Glad Day Bookshop Boston
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Introduction for the Gallery: Glad Day Bookshop Boston
I tend to sense the specific limitations of my surroundings and this has sometimes triggered the need for change. In 1978, I made the decision to go on a trip around the contiguous 48 states with the idea of scouting out a possible location for a second Glad Day Bookshop. When I first moved to Toronto, my knowledge of American cities was limited to New York, and a single visit to Los Angeles at age 16. That summer, I bought a cross-country Greyhound bus ticket and headed south to explore the country where I was born and educated.
In those days, I was still living something of a subsistence life and therefore never even thought about staying in a hotel. Besides, gay saunas were everywhere, offering shelter, security, and, if one was lucky, the pleasures of companionship. Otherwise, I sought out local activists and would usually be invited to stay with them. Such was the spirit of the times. In this manner, I visited Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Denver, Houston, Chicago, New Orleans, Miami, Key West, Charleston, Baltimore, Philadelphia, and Boston.
Within my chosen field, I had come to realize the pricing of new books, especially cloth or hardcover editions, was calculated to be just below the perceived point of resistance for the American book buying public. However, during much of my career, the differential between the U.S. and Canadian currencies was such that new hardcover books were priced so high that only the wealthiest or most committed Canadian customers were able to give in to the temptation of buying new releases while advertising campaigns, book reviews, and author tours were capable of having any influence or impact on the consumer.
Adding to this problematic equation, was the constant threat of arbitrary censorship by the Canadian government. Back in the 1970s, long before future Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney introduced his notorious Memorandum D9-1-1, the occasional parcel coming from the States was seized, destroyed, or sometimes returned to sender. This was a clear challenge to any illusion about unfettered ‘freedom of expression’, existing north of the U.S. border… but nowhere near the survival threatening level it later assumed. Still, it seemed obvious to me that having a base in the U.S. book world would greatly benefit and enrich the variety of gay related literature sold in the Canadian operation.
Typical of most of my travels, I didn’t rush things and returned to Toronto after two months or so on the road. As it had turned out, I concluded that it was in Boston that I bonded best with other gay male activists and that the city would also benefit by having a serious gay bookstore. The members of Fag Rag, a sort of American east coast “radical” counterpart of The Body Politic, received me with a degree of brotherhood I had never experienced before … and quite frankly, have never experienced since. We were all committed gay radicals of one sort or another, not just the breed of activists with a vision of ‘liberation’ limited to legal & civil equality within an oppressive heterosexual, capitalist political, social and economic framework.
In those days Boston was much more of a gritty town than it is now, this can be said for all cities everywhere in both North America and Europe, but obviously not all to the same degree. Boston’s volatile mix of ethnic groups, races, and social classes all pretty much locked into concentrations within their distinct districts, made for a stew of considerable volatility & corruption, along with distinct rays of enlightenment. Somehow it all appealed to me. Boston was also home to innumerable bookstores (especially used and antiquarian shops), several big publishing houses, and of course, many of the largest and most famous universities in North America.
Its gay scene offered possibilities ranging from political organizations, an active gay press, plus a very lively cruising scene, along with plenty of bars, clubs and saunas. Gay men were already beginning to move into the South End in large numbers. There was also a concentration of lesbians in a part of Cambridge near the highly regarded women’s bookstore, New Words. Gay and lesbian footholds were also beginning to emerge in several other neighborhoods. What was obviously missing was a serious gay and lesbian bookstore (an earlier effort at creating a shop had failed). Indeed, it seemed that many of the locals I spoke with, really didn’t have much of an idea about what might actually be possible.
During most of my life in Canada, I had experienced a vacillating reaction between resentment – sometimes almost a hatred – of America (often related to the absurd foreign war it had embarked upon) to an adoration of all things American. These vastly different reactions had much to do with the ongoing struggle within Canada to somehow arrive at a separate Canadian identity. Living among English Canadians forced me to think about and try to analyze the psychological differences between these two nationalities. This seemed to place me – firmly – as an outsider in both the U.S. and Canada, not that this status needed further enhancement.
Few, if any, people in the Canadian movement seemed to grasp the reality and depth of my dual American-Canadian identity … let alone the internationalism that put those aspects of my worldview into high relief. (Within its own separate dynamic, the same could be said of the American movement’s interest in all things Canadian.)
