Confronting a Gay Historian

30:09And you could just go in and let your shoulders down and not have to be on guard, right? And you didn't have to worry about covering anything up. and it was also a way to sort of keep tabs on the community because if you went regularly, you would get to know people by sight. And then when those people stopped showing up for a few weeks, there was concern that, well, maybe they're sick. And that was, of course, the euphemism, just being sick. That's how people talked about AIDS. Yeah. Yeah.

30:48and then they'd show up again. So you could read a little easier and it's like, okay, maybe they were just on a trip or something, but they're okay.

30:59And you're right. It was a quasi kind of community center because at the same time you had, as time went on, you had activists standing there handing out condoms and explaining why you needed to wear them and how to wear them appropriately and just the importance of safe sex practices. And that's where a lot of the fundraising was happening, was in the bars, fundraising for organizations like Good Samaritan Project. Because the community tended to turn to drag queens to raise money because they're very good at visibly raising money. They're walking around with dollar bills in their hands, right?

31:38Yeah. So that was one of the places that these orgs went to to raise money regularly. And the queens responded, of course, positively and did a lot in the early years to fund these organizations. And where are the lesbians in all this? The lesbians, well, you know, in a city like this, there were enough bars that there were lesbian bars. So over on Main Street between 50th and 51st was one of the primary bars. It was the Cabaret. And then two doors down was Billie Jean's, which was a lesbian bar. I'm sure it was. It absolutely was. Hey, I believe you.

32:28But they were around. They were also participating in the fundraising. They were helping to take care of folks who were sick, either formally or informally. They were volunteering at the orgs like the Samaritan Project. So they stepped up. They stepped up and did what needed to be done. Yeah. Yeah. And I have so many questions I want to ask you. Womantown is something that a lot of people might not know about. It's very Kansas City specific. Don't tune out even if you don't care about Kansas City. This is interesting, I promise. Will you talk a little bit about Womantown? Sure. Womantown was an initiative that started in the very early 1990s to create, as they build it, an intentional urban women's community, Women with a Y.

33:25basically what it was was an effort to create a safe neighborhood as they as as the founders described as a place where they felt safe walking hand in hand down the street and it was in a neighborhood if you know Kansas City from 25th to 31st Gillum to Troost and it was a neighborhood at that point that was just on the cusp of decline. And so these two women came in and started buying property and then encouraged other women to come either buy property or rent property in the neighborhood. And if they bought property that needed some rehab, the members of Womantown would collectively work together to rehab the property.

34:06And along the way, they established opportunities for social engagement. They did trips and they participated in things like marches and pride and all that kind of stuff. And it turned out to be really quite successful and really, really resonates with the women who lived there. Yeah. Yeah. So these lesbians were going to like women's fairs and stuff, right? Like women's festivals. Sure, sure. And flyering and being like, move to Kansas City, we're making lesbian town. And they were advertising. They were advertising internationally. and they got correspondence from all across the world. Because, you know, it's an interesting take on promotion of the city.

34:50Yeah. Because they're promoting it to a very specific audience. And so in the materials that we have about Womantown, you see a lot of these letters from women all across the country just inquiring about the scene and what it took to be here. Yeah. Yeah. But the founders are these two amazing women. They're now down in Georgia. And I guess it was last year we put up a historic marker commemorating Womantown. Because it's a very interesting and unique take on the whole idea of lesbian separatism, which really gained ground in the years immediately after Stonewall in the early 70s. Yeah. And what's interesting to me about it is that Womantown was 20 years later, and it was in the middle of a city.

35:41Because the post-Domewall efforts were very rural. Get off the grid, get out of the patriarchy, and they were out in the woods, basically remaking their world. Whereas here in Kansas City, it was just adapting. and we thought it was important enough to commemorate by installing this historic marker and we wanted to do it while a lot of the women were still around. So we had a really great event last summer, an unveiling, and a number of the residents were in attendance and it was a really fun blowout. Yeah. Yeah. I can't believe that's already been last year. Yeah. Feels like yesterday. Yeah. But y 'all were also having, what was it, the queer community in Ken City was throwing like a big picnic in the country every year?

