain as I can be that my dad had physically intimate relationships with man. I know for 100% fact that my dad was completely loving and supportive of lgbt people.”

While Vincent Price’s acting career is what made him famous another side to him is less well-known. He was an art collector and historian. At Yale University he studied art history, after which he became an art teacher for a year. Then he travelled to England to study at the Courtauld Institute of Art in London.

In London he became attracted to the stage and began his acting career when he returned to the USA. In 1935 he made his first stage performance playing Prince Albert, Prince Consort in “Victoria Regina”. Acting became his profession but he continued to study art and amassing a huge art collection.

His love of art inspired him to write “The Vincent Price Treasury of American Art” (1972) as well as a couple of other art books. He also gave lectures on art, and was a committee member on several art organisations. In 1947 he co-founded the Modern Institute of Art in Beverley Hills with fellow actors Edward G. Robinson and Fanny Bryce. Sadly, the venture only lasted two years. One other passion was food. Vincent wrote a series of cook books and often demonstrated his recipes on American television.

Vincent and his second wife Mary were frequent visitors to the East Los Angeles College. With his keen desire to see better access to art given to marginalised sections of the community he donated 90 works of art from his own collection to the college in 1957. This formed the basis of a teaching collection and was the start of the Vincent Price Art Museum (VPAM) which now has collected over 9,000 works.

Victoria Price is currently a board member of the VPAM. She continues to support the museum’s aim to foster under-represented artists, often of ethnic or disadvantaged backgrounds, as well as established artist and old masters. One of the artists showcased at the VPAM was a former student of the East Los Angeles College, 43) Laura Aguilar (1949-2018). Laura took a photography course there in the early 1970s.

Laura was a photographer who was an example of the under-represented artists the VPAM championed. She was an open lesbian from a poor background, came from a Mexican-American-Irish family, was dyslexic and diabetic. Her dyslexia affected her learning abilities as a child. With her grandmother Laura would go out into the California countryside and the landscapes influenced her art.

While at the East Los Angeles College Laura was told by a teacher that she was wasting her time trying to be an artist when she couldn’t even read properly. Because of this attitude Laura transferred to the Pasadena City College. This has a more inclusive and progressive programme of teaching.

Laura’s interest in photography was sparked by her brother who taught her how to develop photographs. She became a pioneer in the genres of Latina and chicana lesbian imagery, often using herself as a nude model. Her focus was on the ordinary lives of Los Angeles lesbians. A series of portraits called “Latina Lesbians” (1986-1990) is one of her most significant works.

During her lifetime Laura’s works were exhibited in many international galleries and museums. She died from complications arising from her diabetes at the age of 58. The VPAM was the first gallery to mount a retrospective of her work the following year.

Let’s go back to the Pasadena City College where Laura studied in the 1980s. There’s several other former alumni worth mentioning. First is Fred Phelps (1929-2014), the vehemently homophobic pastor of the Westboro Baptist Church. Two other alumni are more welcome, and linked - George Reeves (1914-1959), who became famous as television’s Superman in the 1950s, and his co-star 44) Jack Larson (1928-2015).

Next time on “80 More Gays”: We dive into superhero comics and films, and take a philosophical look at a lost continent.

My Ancestor Was A Mermaid

That’s an extraordinary statement to make, but according to medieval legend I’m descended from a mermaid, and so are millions of Europeans and North Americans. More of that later. A couple of weeks ago I wrote “Queer Cryptids”, an article about legendary beasts. I mentioned mermaids briefly, and today we’ll look at some of the numerous lgbt connections of these citizens of the sea.

Mermaid is a term that encompasses many half-human, half-fish beings from just about every culture in the world. Whether it’s called a mermaid, naiad, merrow, siren or rusalka the common link is the traditional representation as seen in the Disney version of “The Little Mermaid”.

“The Little Mermaid” was a story written by Hans Christian Andersen (1805-1875) in 1837. Recent research has uncovered the circumstances behind the story. Hans was bisexual. For several years he had harboured a crush on Edvard Collin, and when he found out that Edvard was going to get married he incorporated his own loss into the ending of “The Little Mermaid”. In the original story the mermaid does not marry the prince but leaves him.

Disney’s “The Little Mermaid”, Ariel, has a desire to live in the human world. She sings a song entitled “Part of Your World”. In the lgbt community most of us have felt the same feeling, whether it is the right to marry or just the desire to be accepted and not persecuted for being different. The lyrics were written by Howard Ashman (1950-1991), whose first big success was “Little Shop of Horrors”. With song-writing partner Alan Menken he wrote songs for “The Little Mermaid” and “Beauty and the Beast”. Sadly Howard died from AIDS-related causes in 1991 before he could finish his songs for “Aladdin”. If you watch “Beauty and the Beast” you’ll see a dedication to him at the end of the film. The title song from that film won the 1992 Oscar for Best Original Song. His partner Bill Lauch accepted the Oscar at the ceremony.

