March 04, 2010 News & Commentary » Our Town

Hyde Park & Kenwood Issue: Dance for Your Rights

Hyde Park was a bastion of the Stonewall-era gay-rights movement in Chicago.

By Sam Worley

Fred W. McDarrah/Getty Images

The New York chapter of the Gay Liberation Front in 1970

A few months after Stonewall—the 1969 riots in New York incited by a police raid on a gay bar—an ad for a gay roommate appeared in the University of Chicago Maroon. The man who'd placed it was former student Henry Weimhoff—and the responses he received would end up inspiring him to place another, seeking activists to help him form a local chapter of the Gay Liberation Front, an organization that had started in New York in response to Stonewall.

The Chicago GLF was much more militant than any of the city's previous gay activist groups. The first one, the Chicago Society for Human Rights, founded in 1924 and thought to be the earliest documented "homosexual emancipation organization" in the United States, was almost apologetic in its quest for fair treatment of gays. Its official mission was "to promote and to protect the interests of people who by reasons of mental and physical abnormalities are abused and hindered in the legal pursuit of happiness." It was fairly short-lived: after publishing two issues of its newletter, Friendship and Freedom, the society was shut down by police and its founder, Henry Gerber, arrested.

The 1950s and '60s saw local chapters of two national organizations, the lesbian Daughters of Bilitis and the gay Mattachine Society. Rather than social agitation they focused on support, opting for secrecy in an era when the opposite could have serious consequences. Police raids on gay bars were frequent, and arrestees would often find their names printed the following day in local newspapers, jeopardizing jobs and livelihoods.

By the late 60s, more radical groups, like Mattachine Midwest, had formed locally and were responding more aggressively to police harassment. The high-profile closing of Chicago gay bar the Trip in 1968 led to a legal challenge that went all the way to the Illinois Supreme Court (which ruled in favor of the bar).

Stonewall, though, was the real flash point—in New York and nationwide—and the Gay Liberation Front chapters formed in its aftermath were far more abrasive and demanding than previous groups. The manifesto of the national organization called for the abolition of "existing institutions" of oppression, among them heterosexuality. And its statement that "We reject society's attempt to impose sexual roles and definitions of our nature" was a far cry from the "mental and physical abnormalities" to which the fledgling Society for Human Rights had confessed.

It was an article in the Village Voice that clued Weimhoff in to the existence of the Gay Liberation Front; acquaintance Murray Edelman, who was a U. of C. grad student at the time and would become the cofounder of the local GLF chapter, encouraged him to place the Chicago Maroon ad to find members.

Once formed, the Chicago GLF's earliest actions appeared to be a direct retort to the police raids common in that era: the group hosted a series of dances for same-sex couples.

The first, a small mixer held in January 1970 on the U. of C. campus, was timidly promoted and sparsely attended. Emboldened by the lack of police harassment, though, Weimhoff organized a subsequent on-campus event that attracted around 600 people. Mark Sherkow, who'd been a graduate student at U. of C. in the late 60s, remembers the scene at the university's Pierce Tower: "It was packed," Sherkow says. "I wasn't ready to dance with anybody—I just sat in a chair and watched." Other students, he says, were "kind of gawking into the room, and laughing." Still the police didn't come.

Full text

1 2 next »

Tags: Our Town, Stonewall, Hyde Park, Kenwood, University of Chicago, Gay Liberation Front, Chicago GLF, gay activism, Henry Weimhoff, Chicago Society for Human Rights, Friendship and Freedom, Henry Gerber, Mattachine Society, Daughters of Bilitis, Mattachine Midwest, Murray Edelman, Mark Sherkow, Pierce Tower, Renee Hanover, Chicago Gay Alliance, Marie J. Kuda, Lesbian Writers' Conference, Valerie Taylor, Rita Mae Brown, Rubyfruit Jungle, Women Loving Women, GLBTQ, Chicago gay history

Comments (3) RSS

Showing 1-3 of 3

Add a comment

Mr. Worley's article "Dance for Your Rights" while brief and interesting contained some incorrect information and failed to cite some sources. For example: regarding the 1970 citywide dance at the Coliseum, he notes 2,000 dancers came "but the police didn't." In fact there was considerable police presence at the event (see contemporary sources and John D'Emilio's "Let's Dance" in Our & Proud in Chicago (2008). Further, the pioneering publication "Women Loving Women: An Annotated Bibliography of Women Loving Women in Literature" was published in 1974 and given out to the participants of the first Lesbian Writers Conference (not 1975 as Worley notes). The five Lesbian Writers Conferences held in Hyde Park (with attendees from all over the country, Canada "and even Chicago's North side"), were remembered in "Women Loving, Women Writing : A Brief Look at the Lesbian Writers Conference, Chicago 1974-78" in Outlines, Sep 30 1998 pp, 18-19 and an abridged article in Out & Proud. The quote re: McCormick Place and the ERA was from a contemporary (1975) article in GayLife and is uncited by Worley. [In the early 1970s I had the good fortune to co-contribute, with Michael Bergeron, an extensive Reader article on Chicago's gay life.] Marie J. Kuda

