All posts filed under: Lesbian History

The Library is Open! (Let’s Keep It That Way)

Activist Histories / Drag / Gay History / Lesbian History / Queer History / The Gays Did What Now? / Trans History

The Library is Open! (Let’s Keep It That Way) Was your non-committal New Year's Resolution to “read more”? Did you join a queer book club and silently sob at the price of the newest gay paperbacks? Are your internal organs begging you to take up a hobby with a somewhat lower stroke risk? The Toronto Public Library’s dedicated Pride Collection at the Yorkville branch is full of luxuriously queer books, DVDs, CDs, audio books, movies, ebooks, magazines, comics, maps, classes, groups, kids’ rooms, study spaces, conference rooms and anything else your little gay heart desires.

Back, Back, Back Again! A Snapshot of Sapphic Aquatica, the New (New) Pussy Palace

Activist Histories / Kink Cultures / Lesbian History / Pussy Palace Project / Queer History / Trans History

The Pussy Palace is back! Sort of. In November 2022, the club that hosted the Pussy Palace relaunched the pre-pandemic women and trans bathhouse night called, uh...Sapphic Aquatica? Held in the same historic bathhouse as the Pussy Palace, the pansexual swinger’s club, Oasis Aqualounge, ran another monthly women and trans bathhouse event from 2012-2019. Thought to be yet another permanent pandemic casualty, the party is back, back, back again in yet another form with the same fishy name.

A Conversation with Dr. Alex Ketchum about her Directory of LGBTQ+ Archives

Archiving Oral History / Gay History / Lesbian History / Public Humanities / Trans History

Having a good sense of the LGBTQ+ archives and resources available in North America has been crucial in my scholarship. My doctoral project on the history of gay periodicals led me to a number of these repositories, which included both physical and online spaces. Yet the increasing number of queer archives and the occasional changes...

NOW OPEN! The Pussy Palace: An Instagram Story

Collaboratory News / Lesbian History / Oral History / Pussy Palace Project / Queer History / Trans History

If you find yourself in Toronto’s East end this Pride season, drop by Gallery 1265 at the University of Toronto Scarborough (UTSC) to experience The Pussy Palace: An Instagram Story. Commissioned by UTSC’s Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Office and the Positive Space Committee, this interactive, self-led exhibit blends digital art, narrative text, and interview soundbites from the Collaboratory’s Pussy Palace Oral History Project, immersing patrons in an “average night” at the Palace. The Pussy Palace […]

Pussy Palace Digital Exhibit: Coming Soon!

Collaboratory News / Lesbian History / Public Humanities / Pussy Palace Project / Queer History / Trans History

In 2021, the Collaboratory conducted the Pussy Palace Oral History Project (PPOHP), preserving 36 interviews with patrons, organizers, and allies of the Pussy Palace — an exclusive sex party and bathhouse event for queer women and trans people in Toronto. Interviews address not only the infamous, September 2000 police raid, but also radical sex/gender cultures in turn of the 21st century Toronto.  A desire to connect broader publics with this rich archive of oral testimony […]