SF 1860s bohemia, Quentin 1920s queers, castrating deviates...

ADDITIONS to "City Of Love" timeline,
circa 1540 - 2003

.......
circa 1540, California: Among a group of California natives,
explorer Hernando de Alarcón notices 3 or 4 men wearing women's clothing. [GAH]
.......

circa 1775-76, California: Jesuit padre Pedro Font writes of native Californians:
"Among the women I saw some men dressed like women...." [GAH]


........
circa 1847 - 1848: On the eve of the California Gold Rush, these events set the stage:
Chinese immigrants arrive in New York City; Mormons settle at Salt Lake;
feminists meet in New York state; the Communist Manifesto appears; Associated Press begins;
while liberal and nationalist uprisings occur in Europe.
Many defeated European rebels will flee to the New World,
especially to San Francisco. [CCOWH]
........
1848 January 24, northern California:
Gold is discovered near Sacramento; but the news will travel slowly. [CCOWH]
........
1848 February 2: Treaty formally ends U.S.-Mexico war.
Mexico loses Alta California. [CCOWH]
[ Question: On Feb. 2, did the treaty negotiators know about the Jan. 24 gold discovery?
Would such knowledge have affected their negotiations? ]
........
1848 August 19: New York Herald publishes news of California gold discovery;
sparking world-wide gold rush. [CCOWH]
........
1849: While the 49ers invade northern California,
Henry David Thoreau writes essay "On Civil Disobedience". [CCOWH]
.........


1852: SF: founding of Golden Era magazine.
.........
1853: San Diego, CA ( near Mexico border ): George Horatio Derby writes for
the S.D. Herald, as "John Phoenix"; pioneering the "Western-humor" style. [MT]
..........
1853: SAN FRANCISCO DIRECTOR includes "Brief Historical Sketch" by Charles P. Kimball
[ see "The San Francisco History Index, < http://www.zpub.com/sf/history > ].
Describing the Fortyniners, Kimball writes:
"In those days the humor of the people inclined them not in the slightest degree
toward intellectual pursuits...," while "drinking was a universal habit." [ MT ]
.........
circa 1858-60: Marin County: earliest known reports of male/male sex
at San Quentin prison. [ COSQ; GAH ]
.......


circa 1860s, USA: "Bohemians", gathering in New York City since the 1830s,
colonize SF. From now on, NYC and SF "constitute the poles of the American avant-garde".
[ - Ron Powers, MARK TWAIN: a life, ch. 13, p. 129 ]
[ Comment by TBL, in 2006:
This duopoly persists for a century or more. In the early 1960s, most SF bohemians deign to recognize
only NYC as SF's peer ( and NOT her superior) among U.S. cities, in terms of avant-garde leadership in arts and progressive culture. Is this view still valid in the 21st century, when many lesser cities and towns have grown their own local bohemias? Most non-queer San Franciscans still view SF as first
among U.S. urban bohemias -- a world-class refuge for brainy misfits. This opinion prevails even more strongly among queer residents of The City. San Franciscans view Berkeley and Silicon Valley as intellectual exclaves of SF, not as rivals. ]
........
1860, California: When Bret Harte reports honestly on a massacre of Indians by whites,
he gets fired from a newspaper in Unionville.
So he moves to San Francisco, where he's hired by the Golden Era. [MT]
.......
circa 1861-1864: Virginia City, Nevada: "Journalistic counterculture" flourishes
at the Territorial Enterprise; continuing the humorous "Western" style of tall tales and satire
already practiced in California periodicals. [MT] [ see 1853 ]
.......
1862: Nevada (also known as Washoe) and northern California:
After failing as a miner, Sam Clemens (Mark Twain) becomes a journalist.
[MT] [ Mark Twain: a life, by Ron Powers (2005) ]
.......
1863, circa May-June: Mark Twain visits SF; arranges to send correspondence
from Nevada to the San Francisco Morning Call. [MT]
.......
1863 December: Virginia City, Nevada:
Writer "Artemus Ward", visiting from back East, meets Mark Twain. [MT]
.......
1864 May: Mark Twain, 28, flees from Nevada to San Francisco,
to avoid a possible duel. [MT]
.......
circa 1864 September, SF: Mark Twain meets Bret Harte. [MT]
........
circa 1864-65, SF: Salons "drew upon a thriving counterculture....
The bohemian aesthetic animated San Francisco theater, music, painting and literature."
[Ron Powers, MT]
.......
circa 1866-67, California and Nevada:
Mark Twain becomes a professional lecturer. [MT]
.......
1869 September, SF: The Overland Monthly (edited by Bret Harte) publishes
"A South Sea Idyl" by queer Charles Warren Stoddard. [GAH]
.........







