Letters

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BUBBLE, BUBBLE, TOIL AND TROUBLE Dear friends:

Have been traveling to various Gay summer playgrounds on the eastern seaboard and what changes have occurred! In Provincetown the bars have been closed at this writing, thereby making the dunes the only place to meet people. The officials are making the boys into dune-bugs.

In Atlantic City the same situation abounds. After a Memorial Day murder involving a young gay soldier the city decided to keep out "deviates and queers." Atlantic City has been a gay hangout for over ten years. The situation looks pretty bleak for the rest of the summer.

In Cherry Grove the bars are open, but one is closely supervised by five policemen. A letter on the wall written by the State A.B.C. states that Homosexuals, Sex Deviates, BGirls and Prostitutes frequent frequent the place, thereby necessitating the presence of the police. Two raids were pulled in June. About thirty people were arrested, fined, and found their names, ages and addresses printed in the Long Island Press and given over a local radio station.

The situation here in New York seems to be easing up, due to the proximity of the elections perhaps.

Dear Dal:

Mr. G. New York, N. Y.

Greetings from old New Orleans. The court battle to force the city to return books and magazines seized from a dealer was won, but that won't stop their continuing their raids they say. It is going to take nothing short of cutting their throats to stop them. I have never seen such a bunch of Mid-Victorian diehards die so hard.

Just received the QUARTERLY #8, "The

Right of Association." Wow!! I have only skimmed through it, and read a few pages here and there, but I know enough to know that it is the answer to lots of my prayers. Then comes that lovely article in ONE (July, 1960) by the Florida judge.

We here in New Orleans are getting sick and tired of being pushed around and harrassed. There are several of us who have decided to get out and go to the bars, and should we be a part of some raid we will pursue counter legal action to the hilt. We live here and we are determined not to move away to other places where the situation is no better, if not worse. The only way to stop this and make New Orleans a safe place to live is to stay right here and fight it out.

Dear friends:

Mr. S.

New Orleans, Louisiana

The Eastern Seaboard

"touchiness" has

reached Provincetown too. One of the most popular places for straight and gay didn't get their license renewal this year.

Responsible town fathers objected "because a parking lot is near my home and I hear high-pitched screaming and it annoys me so I vote NO." Two other well-known places had their licenses suspended supposedly because State Cops were propositioned and appalled at the carryings-on. Numerous arrests in both places.

Rumors are rampant that there will be midnight inspections of rooming houses, as well as pictures taken-of what? One of the churches had a bulletin announcing it as a parish religious duty to attend Town Meetings to vote against "homosexuals who are trying to make Provincetown their haven of lewdness." A general feeling of caution, concern, worry and fright seems to pervade the

town.

I understand that a well-known bar in Philadelphia was raided twice and the boys carted off to jail for "frequenting a disorderly place." New York City is still closed down fairly tight, so the streets are busy.

Dear sirs:

Mr. L. Brooklyn, New York

Such amazing work as has been done by your organization should be rewarded ten thousand times more than the amount which I enclose. Wish there was something I could do here, something concrete to knuckle down to. It's a wonder a moment in history has come to pass that we even have something to give to.

Mr. T. Miami, Florida

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