36:30What was that thing? That was in the 70s. Yeah. So there was a group that was called the 10-400 Club. And we don't have a lot of reliable information about it. But from my understanding, the name comes from the address of one of the members, which at that point would have been 104th and something. And in the 70s, that was all country. because that was south of the highway. And so it was a social club, and it was a philanthropic club. They raised money for different kinds of community, broader community things like Toys for Tots, that kind of thing. And they would regularly have what they call pasture parties out at a couple of farms of the members.

37:16and we have some footage in the collection of a big giant party like it looks like about 200 people and you know it's a it's it's a it's a party out in a pasture and so everybody's sitting on their lawn chairs or on their blankets but they uh there's also footage of them doing these really quintessential kind of midwestern things there are sack races there's a big giant egg toss and then the film cuts to this sort of weird makeshift stage with this lesbian rock band playing. Let's go. And then it cuts to an even smaller platform where this well-known black drag queen performs out there in the middle of the farm.

38:09It's really, really kind of astounding And it's a really cool example of what it was like for Midwestern queers. And these films are from about 1976 in the 70s. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, we've always been here. Yeah. I think that's the stuff. I love learning about that stuff because it just like growing up in, you know, small town northern Missouri, I didn't know an openly gay person until I was in my 20s. Right. You know, openly. I didn't know anyone that I proclaimed as gay. I have my suspicions, but they're probably right. Yeah. I, yeah. There's at least one science teacher that I'm like, the haircut told a story, you know?

38:50Um, but yeah, I, I just think it's, it's feels so good to me to hear about how long we've been here and, and, uh, to think about the fact that for so long, I think a lot of rural queer people experience this feeling of like, I am, I don't belong here. This place is not for me. Right. And then to get evidence that it's like, well, that's just not true. Right. That's just not true. Because the thing about growing up and coming of age in the Midwest is that you're really tied to the landscape. I mean, that's one of the reasons we like living in the Midwest is because of the ties that we have here and that aren't necessarily queer ties.

39:31But there is that tension between that and the fact that there are many, many people who don't want you here. Well, there are many, many people who don't want you anywhere. So that's just going somewhere else isn't going to make that any different or go away. And it is nice to have the validation that we've always been around and always been in these spaces. Yeah. Yeah. Well, and I don't want to give... Yeah, that's why I... Home is so important to me because I don't want to give it to the people who want us to leave. Right. I don't want to give it to the... I don't want to cede that to them. The homophobes and racists and misogynists don't get to have the Midwest.

40:13Right. To me, I'm like, we can't leave and abandon and just all of us go away because they don't get to own Missouri. I'm also from here. Right. And the queer kids who are coming of age now need to see queer people in Missouri, in Kansas, and know that they are here. And that it's okay to be queer and be here. Yeah. Yeah. Okay, so I'm backtracking a little bit. You're here in the mid-'80s. Mm-hmm. And when do you meet your husband? We met in December of 1988 at a bar. Which bar? Cabaret, of course. Cabaret, of course. The lesbian bar? No, that was Billie Jean's. Oh, sorry. Oh, you were telling me in reference to gotcha, gotcha, gotcha.

41:03Right. Yes, I thought they were both lesbian bars, but not lesbian. Oh, no. No, Cabaret was a men's bar. So you guys met at the bar in 1988? Yes. And just come on. Give me the good stuff. What happened? So he was there with his partner at the time. Boo. And a friend of theirs.

41:24And I had had enough libations that I had... I hated going to bars because I just stood there by myself. and so i'd get drunk enough to then just go dance by myself um and so i was dancing by myself and and their friend sort of approached me on the dance floor and gestured if he could dance and i said sure and uh so we ended up connecting and then his name was craig the four of us uh started running around together as two couples, as friends. And then my husband Christopher and I, after about a year of that, realized separately that we were not with the people we should be with. And so... Drama.