[As I recall, in its 21 year history, the main Toronto gay press (The Body Politic followed by the poorly named Xtra) never once mentioned the Boston Glad Day Bookshop. So except for those Canadians who visited Boston, there was little awareness of this other dimension of my activist life.]
It was the core American value of ‘Freedom of Expression’, grounded in the First Amendment to the Constitution (and first introduced to students in Grade 7 or 8) that ultimately gave me the determination and fortitude to struggle against Mulroney and his utterly anti-democratic Memorandum D9-1-1, which directed Canada Customs officials to stop gay & lesbian literature from entering Canada. His powers as Prime Minister allowed him to carry out his campaign against the gay movement by producing & disseminating something designated as a ‘memorandum’, since any attempted legislation would certainly have gone against the spirit & intent of the Charter of Rights & Freedoms introduced by PM Pierre Eliot Trudeau in 1982.
Perhaps one must give Mulroney credit for having some degree of understanding about the importance of gay & lesbian literature in helping to raise consciousness and play a vital role in helping forge a community unwilling to accept the second class citizen status his Canada was attempting to force upon us. The Memorandum’s real purpose, hidden below all the jargon about obscenity, was to stifle an open dialogue on gay subjects and in doing so, help to destroy the fragile network of gay and lesbian bookshops in Canada. Unfortunately, most – but not all Canadians reacted to this heavy handed and blatant censorship with total passivity.
Indeed, it might be difficult today for some people to understand that when Glad Day brought the banning of The Joy of Gay Sex before the courts, Mr. Serge Lavoix, then Executive Director of the Canadian Booksellers Association, refused – outright – to aid or even lend support our action! Furthermore, the gay Canadian press (represented by Pink Triangle Press) seemed not to understand the seriousness of the war until it was nearing its final stages.
Throughout the decades of this conflict, as activists were able to influence and slowly change policies and attitudes, there was never any admission that the Federal Government had ever been in the wrong. There was never to be any public ‘truth and reconciliation’ forum addressing the suffering and injustices heaped upon thousands of lives while their prejudiced laws and regulations were enforced.
The fact that my constant wanderings sensitized me to variations found in other world cultures eluded most everyone, except those I met who had themselves grown up ‘over there.’ Too much is made out of the melting pot vs. the (more quaint) cultural mosaic. In most cases, it takes just a decade of a child’s life to shape the cultural base of his/her identity. In my case, things worked in reverse form: my cultural identity, always intrigued by difference, kept absorbing the things I found admirable in foreign cultures.
As they related to my professional life as a gay and lesbian bookseller, my insatiable wanderlust and embrace of cultural differences – as a way to both understand ourselves and the rest of the evolving gay world – regularly led me to other countries to search out gay and lesbian authors. Both Glad Day Bookshops included queer literature in Spanish, French, German, Italian, Greek, Portuguese, and Chinese. I personally traveled to European countries and to Mexico in order to attend book fairs, visit publishers, and to network with the gay bookshops which had emerged in Europe during the 1970s and 1980s. (In matters of Chinese culture, – Siong-Huat Chua in Boston and Alan Li in Toronto – both helped seek out literature of Asian origin.)
The Boston bookstore had three locations over its 21 year history. From February 1979 until July 7, 1982, when Glad Day, along with the offices of Gay Community News and Fag Rag, were totally destroyed by arson. I was away on a trip to Europe, in Paris at that particular time, waiting to meet up with my boyfriend who was in London, where he had just given an organ recital for the Queen Mother. As it happened, I was sitting having a coffee in Les Mots à la Bouche bookstore when a staff person called out my name. There was someone on the phone, calling from New York. David Thorstad was on the line. Efforts had been made to contact me and it was by sheer luck that he called the right place at the right time. I cannot really describe my reaction or state of mind, but my actions in the following two weeks speak for themselves. Basically I was shell-shocked – in a state of denial and emotionally distraught. On a strictly personal level, it wiped out a romantic rendezvous that had been anticipated & planned for several months. Myself, still something of a fledgling bookseller trying to build a business from almost nothing, it seemed a death knell.
What happened from the moment the call ended until I finally arrived back in Boston to face-up to my situation & responsibilities is even difficult for me to believe! That tale I hope to write up as a separate item.
