In gay culture, a bear is a man who is fat, hairy, or both.
Leather subculture denotes practices and styles of dress organized around sexual activities that involve leather garments, such as leather jackets, vests, boots, chaps, harnesses, or other items. Wearing leather garments is one way that participants in this culture self-consciously distinguish themselves from mainstream sexual cultures. Many participants associate leather culture with BDSM practices and its many subcultures. For some, black leather clothing is an erotic fashion that expresses heightened masculinity or the appropriation of sexual power; love of motorcycles, motorcycle clubs and independence; and/or engagement in sexual kink or leather fetishism.
The leather pride flag is a symbol of leather subculture as well as kink and fetish subcultures more broadly, including BDSM. The flag was designed by Tony DeBlase in 1989.
Folsom Street Fair (FSF) is an annual BDSM and leather subculture street fair, held in September that concludes San Francisco's "Leather Pride Week". The Folsom Street Fair, sometimes referred to simply as "Folsom", takes place on the last Sunday in September, on Folsom Street between 8th and 13th Streets, in San Francisco's South of Market district.
The Society of Janus is the second BDSM organization founded in the United States and is a San Francisco, California-based BDSM education and support group.
Bound & Gagged magazine was published by the Outbound Press from 1987 to 2005. The magazine was dedicated to the interests of gay bondage and discipline practitioners and provided articles about actual encounters, fictional encounters, techniques, fantasies and images of bound and gagged men. It was headquartered in New York City.
Gayle S. Rubin is an American cultural anthropologist, theorist and activist, best known for her pioneering work in feminist theory and queer studies.
The Bay Area Reporter is a free weekly LGBT newspaper serving the LGBT communities in the San Francisco Bay Area. It is one of the largest-circulation LGBT newspapers in the United States, and the country's oldest continuously published newspaper of its kind.
Charles "Chuck" Arnett was an American artist and dancer. His best-known work is the Tool Box mural (1962).
The lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBTQ) community in San Francisco is one of the largest and most prominent LGBT communities in the United States, and is one of the most important in the history of American LGBT rights and activism alongside New York City. The city itself has been described as "the original 'gay-friendly city'". LGBT culture is also active within companies that are based in Silicon Valley, which is located within the southern San Francisco Bay Area.
Folsom Street is a street in San Francisco which begins perpendicular to Alemany Boulevard in San Francisco's Bernal Heights district and ends perpendicular to the Embarcadero on the San Francisco Bay. For its southern half, Folsom Street runs north–south, but it turns northeasterly at 13th street. It runs through San Francisco's Bernal Heights district, Mission District, SoMa District, Yerba Buena District, and South Beach district.
The Catacombs was a gay and lesbian S/M leather fisting club in the South of Market area of San Francisco, which operated from 1975 to 1981, and reopened at another location from 1982 to 1984. It was the most famous fisting club in the world. The founder and owner was Steve McEachern. The location was semi-secret and admission was by referral only. It was originally a gay men's club, but Cynthia Slater persuaded the management to open up to lesbians. Among the patrons was Patrick Califia, known then as Pat Califia. The Catacombs has been exhaustively described by sexual anthropologist Gayle Rubin, who calls it "exemplary" in its attempts to deal with the AIDS crisis which would eventually lead to its closure. Patrick Moore devotes a chapter to it in his Beyond Shame: Reclaiming the Abandoned History of Radical Gay Sexuality. Sex educator Carol Queen called it "the place to be seen and to play at during the 1980s."
The Stud is a gay bar currently located on 1123 Folsom Street in San Francisco.
Mark Thompson was an American journalist and author. He was a senior editor for The Advocate and the author of several books about LGBT culture. He received the Pioneer Award from the Lambda Literary Foundation in 2008.
The San Francisco South of Market Leather History Alley consists of four works of art that honor the history of gay and lesbian leather culture in South of Market, San Francisco. The art is embedded in Ringold Street, an alley between 8th and 9th Street. The installation opened in 2017. The alley is part of the Leather and LGBTQ Cultural District.
The Leather and LGBTQ Cultural District is a cultural district in San Francisco's South of Market (SOMA) neighborhood commemorating the history and culture of the leather subculture active in the area for approximately half a century. The San Francisco Board of Supervisors established the district with legislation signed into law by the mayor on May 9, 2018. A ribbon cutting was held on June 12 that year outside the Stud on 9th St.
Tony DeBlase (1942–2000), also known as Anthony DeBlase, was part of the BDSM and leather subcultures. He was the designer of the leather pride flag.
The Eagle is a name used by multiple gay bars. It is not a franchise or chain of gay bars, but rather a name adopted by bars inspired by The Eagle's Nest, a leather bar in New York City. Bars that use the name "Eagle" typically cater to a clientele of gay men in leather and other kink subcultures. As of 2017, over 30 gay bars in locations around the world operate under the name "Eagle".
Twin Peaks Tavern is an American historic gay bar. It first opened in 1935 and is located at 401 Castro Street in the Castro District in San Francisco, California. It is one of the most famous bars in the Castro and features prominent oversized windows that were unveiled in 1972, something uncommonly seen in older gay bars. It is located across the street from the Castro Station for Muni Metro, and near the F Market heritage streetcar line.
The Tool Box was a leather bar for gay men in San Francisco that operated from 1962 to 1971 on the east corner of 4th Street and Harrison Street. It was the first leather bar in the South of Market, and a meeting spot where influential personalities of the early San Francisco leather scene gathered. After a prominent feature in Life magazine in 1964, it was considered the archetypal leather bar, helping to cement San Francisco's reputation as the “gay capital” of the US. The bar's history was short-lived: from 1965 onwards, the epicenter of the leather scene shifted towards Folsom Street, which ultimately led to its closing in 1971. The Tool Box is commemorated at the San Francisco South of Market Leather History Alley.