42:19It was drama. It was total drama. And they exited the picture, and Christopher and I connected just sort of kind of begrudgingly on the rebound. And we're like, okay, let's just see what this is going to be like. And then 34 years later, here we are. That's so sweet. I love that. I love that. So how long were you guys friends before you, the breakups happened and you officially? About two years. Yeah. Yeah. God. yeah it was two years of drama I was gonna say I'm like that's excruciating yeah it was a lot because each of the partners had their own issues mostly from their families actually know that I think about it because his partner was a Syrian who had lots of challenges and my partner had had lots of challenges from his family so yeah yeah and then you guys linked up yep it's been 34 years yeah that's crazy does that feel crazy to you yes it does feel crazy you know and it's just like any relationship you it's work and you work through stuff and then you reach a point where as we say it's it's too much work to train a new one so

43:48you just ride with it Yeah.

43:53What's your favorite thing about him?

43:57He's so smart and he makes me laugh. Yeah. Yeah. He is so smart. He is really, really smart. It's crazy. Yeah. I mean, you are too. It makes sense. But when I met him, I was like, this guy's brilliant. Yeah, he really is. Yeah. Yeah. What is, is there another quality, Smart and Makes You Laugh are two great ones. Is there a quality that, because you know, you guys, how old are you in 1988? In 88, 27? In 89, yeah, I'm 27. Yeah. So you're young. You've got options. You're in Kansas City. There's a few gay bars. Things are going on. There's gay guys here. You could have also moved somewhere else and been single if you wanted to.

44:36Right. Is there a quality about Christopher that made you think, this is what I should be doing? This is the person I should be with? Not immediately. Yeah. you learn that you kind of learn that as you go along in the early years because he's an artist, he's a visual artist and I had always had a thing about our boys and I really liked that idea of being with an artist and helping to support an artist and the work that they do because the kids I ran around with in college were all artists and I am not I'm not and I just admire it

45:20and I think you realize as time goes on, it's like, okay, so this is where it can work and this is where it fits and this is why we should continue. And we both came from similar backgrounds, which I think helped. We both came from small towns, he in Oklahoma and me in southwest Missouri because I grew up in a smaller town south of Springfield. And just that shorthand of that experience, of that life experience, also contributed to our understanding of each other and why we do things the way we do. Yeah. Yeah. Hmm. Well, that's beautiful. Thank you. I love that. And he's also a very good artist.

46:05Yeah. By the way. Yeah. I can see why. I can see what you were picking up on. Yeah. I see it all. I see what both of you are picking up on. You emailed me a picture recently of you from back in the day, and I said, I know that's right. I said, damn right, Christopher. Come on. She told me that you got hired at some restaurant job because the owner wanted to look up with you. Oh, yeah. He wanted it in my pants. That's the only reason he hired me. I had no experience whatsoever. He hired me as a cook. Yeah, I know. That's right. He said, you'll figure the stove out. Get in here. I'll know to turn it off.

46:40Yeah. Yeah, well, God, I left my stove on all night last night. I don't even know if we've said that on here yet. I didn't even use it. I just bumped into it and turned the gas on and then woke up this morning and was like, my house smells funny. We'll see what happens. I don't know. I'm having a good time. I hope I live longer, but if the stove takes me. Well, yeah. Stay away from the stove then.

47:07Okay. What else do I want to ask you? Well, God, there's so many things. You work with college students a lot as a teacher, professor. What is going on with the AI shit? What are we thinking about this? I'm scared. I honestly don't know. Okay. Because in our little niche, because we're dealing with old books and we're dealing with archival materials, we're pretty removed from the AI and it's not going to take over our work so none of us are worried about it and then in terms of the classroom I'm a very casual and laid back teacher you're a cool professor and I because I'm an adjunct and I get paid no money and so I'm not going to be as intense as like a full-time teaching faculty member.

48:02And so I give them very simple assignments. All they have to do is two film reviews.

