Gay bars orange county
The insensitive coverage by some of the county press brought action that forever changed how the media writes about the community.įirst Annual Laguna Pride Weekend was sponsored by Laguna Outreach. The UCI GLBSU and UCI Department of Studio Art hosted the county’s First Annual Festival of Lesbian and Gay Film and VideoĪ man is beaten in Laguna Beach by a carload of South County high school students out on a gay-bashing spree.Īlan Schwalbe, a gay activist, was found slain in the kitchen of his Santa Ana Heights home.
The first issue of The Blade, an alternative publication serving Long Beach and Orange County, hits the news stand Over 2,000 people attended.įive member of ACT UP/OC leave 170 pounds of steer manure outside the Anaheim office of Lou Sheldon’s “Traditional Values Coalition.” The first Annual Festival and Parade, Orange County Cultural Pride was held in Santa Ana. Vincent Chalk, an OC middle school teacher who was fired because he had AIDS, wins reinstatement in a wrongful-termination ruling. (It was not completed lifted until 1989)ĪIDS Services Foundation (ASF) was established. Gay architect Philip Johnson designed it.ĪIDS was first identified in Orange County.Ĭourts strike down the 27-year ban on same-sex dancing at Disneyland.
When Disney realized it was a gay organization, they cancelled live music, closed the dance floors, and instructed security that “courtesy was optional.”Ĭrystal Cathedral in Garden Grove is dedicated. They later become lovers and left the organization.ġ5,000 people attend the first-ever “gay night” at Disneyland. Michael Bussee and Gary Cooper founded Exodus International, a “reparative therapy” group at Anaheim’s Melodyland Christian Center. He was pistol whipped by two deputies after being identified as gay. The owner of the Climax bar was arrested by Orange County Sheriffs for offering after hours dancing at his club. John Rule hosts what will eventually become the Center OC in his home.Īl Potts, owner of he Garden Grove gay bar “Mug”, was killed and mutilated. Sam Warren published the first Orange County gay newsletter, Focus The newspaper prints their names, ages, home addresses and occupations before they are ever convicted.Ĭhrist Chapel MCC becomes the first gay and lesbian organization in Orange County. The Santa Ana Register (now The OC Register) reports a “crackdown of suspected homosexuals” who had allegedly been propositioning undercover police officers in the Newport Pier area. It has been community stalwart ever since.
Police sweeps of Laguna Beach gave the city the nickname of “Fag City.”Īrt Frink and Harry Moon open the Cottage Restaurant in Laguna Beach. It remained open until 2003, marking it as the oldest continuously operating lesbian bar in the county.Ī Tent City existed in downtown Laguna Beach and was very popular with the gay summer crowd. The Happy Hour, a lesbian bar, opens in Garden Grove. Thinly veiled as a crowd control measure, this ban remained until 1985. Only two years after Disneyland opened, the theme park adopted a ban on same-sex “shimmying”. Like many of the early gay bars, it was straight during the daylight hours and gay after dark. The South Seas Bar opens in Laguna Beach (it is later named the “Boom Boom Room”). – sample data from the Orange County LGBT Time Line Project, courtesy of B.L.