noizemagazine - Index

noizemagazine - Summer 2008, Issue #56 - Index

man could present himself publicly
as herself. Not just men in
drag attended these functions;
women also dressed as men. Like
the molly house parties, there was
music, dancing and plenty of drinking.
The popularity of drag balls for
both straight and gay audiences
eventually led to one being held in
Madison Square Garden.
But pansies on parade in the middle
of Madison Square Garden
made the fags way too visible. The
same popularity that undermined
molly houses led to the demise of
the drag balls. With the approach
of World War II, the government
cracked down on such “subversive”
activities.
Once again, the scene went underground.
Gay male festive culture
expressed itself in rent parties (parties
held in an apartment to help
the host pay the month’s rent) and
orgiastic drugged-out get-togethers
called “buffet flats” (as in “all you
can eat”) that would include live sex
shows.
ThE BEAuTIFul SOuTh
Few people know this, but portions
of the Bible Belt are covered in
rhinestones. In the 1950s and ‘60s,
a circuit of underground parties was
the rage in the Southern U.S.
When it comes to decadence, it
should come as no surprise that
New Orleans led the way. Gay
Mardi Gras societies (called krewes)
began in the 1950s with the allgay
male Krewe of Yuga, and drag
queen contests during the festivities
became popular in the 1960s.
As expected, police raided the
krewes in the early days, but you
can’t keep a gay man on his knees
for long. Eventually, the queer
krewes became tolerated, if not accepted
outright. Notably, like other krewes,
they were racially segregated: The earliest
gay krewes were all white.
A bigger surprise is the Emma Jones
parties in Pensacola, Florida. They
began in the early ‘60s when a group
of men created an imaginary town resident
named Emma Jones so that they
could set up a post office box in her
name. Emma Jones received homoerotic
magazines to keep the men from
being arrested for ordering obscene
material over the mail.
The Emma Jones Society began celebrating
their imaginary patroness at
Fourth of July beach parties. Initially, the
gatherings were small, less than a hundred
people. But word quickly got out.
The parties grew to 200 people, then
15
The mostly gay St. Anne’s Krewe still
participates in New Orleans’ Mardi Gras.