48:10And this semester especially, I could tell that they either copied and pasted it or they had some computer, some of them had some computer spit it out for them. Yeah. you know as i tell them the first the first class we have i'm not there to grade their writing skills or to meet the student learning outcomes or any of that crap i'm there as their gelder to share these stories with them and if they choose to go down a path that isn't as challenging as it could be for them that's their choice they get less out of the class but I'm not going to track it down because one semester I did call a girl out on her plagiarism and it ended up being a crap ton more work for me as the instructor and I was like I don't have time for that so I just got to shift the burden of responsibility back to them and you know it's however much they want to get out of the class they'll put into it yeah yeah it makes me sad though for a million reasons i mean the ai stuff i'm at my fucking wits end already with it i'm so mad about it i we just got another offer yesterday i didn't even tell you guys this we just got another offer yesterday to do a huge ad campaign for an ai really oh they're offering their well they're consent manufacturing right now right that's what i want a lot of people platforms to understand is they are they're in the process right now of manufacturing consent for this technology and when they come and offer people with cool platforms or audiences or whatever, whatever that means, and they offer you an outsized amount of money, which they are, all of them, they offer you hundreds of thousands of dollars to do an ad deal for them, they are doing that because they need your help to manufacture consent for this.

50:05So that when they use this to take everybody's jobs, when they use this to destroy, it's already ruining our brains. We already have, the shit just got here, and we already have research about what it's doing to the human brain. it's making us it's going to make us dumber it's going to steal jobs from people that we already don't have to give away right and i just feel insane about it but i it makes me even more sad in a class like queer history which is presumably a lot of queer kids right that i'm like why take it why take it if you don't want to this is important stuff and this is actually like the the privilege and the benefit and the joy of being a student is that there's this time in your life where you get to dedicate many hours a day to just thinking.

50:46Right. That will never happen for you again. Right. That's so exciting. Right. And I know that I totally, I totally slacked off in parts of undergrad. And there are totally things that I didn't, you know, care for. I didn't appreciate the way that I should have. Right. That's just part of being 20. But there's something more happening now, I think. And maybe that's just because I'm 30. And maybe I'm just becoming one of those guys who's like, it's different. But I do think there's a difference between phoning in a 12-page essay but still writing it yourself and just completely turning it over to a computer.

51:18Yeah. I do feel that there's a difference in that. Yeah. And, you know, if I had my druthers, I wouldn't even assign them the two film reviews. Yeah. And they're only three pages, three to five pages. It's like, come on, kids. And I tell them what to do. Yeah. but I have to just to meet the needs of the school. And yeah, to your point about it being the only time in your life where you are going to be able to do this, where you and a group of other people are going to read the same thing at the same time and then come together and learn more about it. take advantage of that and dive in and be a student.

52:06The whole, the whole point of being a student is that you don't know. You're not, I don't expect you to know this. That's why you're taking a class like this or any class. And it's okay to not know. That's why you're here. And then spend the time learning it. And then you walk away knowing it. Yeah. Yeah. What would you, what would you tell what do you wish that younger queer people knew? Like what do you wish that younger queer people knew or understood that you think they might not? I wish that they knew more about their history and quite honestly I wish the community as a whole had better infrastructures for making

52:59intergenerational connections, which we don't. We're really, really bad about that. And we just don't have any systems for connecting older queers with younger ones to help them along and to guide them and help them through, you know, most cultures have rituals around specific ages or rituals around specific points in life, and we don't have that. And I'm trying to figure out a way as, again, a gelder to put that into place where we can. I'm actually meeting with a group next month that deals with queer seniors. Because I did a series of talks in May at the Artists Coalition, Kent City Artists Coalition.

53:52And the audience was really diverse in terms of age, from senior seniors to very, very young people. And in our conversations over the course of the series, the young people were really, really interested in how can we replicate this kind of makeup of an audience for our own organizations. And so we were all kind of brainstorming ways to do that. and I think there's, just like there's a hunger for the history, I think there's a hunger for making those connections.