Posted by Marie J. Kuda on March 7, 2010 at 12:53 PM | Report this comment

Hey Marie,

Thanks for commenting. Since you were around for most of this, I don't doubt that you're right. That said, I wanted to clarify the sources of some of the information in the piece. One of the places I learned about your book "Women Loving Women" was in an entry you wrote in Bonnie Zimmerman's "Lesbian Histories and Cultures: An Encyclopedia," which describes the book as an "outgrowth" of the Lesbian Writers' Conference. I found a listing for its publication date, at openlibrary.org, as 1975 by Womanpress.

Regarding your quote, I read it in a piece by John D'Emilio. That article, "Writing for Freedom," is in the Windy City Times archives here: http://www.windycitymediagroup.com/ARTICLE….

Finally, when I wrote "About 2,000 dancers from all over Chicago came, but the police didn't," I simply meant that the police didn't raid the dance. That was sloppily-worded, though, and I apologize for it. --Sam W.

Posted by Sam Worley on March 9, 2010 at 10:04 PM | Report this comment

Sam Worley: Hi-just noticed your comment on a google search--to clarify: Women Loving Women was published in 1974 under the imprint of Lavender Press (offshoot of Lavender Woman, a Chicago lesbian newspaper that ran from 1971-1976) a makeshift publisher of a few monographs and some poetry. I held copyright and technically "reprinted" under my Womanpress imprint in 1975 (who knew edition, from imprint, from reprint--in those days we were all flying by the seat of our pants). The Zimmerman entry ("Chicago, Illinois" pp. 158-159) does not give WLWs date; so Open Library was/is not aware of the earlier printing in 1974. Marie J. Kuda

Posted by Marie J. Kuda on June 6, 2010 at 4:46 PM | Report this comment

Browse News & Commentary

Browse Music

Browse Movies

Browse Arts & Events

Browse Food & Drink

Browse Blogs

Browse Straight Dope

Browse Classifieds

Browse Rentals

Browse Jobs

Browse Matches

Browse Best Of Chicago

Hyde Park & Kenwood Issue: Dance for Your Rights

Hyde Park was a bastion of the Stonewall-era gay-rights movement in Chicago.

Article Tools

Related Stories

For decades now, most of Chicago's political independents have emerged from Hyde Park and Kenwood.

Building bikes, visiting patients, leading Robie House tours, and more

A tour of some of the neighborhoods' lesser-known architectural gems

Independent politics. Aggressive urban renewal. Ambitious architecture. More bookstores than bars. And the 800-pound gargoyle: the University of Chicago.

The University of Chicago may not be the only force that shaped Hyde Park and Kenwood, but it's the biggest.

The U. of C. wants to park bulldozers on a Woodlawn community garden, and it won't take "let's talk about this" for an answer.

Both Chicago improv and the off-Loop theater movement have their roots in Hyde Park. Sheldon Patinkin was there.

Museums, fairs, a transitory art project, and more

Where the locals drink

A roundup of neighborhood classes, schools, and more

Neighborhood GLBTQ centers and services

Bookstores, lecture series, and more

Doc Films and the University of Chicago Film Studies Center

Music venues, festivals, series, ensembles, and more

Promontory Point, Jackson Park, and more

Where to go in the birthplace of off-Loop theater

The Medici, Valois, Park 52, Backstory Cafe, and more

Bike stores, high-quality cookware, a "potted-plant gallery," and more

Comments (3) RSS

Author Archives

Trap Door Theatre presents a free performance of A Couple of Poor Polish-Speaking Romanians tonight at 8 PM in FXK Theater.

Part of "Phenomena," on display at Zg Gallery.

Tonight at 8 PM, the Double Door hosts Jon Griffin's Comedy Night and Zinger Showcase.

Latest in Our Town

Invest in your community today, says former banker Ben Wong, and spend your retirement singing Elvis songs.

On the road with a local artist's mobile tribute to the King of Pop

Wrigleyville, June 9, 2010

Popular Events

User Submitted Chicago Baby & Toddler Expo @ Renaissance Schaumburg Convention Center

Recent Comments

Re: When Hyperlocal Journalism Does Its Job

Re: Savage Love: July 29, 2010

Re: The Picture Police

From the Archive

User Submitted
Chicago Baby & Toddler Expo @ Renaissance Schaumburg Convention Center