Unlike the Andersen and Disney mermaids traditional mermaids didn’t trade their voice for legs. When they went onto dry land their tail turned into legs automatically, and changed back again when they came into contact with water. One legend which illustrates this comes in the folk legends of medieval France. There are many variations but all centre around the same mermaid called Melusine.

A French nobleman called Raymond was wandering alone in a forest when he came to a magic fountain. Standing beside it was the beautiful Melusine, the water spirit who guarded it. She promised Raymond if he married her they would become the founders of a royal dynasty. She gave one condition however. Under no circumstances was Raymond allowed to see her on Saturdays. Raymond agreed, they got married and went to live in Lusignan Castle. They had ten sons.

After many years Raymond’s suspicious brother persuaded him to look into Melusine’s chamber on a Saturday. The sight he saw horrified him. Melusine was in her bath in her natural form – each human leg had changed into water-serpent’s tail. Melusine shrieked in surprise when she saw Raymond and leapt out of the window, never to be seen again.

Even if that’s just romantic fiction the Lusignan family were very real. They were an influential French dynasty who rose to become Crusader Kings of Jerusalem. They have left many millions of descendants, including myself. My nearest ancestor is Countess Jeanne de Lusignan (d.1232).

You may have seen a picture of Melusine without realising it. In 1971 a company in Seattle, USA, was looking for a logo which symbolised the sea routes that early traders used when transporting their product around the globe. They chose a depiction of Melusine, with her two tails, as a representative of the sea trade, from a 15th-century printed version of the legend. They still use a modified version of that picture today. The company is called Starbucks.

The stories of Melusine and Ariel both show the importance of physical change to the characters. As such the mermaid became a symbol of some transgender groups. One of these is Mermaids UK, a transgender and gender-nonconforming youth network formed in 1995.

As well as on coffee cups pictures of mermaids appear in many places. One gay man who works for the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich, Greater London, has built a career out of looking for them. Sacha Coward is the museum’s Community Participation Producer and is responsible for getting the public interested in maritime history. He’s been collecting images and depictions of mermaids, and mermen, from different cultures and has produced exhibitions at Greenwich in celebration of them.

To end with I’ll ask you a question. Do you remember the series “Man From Atlantis”? Would you class this character as a mermaid/merman? It made a star out of Patrick Duffy, but did you know that most of his underwater swimming scenes were done by a body double called Tom Reudy?

Tom Reudy went on to become a multi-medal-winning swimming champion at four Gay Games from 1986. In some of the relay races a team member was a man I’ll mention in my next “Around the World in Another 80 Gays” article, Michael Mealiffe. Today Tom Reudy is Head Coach at San Mateo Masters Swimming club.

So, from cryptids to coffee, and from Denmark to Atlantis, mermaids have a multitude of connections in the lgbt community.

City Pride : Gay Paris

The 10th Gay Games begin in Paris tomorrow. To celebrate let’s have a look at some of the city’s lgbt heritage. If you’re in the city for the games, or even plan to visit in the future, these glimpses into Gay Paris present just a small selection of its vast lgbt history. I’ll not cover the most obvious tourist attractions and sites but those that are less noticeable.

The map below gives a very simplified lay-out of the city. With a proper city map you’ll be able to home in more precisely on the sites I’ve chosen. I’ll give the current address of sites to make things a little easier. You don’t have to visit each site in numerical order.

First of all, there is the Parisian “gay quarter”, Le Marais (in orange on the map). This district has been a gathering place for many diverse and bohemian communities over the last century. From the 1980s the lgbt community has been making a more visible presence, and today it is claimed that 40% of lgbt businesses in Paris are based in Le Marais. It is also one of the most untouched areas of the city and still contains many historical buildings and streets.

1) No. 102, The Champs Élysées : This is the site of the terror attack of 20th April 2017. Three policemen were shot, one of whom, Xavier Jugelé, died. He was an active member of the French police lgbt group, Flag! Xavier’s civil partner, Étienne Cardiles, gave a moving eulogy at the national ceremony to honour him. Xavier was awarded a posthumous Legion d’Honneur, and he and Étienne were allowed to marry posthumously, France being a country where this is possible in special circumstances.