1906 April 18: great quake and fire leave SF in ruins.
1906 April 21: SF Examiner reports that "Golden Gate Park is a vast encampment of refugees.
Men, women and children are huddled together on the wide stretches of lawn....
They are packed so closely that it is hard to move about among them.
The rich and the poor -- all poor now -- touch elbows and talk in hushed tones...."
[ reprinted, SF Ex, 27 March 2006 ]
......
1916: S.F. Public Library builds 7th branch, in Noe Valley neighborhood.
..........
circa 1925: Marin County: At San Quentin prison, each Sunday morning,
a "Jocker's Ball" included male/male dancing.
[COSQ; GAH; E.B. Block, Sunset, July 1926 ]
........
1935: founding of SF Junior College, nicknamed "Trolley Car College". [see 1948]
.......
1936: "San Francisco" film centers on a gambling hall and beer garden.
.......
circa 1939-1940, SF: Golden Gate International Exposition, on Treasure Island.
Several large artworks from this world fair will wind up at City College of SF;
including "Pan American Unity", a mural by radical Mexican painter Diego Rivera.
.......
1941 December 7: Japan attacks Pearl Harbor, Hawai'i; forcing the U.S. to enter WW2.
Pacific phase of war moves many young men thru California ports;
including queer and/or bohemian men who will settle in SF after the war ends.
......
1944: San Quentin prison segregates queer male prisoners. [ COSQ; GAH ]
.........
1948: SF Junior College becomes "City College of San Francisco;
and adopts a new motto -- "The Truth Shall Make You Free". [ see 1935 ]
.........

1952 March, California state Assembly:
The Judiciary Committee's Subcommittee on Sex Research publishes a report;
including an article on "Sexual Deviation Research" by Dr. Karl M. Bowman,
director of Langley Porter Clinic, U.C. Medical School in SF (now UCSF).
He proposes a long-term study of the "anatomical, physiological, endocrine, psychological
and psychiatric... effects of castration in sex deviates."
During the Fifties, Dr. Bowman writes often about homosexuality. [GAH]
........

1953 August: California: ONE magazine speculates about male/male marriages --
100 years forward into an imagined future, circa 2053.
[see 1963 ] [G&LR/Worldwide, Jan./Feb. 2006]
.........
1961: publication of CHRONICLES OF SAN QUENTIN: the biography of a prison. [COSQ]
.........
1963: California: ONE magazine prints article advocating "homophile marriage".
[ see 1953 August ] [G&LR/Worldwide, Jan./Feb. 2006]
.........
1967, SF: "Dr. Dave" Smith starts Haight Ashbury Free Clinic,
treating "addicts, hippies and students."
[ SF Examiner, 20 March 2006 ]
.........
1971, SF: In The Ladder, Rita Laporte praises
"lifelong, monogamous Lesbian marriages."
[G&LR/Worldwide, Jan./Feb. 2006] [cf. 1972 March]
.........
1971, SF: The Midnight Sun, a gay bar, opens on Castro Street.
[B.A.R., 2 March 2006] [see 1981]
........
1972 March: SF: Bay Area Reporter columnist mocks same-sex marriage.
[ G&LR/Worldwide, Jan./Feb. 2006 ] [compare 1971 ]
.........
1976: publication of GAY AMERICAN HISTORY. [GAH]
.........
1979: "Escape from Alcatraz" film dramatizes an historical incident.
.........
1981, SF: Midnight Sun moves to 18th Street, near Castro St.
[B.A.R., 2 Mar. 2006] [see 1971]
.........


2003, Berkeley: publication of ALL POETS WELCOME: the Lower East Side poetry scene in the 1960s.
[ including "bicoastal" California poets ]

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( added to "City Of Love" time-line,
26 February 2006
thru 27 March 2006):

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/franhattan/message/24

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