Gay by the Bay: A History of Queer Culture in the San Francisco Bay Area

By Jim Van Buskirk and Susan Stryker

A fabulous montage of word and image, this is the first book ever to chronicle the origin and evolution of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender culture in the San Francisco Bay Area. Capturing the international center of the gay experience as never before, and published to coincide with the opening of the Gay and Lesbian Center of the new main San Francisco Public Librarythe only publicly funded archive of its kind in the world Gay by the Bay contains over 200 full-color and black-and-white photographs of historical memorabilia, including correspondence, posters, buttons, and other artifacts. With anecdotes about Bay Area gay luminaries, past and present, and a foreword by acclaimed author Armistead Maupin, Gay by the Bay offers a scintillating look at a continually dynamic and evolving community.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0811811875
• ISBN13: 9780811811873
• Release Date: March 1996
• Publisher: Chronicle Books
• Length: 176 Pages
• Weight: 2.12 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 9.7" x 10.1"
• Grade Range: Grade 8 to Postsecondary

Customer Reviews

Invaluable Reference

This well researched book is also quite entertaining. While I bought it for its scholorship, it also serves as a nice "coffee table" book. Guests in my home enjoy thumbing through its many illustrations. This is a MUST HAVE.

Buy this book!!!

As a long time gay resident of San Francisco, I was thrilled when this historical pictoral tome came out way back then. I bought the book and have it sitting proudly on my coffee table - after all these years. It has great text and even more wonderful photos of personalities and memorabilia from decades of historical gay & lesbian San Francisco. Van Buslkirk and Stryker know their stuff and I appreciate all the research and the historical facts that come out in this masterfully produced work. The photos are well reporduced and there is even the great reprodcution of the hilarious 1982 SURRENDER DIANE campaign poster from Sister Boom Boom's historical SF supervisorial run against then and unpoular Mayor Diane Feinstein. Classic. BUY THIS BOOK.