Page 467 - Gay San Francisco: Eyewitness Drummer - Vol. 1

Gay San Francisco: Eyewitness Drummer 447

The Mineshaft

Written June 1977, this feature essay was published in
Drummer 19, December 1977.
I. Author’s Eyewitness Historical-Context Introduction
written March 8, 2002
II. The feature article as published in Drummer 19,
December 1977
III. Eyewitness Illustrations

I. Author’s Eyewitness Historical-Context Introduction written
March 8, 2002

Over the holidays, the Mineshaft played host to the FFA, UYA,
and countless single guys from all over the world. Many of the
latter came to us during their New York visit after reading a fine
article about the Mineshaft in Drummer magazine. Although
we did not seek this publicity, it was a positive statement for the
Mineshaft and we thank. . . .writer, Jack Fritscher, for his fine
words.
— Wally Wallace, Founding and Only Mineshaft Man-
ager, The Mineshaft Newsletter, February 1978. All Mineshaft
Newsletters and announcements as well as letters from Wally
Wallace are copyright Wally Wallace and are printed with per-
mission.

As editor in chief of Drummer, I took the opportunity to write the first (as
well as the second) national and international article about the “Number
One 1970s sex club,” the immediately legendary Mineshaft which orbited
Earth at 835 Washington Street, New York, from its opening October 8,
1976, to November 7, 1985, when shut down, shuttered, and slammed
closed by the health department of the imperial City of New York. The
second article “Pissing in the Wind: A Night in the Mineshaft Bathtub”
appeared in Drummer 20 (January 1978).
“We lasted nine years and nine days,” Mineshaft manager, Wally
Wallace, told me.
(Note: Except as specifically noted otherwise, all Wally Wallace
quotations are from the video Jack Fritscher Interviews Mineshaft Man-
©Jack Fritscher, Ph.D., All Rights Reserved—posted 05-05-2017
HOW TO LEGALLY QUOTE FROM THIS BOOK