2) The Hôtel Regina : On 26th March 1903 the British war hero Sir Hector Macdonald was staying at this hotel. He went down into the hotel lounge after breakfast to read the newspapers. The New York Herald ran a front page story of him being charged with homosexual offences. Sir Hector then returned to his room and shot himself. Sir Hector was a massive hero in the UK and his suicide came as a shock to the nation, partly because they were unaware of the charges against him. It is believed that he is the army officer who still depicted on the label of Camp Coffee in the UK.

3) The Gay Memorial Stone : The intersection of Rue Montorgueil and Rue Bachaumont was the site of the arrest in 1750 of Bruno Lenoir and Jean Diot, the last men to be executed in France for homosexuality. They were strangled and burnt to death in front of the Hôtel de Ville (see no. 6).

4) The Museum of the Legion d’Honneur : Many lgbt people have been awarded the Legion d’Honneur, France’s highest honour. Among them are Xavier Jugelé (see no.1), artist Louise Abbéma and tennis player Amélie Mauresmo. International lgbt recipients have included Giorgio Armani, Lawrence of Arabia, Eleanor Roosevelt and Father Mychal Judge (9/11 victim, awarded posthumously).

5) Natalie Barney’s Salon : 20 Rue Jacob. US writer Natalie Barney (1876-1972) lived at this address for over 60 years. Many famous writers and artists flooded to her home every week to socialise and exchange views.

6) Hôtel de Ville : This will be the main social point for athletes at the Gay Games – the “athlete’s village”. Many events are planned to be held in the main square, including the start and finish of the International Rainbow Memorial Run (see below). This is also the site of the last execution of gay men in France (see no.3). The building is Paris’s city hall and the offices of its mayor. Bertrand Delanoë, Mayor of Paris 2001-14, was one of the few openly gay mayors of a national capital.

7) Convent of the Abbaye-aux-Bois : On the junction of Rue de Four and Boulevard Raspail the now-demolished convent was the home of a “lady boarder”, the enigmatic Henriette Jenny Savalette de Langes (d.1858). She claimed to be the illegitimate daughter of a Marquis and received favours from the French royal family. She also lived at several addresses in Le Marais (see above). After she died it was discovered that she was a man.

8) The Condé Cluster : This is my name for several locations on or near the site of the old Condé Palace which was split up into lots in 1779. The Condé Palace, or Hôtel Condé, was named after members of the French royal Family. It was the city residence of Prince Louis II de Bourbon, Duke of Condé, (1621-1686), the owner of the Condé Diamond, and I’ll write more about him later in the year.

Among the servants of the Condé family was the mother of the infamous Marquis de Sade, who was born in the palace.

The Théâtre de l’Odéon was built in 1782. Many lgbt singers, musicians, actors and performers have appeared here.

Pierre Berthier (1782-1861), geologist, lived and died at 2 Rue Crébillon. He discovered the mineral bauxite (the main source of aluminium) and invented stainless steel. He was put on the list of homosexuals kept by the police. For his scientific work Pierre was awarded the Legion d’Honneur, and is the only gay man of the 72 who are commemorated on the Eiffel Tower. Berthier’s home is currently the location of the publishers Bartillat.

The original Shakespeare and Company bookstore (see no. 9) was located at 12 Rue de l’Odéon and is commemorated with a wall plaque. It lasted until the Nazi occupation of Paris in 1941.

9) Shakespeare and Company : No. 37 Rue de la Bûcherie. The original bookshop was created by Sylvia Beach in the Rue de l’Odeon (see no. 8). This present bookshop was named in honour of the original in 1964. Both bookshops have been meeting places for many lgbt and bohemian writer and artists, including Djuna Barnes, Gertrude Stein and Allen Ginsberg.

Paris Pride Marches (Marche des Fiertés)
1977 : The first official Paris Pride march took place on 25th June 1977. Lgbt groups had taken part in previous annual marches organised by trade unions, but in 1977 they organised their own independent march. Around 400 people took part.

2018 : The route of the most recent march on 30th June 2018 was highlighted in rainbow colours on Google maps for several weeks beforehand. You may like to pause in the area around the Louvre. Much of what you see is the work of architects Pierre Fontaine (1762-1853) and Charles Percier (1764-1838), who were very probably a gay couple. They invented the distinctive Imperial style for Napoleon (I’ll mention Fontaine again in a couple of days).

International Rainbow Memorial Run – 4 August 2018
The Memorial Run was created in 1984 in memory of AIDS victims and, in more recent years, breast cancer victims. More information is in my 2014 article here. The 2018 Run takes places tomorrow (Saturday 4th August). It begins outside the Hôtel de Ville at about 10.40 a.m.



UPDATE : Less than a week after I wrote this article in which I mention the plaque commemorating the last two men executed for homosexuality in France, and this happens. There’s some very stupid people out there.