Artist, teacher, bon vivant, “The Best Gay Dad Ever,” dog’s best friend; remembering John Weiss in love and leather.
On a sunny day in early March 2024, Kirk Cederwahl finally had his first ever zoom call. I don’t know how he managed to avoid the entire zoom process over the last four years, but it was fitting that Kirk was willing to endure zoom’s tech support torture seminar to chat with me about his recent donation of the John Weiss Collection to The ArQuives: Canada’s LGBTQ2+ Archives. John Wiess (1946-2017) was many things to many people. John was an artist and middle-school art teacher up in North Bay, a spirited host who adamantly refused to cook a single thing, and such a gregarious misanthrope that he actively sprinted away from people he didn’t want to talk to in public. Kirk spent years sprinting after a bolting John; and with good reason. Kirk was John’s boy and John was Kirk’s daddy.
But what is Leather?
Even with the glut of internet resources available to curious queers and the Leather Archives and Museum down in Chicago offering constant free online and IRL programing to the public, the leather life is still relegated to a place of pure fetishism, rough sex and a hard masculine gay bar aesthetic. And make no mistake, these are calling cards of the leather lifestyle, but the leather life is about the families you make and the people who make you feel at home. Leather families are like any other queer chosen family; just with extra snazzy boots.
Drag queens have drag daughters and leather daddies have leather boys; these are terms of endearment and connection, subversively gendered and applicable to any presentation. Like all chosen families in a marginalized community, newer and nervous people can find safety and security with experienced and established members, relax into fairly straightforward protocols of social acceptance and connection, and experiment with complex and dangerous activities in a safer container. This is the ethos of a leather family; community service, harm reduction, and consensual experimentation.
Coming from a post-WWII era of gay men who didn’t want to reintegrate into cis-het society when the war ended, North American leather culture tangoed with biker and hippie culture in its toddler years. Adopting the motorcycles, transience, substance use and boots of these worlds, leather culture took a queer chisel to the familial-formal structures of military life that had carved itself into an entire generation. Joining them were the lesbians (you know, them dykes of Dykes on Bikes) who refused to stuff themselves back into the procreative home after tasting the relative freedom of traditionally male forms of labour. Distinct yet connected, respected yet rejected; leatherdykes and leather men have always twisted together in a plume of polish, politics and motor oil.
John Weiss Was Here
As Kirk and I chatted about the chickens he was going to visit the following week, the noted Toronto leatherdyke Nancy Irwin (known by the nom-de-plume Naughty Nancy) joined our zoom call all the way from a gorgeous Guatemalan beach resort. She was on yet another of her motorcycle riding adventures and had tackled the 19 hairpin turns around Lake Atitlán just the other day. An established chronicler of all things related to the Toronto leather world, Nancy was well acquainted with John and remains an avid friend of Kirk’s.
Between our three tenuous wifi connections, I had the distinct pleasure of hearing stories about John Weiss. Kirk told me about meeting John through a friend at the bar Tracks in 1984. John had collapsed after a puff of something outside and Kirk quite literally caught the man before he hit the ground. Throughout our chat was a liturgical recitation of the greatest hits of the Toronto gay bar scene from the 80s and 90s.
Tanks, Tracks, The Black Eagle (the original 1994 location at 459 Church and the post-1998 move one door down to 457), Togethers, The Red Spot, The Toolbox and Mother’s above it, The Parkside, St. Charles and Boots were just a few of John’s regular haunts. Going by Dr. Perv or Johnny B Bad, John had a wig for every occasion (a favourite of Kirk’s being a real piece of wolf fur applied to John’s bald head with double-sided tape), regularly matching his hair pieces with head-to-toe chainmail or full leathers. He wasn’t shy about pissing people off (sometimes literally), and John’s commitment to the bit even got him 86ed from his go-to summer crash pad at The Selby after he coated the pristine white bathroom titles in black wax.
Kirk’s donation to The ArQuives includes 200+ prints of John’s work and seven (7!) journals stuffed with John’s notes and sketches. While it has yet to be processed and made available to the public, Nancy and Kirk collaborated on an autobiographical sketch of the man, the myth, the “best gay dad ever” (Kirk’s love for him is irrepressible) to be included in the collection. As a priority access perk, we at “The Gay’s Did What Now?” are pleased to bring you this tender homage to John Weiss as remembered by Kirk Cederwahl and written by Nancy Irwin.
The Truly Fabulous Story of John Weiss
(As told by his good friend Kirk Cederwahl, an artist who has quite the story too! And written by Naughty Nancy, aka Nancy Irwin, who was there and is still here!)
When an artist dies, someone left has to tell their story. In the case of John Weiss, a body of work remains. However, AIDS wiped out so many of a certain generation, few left alive who can contribute. Imagine being the ‘last man standing.’ It was the boomer gays, peaking sexually in their 20s and 30s, who were hardest hit. So that leaves us a select few who can tell the tale. And that is important to say because it’s been a few decades since the big fright of AIDS. The new generation doesn’t even know we already had a pandemic in our lifetimes! It also means they don’t know about the immediate and long-term effects of AIDS on our community, culture and lives.
