Mapping the Gay Guides’ website hosts an interactive map, where the hangouts from Damron’s books are transformed into little blue pins. His collections, originally known as the “Address Book,” became a survival guide for queer road trippers, comparable to the Jim Crow-era Negro Motorist Green Book, which guided Black travelers through the country.
He then published a series of travel guides based on that research beginning in 1965. Now, as a trained historian and professor of American Studies at California State University, Fullerton (CSUF), Gonzaba is uncovering and preserving hidden histories like this one through a digital project called “ Mapping the Gay Guides.” The project, which is co-led by Amanda Regan, a lecturer in the Department of History and Geography at Clemson University, uses a series of travel guides published by Bob Damron to map historic queer spaces across the United States.ĭamron was a traveling businessman who took note of the gay or at least gay-friendly bars, bathhouses, theaters, bookstores, restaurants, and shops he discovered on his many trips.
Louisans Mapped Monuments of Their City, and Uncovered Surprising Connections How Should Minneapolis’s George Floyd Plywood Murals Be Preserved?.Once a Bus That Transported Incarcerated People Around Rikers, Now a Gorgeous Work of Community Art.Dyke Bars are Vanishing, but Dyke Beer Wants to Reverse the Trend.