54:26I think one of the big barriers is the technology divide because just as you said, you're on this thing all the time. You're immersed in digital all the time and many people my age and older are not. And so there's a real true disconnect there, and it's just kind of figuring out ways to overcome that. I think people are starving for community in general right now, and connection in general. But I do think, I can't speak for older queer folks, but I know that younger queer folks would be excited at the prospect of having an intergenerational queer friendship. I make a lot of new friends, and you're one of my favorite people I've met in years.

55:08We have such great conversations. I just love hanging out with you. you have probably the best advice on boys i i feel so bad for you every time we get together i've got a new boy problem for you to solve that's all right take advantage yeah i'm like it's yeah i just think it's beautiful to have those kind of friendships and i think yeah i'm i'm also interested in figuring out how we can do that yeah um and i also want to like you've taught me so much about like queer people in kansas city even that that did so much for our community and like made Kansas city a viable place for an openly gay person to live period.

55:45Right. That are now struggling or now have this or that. And I'm like, I want to help. I'll do anything, you know, that you were helping that, uh, person, that older lesbian move out of her house. Right. And she was such a, you know, they're just things like that where I'm like, I would show up and move boxes for a day or whatever, you know? Um, yeah, I think that's, I think knowing our history is really important and I would, I would like to help make more intergenerational connections. Um, There's just a lot of hope in that also. Yeah. I think it's a real source of hope. On both sides, quite honestly.

56:17Because for the older generation, Grindr is a mystery. Grindr is a mystery. Back in the day. Grindr is a mystery, by the way. And so I just think it helps us to understand what you all are having to contend with, that we never would have, that we never did. Yeah. And what we don't have to contend with because you did. Right. Yeah. Right. Yeah. That's really beautiful. That's a good point. Good job, Caleb.

56:55Okay. Question for you. Uh-huh. And I, you know, this might be annoying and you don't have to answer it because I know sometimes, anyway, you're in a beautiful long marriage. We talked about Christopher, who we love. Shout out Christopher and his garden that he's obsessed with. What do you think is the secret? What is the secret to a good, long, maybe not even secret? What is your advice for a good, long, healthy relationship?

57:22We have always said that we were lucky in that we each married someone who likes to be by themselves. and I think just making room for the other person in those kinds of ways, whatever it is, whether it's an outgoing personality, then you just make room for that, or whether it's a little more sedated and introspective kind of personality. and just again in the early phases just kind of figuring out what you're dealing with and what's in front of you and if you want to make it work then you try to find ways to accommodate that and make room for that yeah that makes sense to me what's so true to you Stuart?

58:23what's so true to me is that, I don't know, to be honest, your phones are crack. And crack is whack. Yeah. Okay, say more. What do you think? It's bad for us, the phones? But fun, you have to admit. I presume they're fun. There's got to be some draw. No, they're horrible. I hate them. Yeah, I mean, because Christopher has one.

59:00And people are on them all the time. And when they're forced to be off of them, like in a classroom, you can see them getting itchy. Yeah. It's just like, I need my opium. I need my crack.

59:15And it's astounding to me. It's astounding to me just how much people give over to their devices, especially in terms of time. Yeah. Yeah. The crazy thing is everyone knows it. That's the thing is it's not hidden. Everyone – you would – my friends who spend the most time on their phone, and I am not innocent of this. I spend a lot of time on the phone. I think I have a pretty balanced relationship with it all things considered. But even still, it's bad. I am bad at it. But everyone, my friends who are on the phone the most will go like, oh, I know I'm wasting so much of my life on this thing. And we can't stop.

59:51It's nuts. Yeah. It's really nuts. Yeah. doom scrolling put it shut up put it down yeah i've had it with this my friends be like oh i was up till 4 a.m doom scrolling shut it off are you 12 right stop it that that i can't understand i'm like when when i start to feel bad i do at least put it down no tea no shade but it just it's it is insane to me that we all know how bad it is and we're all still doing it all the time right i am with you on that because you can just put it away you should really only be on your phone for like an hour and a half a week and it's Thursdays when my show comes out.

