Richmond is more queer than most people realize.
That’s according to William & Mary Professor Jay Watkins, whose research focuses on Southern LGBTQ+ theatre history. On Nov. 6, he’ll be the speaker for Pride and Pour, an evening of Richmond’s LGBTQ+ stories at Black Heath Meadery. Bonus: attendees can count on Pride flights, complete with edible glitter.
Watkins tells his students that history is made by regular people showing up and doing stuff. And Richmond has a long history of examples including one of the oldest lesbian bars, a long tradition of queer sports teams, and mainstay Diversity Richmond. He cites activists such as Guy Kinman, Zakia McKensey, Bob Swisher, Beth Marshak, Bobbie Weinstock and countless others who saw a need, had an idea, and then did something.
“These folks created spaces for younger queer people when they arrived here,” he says. “Plus, as the capital city, Richmond attracts a lot of people from all over the state, which has created a vibrant mix of people even beyond queer communities.”
His doctoral work was on North Florida and that research became his first book, “Queering the Redneck Riviera: Sexuality and the Rise of Florida Tourism,” published in 2018. While honeymooning in London he saw a show called “Yank! A World War II Love Story,” only to find that parts of the show felt strangely familiar. The playwright’s notes credited Allan Bérubé’s “Coming Out Under Fire: The History of Gay Men and Women in World War Two,” one of the foundational texts in American LGBTQ+ history.
Countering the narrative
Shortly after, he saw Ain Gordon’s “217 Boxes of Dr. Henry Anonymous,” a play about the professor of psychiatry who helped end lobotomies, chemical castration, electric shock therapy and institutionalization of queer people. The doctor had done so by convincing the 1972 Annual Meeting of the American Psychiatric Association that mental illness should no longer be used to justify homophobic ordinances, statutes and regulations.
“I started thinking about queer theatre and how, because we didn’t learn our culture at home, school, or mass media until very recently, theatre and performance have been vehicles to transmit our culture,” Watkins says. “Because I’m a historian of the queer South, I wondered if there were particular theatre makers in the South or if we just imported from other places.”
Research uncovered a world of performers, playwrights and theatre companies, in and of the South. That led him to Richmond Triangle Players and his current book project, tentatively titled “Performing Community: Southern Queer History, Memory and Theatre.”
Watkins is one of the scholars who wrote for “Queer Virginia: New Stories in the Old Dominion,” a collection of queer history stories. His chapter about Richmond grew out of his queer theatre work. He read Cal Yeomans’ 1979 play “Richmond Jim,” in which Yeoman used Richmond to signal to audiences that Jim came from a place that was small, homophobic and backward before moving to New York, where he could be out and liberated. “His version of Richmond didn’t square with what I knew about Richmond from my work with the W&M LGBTIQ Research Project,” says Watkins. “So, I wrote the chapter trying to show a large swath of Richmond’s queer history and counter that narrative.”
In doing so, his research proved that there’s no other LGBTQ+ theatre space in Virginia that’s been open as long as Richmond Triangle Players, who produce programming rooted in LGBTQ+ experiences, and support and celebrate the development of queer artistry. “They’ve also been deeply committed to showing innovative and timely work that represents all parts of the community,” Watkins says. “They were very intentional about seeking out plays by lesbians and plays by and about queer people of color. They started the So.Queer Playwriting festival to nurture specifically Southern queer work.”
“A lot of people think that in order to be part of history, they have to have done something special, but history is made by ordinary people showing up and doing things.”
Another place integral to Richmond’s LGBTQ+ history is Diversity Richmond, which began as the Gay Community Center and changed its name to better reflect the diversity of the community. He says few other LGBTQ+ community centers have survived as long or reached as far as Diversity Richmond. “The wall that faced Interstate 64 was a giant rainbow, so nobody driving through Richmond could miss it,” Watkins says. “In a city famous for its Confederate statues, that rainbow wall was a fabulous counter-monument.”
Researching Virginia’s LGBTQ+ history can be challenging because of the scarcity of sources. Until not long ago, archives didn’t make a practice of keeping LGBTQ+ materials, so community leaders had to create their own archives, sometimes in people’s closets and living rooms. Now the Valentine, Virginia Commonwealth University and the Library of Virginia are intentional about saving material about queer life in the commonwealth. “Oral history has been one of the primary methods of capturing queer history, but sometimes it’s hard to convince people that their story is worth saving,” Watkins explains. “A lot of people think that in order to be part of history, they have to have done something special, but history is made by ordinary people showing up and doing things.”
Asked to imagine a time when queer history is simply incorporated into American history, Watkins is of two minds.
“On the one hand, I’m not hopeful given the current state of things,” he says. “On the other hand, the students who come through my classroom are doing amazing things. They give me a lot of hope for a different future. So, on the whole, yes, I think we’ll see a time when queer history is just another part of the American history curriculum.”
“Curtain Up on Richmond’s Queer History” will be held on Thursday, Nov. 6 at 6:30 p.m. at Black Heath Meadery, 1313 Altamont Ave.