As a writer who knew both John and Kirk, I will add that looking at John Weiss’ artist written biography I could not help but notice that he had left out 35 years employed as a grade 7-8 art teacher. He would tell everyone, “I am an art teacher in North Bay, and I have taught 20,000 children.” He was such an inspiration to those children. But why did he leave that out? Because he nearly lost his job for participating in a fundraiser that promoted awareness of HIV. Face The Music collected funds for the founding of the AIDS Committee of North Bay and Area. I had to ask John’s longtime friend Kirk about this, and we talked about the number who lost jobs and more due to being outed or exploited for being queer. This didn’t just happen in the 50’s. It still happens today. But it was not good in small-town Ontario back in the 80s when AIDS really hit. Nope. Keep those fags away from children. So, John went into the closet about teaching. Isn’t that special? This is our history. This is John’s history.
John Weiss was from Toronto. Born in Germany on January 12, 1946, he immigrated to Toronto as a child in 1951. He moved to North Bay for a teaching job at Fricker Public School in 1971. He spent the school year in North Bay but remained a regular fixture in both Vancouver’s and Toronto’s gaybourhoods in the summer. He frequented the places that the Betty Page Social Club occupied, as well as the Barn, Boots, Parkside, Tracks, the Toolbox and the Red Spot. Those were all bars. And he would hold court at The Stairs, located outside the Second Cup back in the mid 80’s and early 90’s. People would just sit on the stairs in summer, with or without a coffee in hand. It was the one alcohol-free place one could hang in the village.
John was actively involved in Toronto’s leather scene. He was Mr. Boots 1991. He had many friends and for years was the hub of a circle. He was well known as Dr. Perv and as Johnny B Bad.
He picked up a young boy who was a bit too vulnerable in a community of men who were sometimes like a pack of wolves. That was 1984, when Kirk was a ripe 22 and just in from Kenora. John named him Fetch-it. Fetch-it (Kirk) became his personal service person, polishing boots, cleaning leather and fetching drinks. And he was well cared for by his Daddy. When men approached Fetch-it, he explained that he would have to ask his Daddy for permission to play. Some just backed off right away. But if Fetch-it was scared he would whisper “no” while asking Daddy for permission. Then Daddy John would bellow loudly that he was NOT going anywhere. And that took care of many situations for the boy. (It is that boy, decades later, donating John’s portfolios to The ArQuives.)
John’s circle of friends included Muffy, Gidget, Chlboyko, Smelly Boy, Sweet Baby James, Lloyd, Bobby, Mr. Jones, Silver Fox, Chrys, Marc, Richard, Mag and Jim, Blanche, Nicki, Raoul, Ernesto, the Widow Dale, Mike and Chuck, Chris, 6’8”, and the love of his life, Michael Pratt. If you were around in those days, you would know that is a list of one core group of radicals. They were the centre. Many were artists. There were also queens, drug dealers, leathermen; many were play mates.
John also spent summers in Vancouver. How was he in two places at once? Who knows. But he had a very active life in the leather scene before returning to North Bay and preparing for Grade 7 and 8 students the night before school began.
There were young children who would watch for John out their front windows, waiting to see the most fascinating man in North Bay walk by in the morning. What would he be wearing that day? Something fascinating like a full length white Mongolian sheep coat or dressing up as a lesson in colour for his students.
John was an artist who graduated from OCA (Ontario College of Art) and continued to produce art throughout his lifetime. He had shows and was involved with the arts community in North Bay and Toronto. He also did performance art and worked with the theatre community making props and back drops. North Bay certainly benefitted from his presence.
He was a fixture at Pride both in Toronto and Vancouver (which take place at different times of the year).
It was an opportunity for him to be with people of his own kind. It charged him for his coming school year. When you have two months to play, you play hard.
He influenced many younger and upcoming artists and generations of North Bay art students. It is remarkable that such a flamboyant dresser and a very out gay man could hold such a position within such a small community, working with children. We see so many people brutalized in such positions. He did have one big fight where his job was in jeopardy. And that of course was for being a founding supporter of the new AIDS Committee of North Bay and Area. It was one thing to have such an organization in Toronto but quite another to start one in small-town Ontario. That Committee continues to support people to this day.
John had many men in his boudoir over many years, but he never did get AIDS or HIV, which is truly remarkable. He certainly got a few other things: Chlamydia, Gonorrhea, HPV, Mono, Hep A, Hep B and Crabs! Crabs! Crabs! He’d call Kirk for help.
After living in an apartment on Main Street for 23 years, John bought a large arts and crafts home at the waterfront that had been divided into two apartments. He invited Kirk to occupy the other unit and supervise the renovations of the place. So, Kirk became the property manager and general maintenance person. The house served as a prop for John’s art adventures. He invited other artists to do installations on the property and have viewings of independent films shown outside on the lawn.
At approximately age 66 John developed Alzheimer’s. It was only in those later years that John spent summers in North Bay. He died at age 71. His boy Fetch-it still stands and has gathered up his portfolios and journals. They are now donated to The ArQuives.
John Weiss is Still Here
Kirk Cederwahl will always be John Weiss’s boy. You can see it in Kirk’s actions, in his smile, in his every breath. This is a family bond that can never be broken. As I walk through the world holding my own boy’s hand, Kirk’s enduring love, devotion and service to John is a familiar feeling. It’s homey. And one day, if I’m truly lucky, I’ll know what it’s like to earn the title of “The Best Gay Dad Ever.”
The John Weiss Collection is housed at The ArQuives: Canada’s LGBTQ2+ Archives in Toronto, Ontario at 34 Isabella St. Want to see it? Call 416-777-2755 or email queeries@arquives.ca to book your visit.
Atticus Hawk (they/he) is a doctoral candidate in the Faculty of Information at the University of Toronto. His research looks at the role of Leatherdykes in the creation of medical knowledge and harm-reduction practices for fat, trans and disabled bodies in kink.