1:00:23Other than that, I think read a book, get out there. Go for a walk. Go for a walk. Maybe listen to So True and then I think as long as you listen to all my ads and don't click through them and maybe use the discount code, then you should log off a little bit. Right. Yeah. Right. That'd be good for the culture. Priorities. It is. I've talked about this a lot, but it is funny. I do think we should all get off the phones. I'm actively trying to. I hate the internet. I don't like it. I don't put God bless Virginia. She does all my posting. It is not me that you're interacting with on there. I've been very open about that.

1:00:58And yet it is my job. And so I'm like, don't shut it off entirely. Oh, no. It's a weird conundrum because that's how you do promotion. That's how you have to do promotion now. Yeah. And that's something that we have faced with the archive because I'm not on anything. And so as a result, it's really hard to promote stuff because the primary tools I don't use. We don't use. Which is that you're not at. Yeah. So. What do you need in your work? Do you need donations to the archive? What do you need most? You've got a captive audience here. We have launched a campaign to endow a position that is dedicated to Glamour.

1:01:51Because our thinking, because I've got about four years left before I retire. And the thinking being that if we have a position that is funded with money that doesn't come from the state, that removes the threat of the state getting involved with what it is we're trying to do. that gives a buffer to the collection. AKA, if they were funding it, they could just cut it all together. And the way things are going, they likely would. Yeah. Yeah. It's not out of the realm of possibility. And so that's our focus right now, my dean's focus. And by extension, my focus is to sort of generate awareness about that campaign and try and raise that money.

1:02:39she wants to try to do it before I retire I'm not sure that will happen because it would be helpful for a new person to overlap and this job is all about relationships and it would benefit them to take advantage of me being still around so I can introduce them to people to donors and other people just to help them get their footing we'll see we'll put the link for the donation you'll have to send it to us I'll make a donation for sure and anybody else who wants to make a donation can do that. I appreciate that. But guess what? I have one more segment for you. Uh-oh. This is a game. Okay. Speaking of donations, I'm going to read you 15 statements.

1:03:18Okay. Okay, you're going to tell me as quickly as you can after each one if you think what I just said is true or false. Okay. If you get 10 or more correct, Stuart, I'm going to give you 50 US dollars. It's a game show. You ready? I want Canadian dollars. No. I'm an American, goddammit. actually let me check the conversion rate on that you might be able to get your way um okay you ready okay keanu reeves has a twin brother false that is false oh you were quick too penicillin is an antihistamine false false it's an antibiotic burger king was originally called insta burger king true that is true the band kiss had four original members false it's true Chase Bank's headquarters is in Atlanta.

1:04:02False. False. New York City. Miller Lite came out in 1973. True. That is true. Pistol dueling used to be an Olympic sport. True. That is true. Abdominal pain is the number one thing people visit the ER for. True. True. Andy Reid, head coach of the Kansas City Chiefs, was born and raised in Madison, Wisconsin. False. False. Do you know what it was? No. Los Angeles. The largest indoor theme park in Europe is in Moscow. True. True. Penguin Bay is the capital of Antarctica. True. False. It has no capital. Julia Roberts has been nominated for 10 Golden Globes. True. True. Game of Thrones ran for eight seasons.

1:04:37True. True. Blue Whales mate for life. True. False. The Kansas City women's soccer team is called the Fountain Years. False. False. It's the current. How do you do? 11. 11. 11. Oh, 12. Yeah. Oh, nice. 12 is really good. Wow. 12 is really good. You'd be shocked. A lot of our guests are not very smart. Stuart, it was a pleasure to have you. Is there anything you want to tell the people before you go? Anything you feel we left out? No, I think we covered a lot. I could have done more. I could have done two or three hours more. It was a pleasure. We'll have to have you back. It was always a pleasure.

1:05:09I just love you. Thank you for doing that. Same here. Thanks for being here. You're welcome. Thank you. Anytime. That was a HeadGum Podcast.