The incendiary device used by the arsonists was either thrown or placed inside the room at the back of the GCN offices. It was actually the room used by Fag Rag for the few meetings I had attended when the collective was working on their 12th Anniversary Issue. Glad Day occupied the other side of the second floor of the ancient building, with young artists living in their third floor studios. Fortunately no one was killed in the fire and the fire department was able to prevent it from spreading to the adjacent buildings. The retail area of Glad Day was destroyed not by the flames, but by the water used to put it out. The fire had reached the storage/office space, (which also served as my living quarters) before it was put out.
Unfortunately the manager – my one full-time employee, Philip Knighton lost his job and I was left alone to try and resurrect the business. Glad Day did have a small insurance policy and our accountant helped process the claim. Most of the money went to pay for the stock that had been destroyed. A few publishers showed their understanding and support by wiping out our outstanding bills. Namely, Sasha Alyson, owner of the gay & lesbian book publisher, Alyson Publications and several of the gay male soft core glossy magazines so popular at the time.
My friend Siong-Huat Chua offered me a place to live while I searched for a space to rent for Glad Day. John Mitzel, and Philip Knighton helped in physically sorting through the remains of the store. My personal belongings, including a small collection of rare books (including an early printing of Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass) had been incinerated, along with most cartons of Mitzel’s book The Boston Sex Scandal, recently published by Glad Day.
Looking for a space to rent after you have just been burnt down by homophobic criminals was not the easiest thing to do. I remember literally going around in circles – meaning I found myself returning to landlords who had already said ‘no’. Finally, in early August I was able to rent space at 43 Winter Street and distinctly recall finding myself alone, on my hands & knees, on my 36th birthday scrubbing the floor – and having a good cry.
After about three months working alone, with occasional help from a few friends, the store was up & running again, and I was able to begin hiring staff. Attractive new wooden shelving units were ordered from a local bookstore fixture manufacturer. Rudy Kikel (1942-2017), a local gay poet, organized two seasons of successful author readings that helped raise the profile of the bookshop.
As I recall, the landlords refused to offer me a lease and after nearly three years they raised the rent sufficiently to trigger our departure. Boston’s old downtown, while a beehive of activity during the day, becomes more like a ghost town at night. The closest residential area with a substantial number of gay residents is Beacon Hill, followed by Back Bay and the South End. So I scouted out retail space on both Charles St. and in Copley Square, the prestigious heart historic and commercial Boston. Copley Square is a hub of activity both day and night & I lucked out by renting a large second floor space overlooking the Boston Public Library, exactly where the annual Marathon race ends.
It is in that location that Boston gay activist and writer John Mitzel became manager, a position he held until the middle of the year 2000, when we made the decision to close the Glad Day Bookshop. When the South Station Cinema, a popular gay male porno theatre across from the train station closed around 1984 (?), Mitzel lost his job as manager, a position he had held since 1971. A good part of the day he sat at a small desk in the projection booth with his typewriter. For many years Mitzel was a columnist for the monthly Guide magazine as well as the publisher of a few books of his own writing. I have no document in my possession to verify exactly when the store moved to 673 Boylston Street, but for sure it was either in 1985 or 1986. (It would have been covered and advertised in GCN.) The new space required a fair amount of renovation that took a few months to complete. Sam Jones, a librarian at the Boston Public Library had become Glad Day’s bookkeeper while we were on Winter Street and it was Sam who drove truck loads of stock and fixtures to the new location.
Throughout my career as a gay bookseller, plenty of people in Toronto and Boston criticized my decision to rent second floor space. The reason, of course, was that on the second level you could still take advantage of the physical location and address, without paying the enormous differential in rent and other overhead expenses. Each type of business more or less has its own built in profit margin and the retail book business was at the low end of the profit margin game. I’m sure many of our more closeted gays appreciated the extra degree of privacy afforded by the second floor, plus it was also a likely deterrent to homophobic attacks. Yes, perhaps the first time a customer made their way up the stairs (or in the elevator) there might be a degree of uncertainty as to what a gay bookstore was all about, but once they realized it was a relaxed & friendly turf, loaded to the gills with a wealth of gay and lesbian literature, film, and ephemera – chances are, they became a frequent visitor. And so our customer base was always expanding. As did our hours, from 10am-11pm, Sundays from noon.
After several months of searching for a new location we concluded, that it was impossible to find an affordable large enough space in an area worthy of Glad Day’s raison d’être. While looking for a place to move the bookshop, I slowly became aware that many of the independent small bookshops that
made Boston one of America’s great book communities had already disappeared. Now it was Glad Day’s turn to say good-bye.
