Page 353 - Gay Pioneers: How DRUMMER Magazine Shaped Gay Popular Culture 1965-1999

Jack Fritscher Chapter 13 335

Proposition 8 halted gay marriage until the State Supreme Court approved
marriage equality within the state on June 26, 2013.

May 31, 1979 (Thursday): Our Drummer office was raided by the
post-riot and still angry San Francisco Police Department: cops stopped
in, messed us about, and left. It was frightening. With Embry gone, I was
in charge. No one was arrested. I told the SFPD right away that I was the
editor-in-chief and, desperately seeking some fraternal bond with them, I
freaked and mentioned that I had placed at number 11 on the San Francisco
Deputy Sheriff Civil Service exam—to which they said Hmmph! So I per-
sonally felt empathy with what John Embry and Jeanne Barney had felt
when the LAPD harassed them during the difficult first year of Drummer
(1975-1976) when cop arrests nearly killed Drummer in its crib. It led me to
empathy as well for all the anti-gay stress they suffered during the three years
(1976-1979) of attorney meetings and court hearings in LA which continued
to bedevil Embry, and distract him from the work at hand.

June 1979: Publication of Drummer 30, “The Fourth Anniversary
Issue.” While editing the contents of the entire 96-page issue, I contrib-
uted eight pieces of my writing as well as the arm-wrestling (coded: fisting)
“Cover Photograph of Val Martin and Bob Hyslop,” and published “Chapter
Two” of my edit and serialization of John Preston’s Mr. Benson. Among the
features I wrote were: “Tit Torture Blues,” “Meditations on Photographer
Arthur Tress,” “Zeus Men in Bondage: Introducing a New Studio,” “The
Brothel Hotel,” “Tough Customers,” and “Tough Shit.”

June 2, 1979 (Saturday): Drummer art director Al Shapiro and his part-
ner Dick Kriegmont hosted a water sports party at their apartment for the
Drummer Salon—and fifty other Drummer subscribers and fans.

June 4, 1979 (Monday): My single calendar entry copied off the toilet
wall of the Without Reservation restaurant on Castro: “Madness takes its
toll because sanity has lost its appeal.”

June 6, 1979 (Wednesday): David Sparrow stopped by my house and
asked me for a loan so he could buy a new motorcycle. While we were argu-
ing, he slapped me flat across the face. I fell to the floor. Shocked. I had only
seen that in movies. Amazed, I wrote: “I never believed you couldn’t see it
coming. That’s it. Nobody hits me.”

©Jack Fritscher, Ph.D., All Rights Reserved—posted 03-16-2017
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