City, Suburb, and the Changing Bounds of Lesbian and Gay Life and Politics in Metropolitan Detroit, 1945-1985

This dissertation examines the changing bounds of lesbian and gay life in metropolitan Detroit from 1945 to 1985 as exhibited in city and suburb and the politics of both. Within the city, threat of exposure and possible arrest affected the everyday lives of gay people, yet they found places to meet in a downtown cluster of white bars and in separate gay locations in black neighborhoods. Gays also met downtown in department stores, movie houses, and the Greyhound bus station, urban spaces that were interracial and were in the process of being economically and culturally supplanted. Meanwhile, the automobile served as a means of conveyance and a site for sex in itself. Gays became a moving target, though not always successful in evading police attention. Those traveling to gay sites in the city engaged in a queer sexual commute that reflected the divergent distances and patterns of gay sexual and social quest.;Over time, economic conditions and ethnic and racial migrations favored placement of gay bars in new areas of the city. Gay ownership and a new availability of affordable real estate became engines of gay growth. At the same time, the baby boom and expressways, so germane to suburban development, similarly fueled an increase in the number and variety of bars and allowed for outward relocations that, by the 1980s, butted against the city's boundaries. All the while, gay and lesbian Detroiters created distinctive living space for themselves in feminist communes and apartments, a trend that culminated in a multi-faceted gay territory of bars, street cruising, and domesticity around the Palmer Park Apartment District.;The dissertation reveals how gay and lesbian people were not only present in the suburbs, but were ingrained in the very families that so defined (and constricted) the suburban ideal. Lesbian and gay daughters and sons, friends and neighbors, even wives and husbands, lived in secrecy, masked by the presumptive heterosexuality of the suburban landscape and a premium on privacy.;However straightjacketed, gay suburbanites navigated an environment in which they were vulnerable---especially those who transgressed gender norms---and found places in which to meet for socializing and sex. Some inner-ring and older industrial suburbs, with aging buildings and, relative to surrounding communities, larger African American populations, provided conditions in which suburban gay bars could operate. Private spaces, from adolescent bedrooms to fenced-in backyards, became sanctuaries of gay exploration and socializing. While some jurisdictions displayed outright hostility, and anti-gay communities became battlegrounds, other suburbs cultivated a cosmopolitan, live-and-let-live ethos that became attractive and welcoming to gay suburbanites.;Finally, the dissertation shows how the social and cultural gay and lesbian life of city and suburb transformed emerging gay and lesbian political activism in metropolitan Detroit. Cautious homophile efforts of the 1950s and 1960s achieved mixed results. While Mattachine Detroit, situated in the city, managed to attract a mere dozen members, a similarly closeted Detroit chapter of ONE Incorporated, centered in the well-to-do suburb of Grosse Pointe, made important inroads among local liberal clergy.;The urban-based Detroit Gay Liberation Front and its successor the Detroit Gay Activists embraced a new meaning of coming out, in turn creating the city's first gay newspaper, protesting police entrapment in city parks and at a suburban shopping mall, establishing the Green Carnation community center, and staging the city's first gay pride march. A wave of gay militancy culminated in Detroit with the passage of a new city charter that protected citizens from discrimination based on sexual orientation.;As the imperative to come out reached gays who grew up or lived in the suburbs, the local movement became more moderate, mainstream, and effective within the parameters of traditional politics. Brian McNaught's hunger strike against the Detroit archdiocese energized a push for justice within the Catholic Church, while the Association of Suburban People endeavored to demonstrate gay political clout through lobbying and strategic visibility. The contrasting aims, activities, and character of Sappho Sisters Rising and Suburban Women Together highlight the generational and cultural differences between young, firebrand lesbians in the city and slightly older, settled middle-class lesbians in the suburbs.;Three lasting institutions brought divergent factions together. The pioneering radio program Gayly Speaking showcased individuals and topics representing a broad range of gay and lesbian experiences and political views. The Metropolitan Community Church of Detroit reflected different facets of the community pushing for change. The Michigan Organization for Human Rights established a structure for statewide coalition and dialogue and played a key role in passing of an Omnibus Human Rights Ordinance for Detroit.