Chicago Whispers: A History of LGBT Chicago before Stonewall

17. Lesbian Pulp Paperbacks and Literature

199 17 Lesbian Pulp Paperbacks and Literature The 1950s saw the emergence of trashy dime store lesbian novels, with Chicago’s Newsstand Library Books publisher leading the pack, until a judge ordered their books “obscene and nonmailable.” One local author of lesbian pulp fiction was Valerie Taylor. Another local author, Jeannette Howard Foster, who compiled Sex Variant Women in Literature, accused one pulp fiction writer of “diarrhea of the pen.” Gore Vidal’s The City and the Pillar (1948) was savaged by critics but most likely benefited from the negative publicity, as by 1950 it had sold over two million copies. Two other influential gay books from 1950 were Quatrefoil by James Barr, published by Greenberg Press, and Tereska Torres’s Women’s Barracks by Fawcett’s Gold Medal Books. Barr’s book, a gay romance, was inspired by his service in the U.S. Navy, during which he attended officers training at Great Lakes Naval Base in Chicago. Torres’s Women’s Barracks, thought to be the first lesbian pulp novel, was sold as “the frank autobiography of a French girl soldier”; the story is set in a London barracks for women of the Free French Forces. Women’s Barracks sold two million copies. Lesbian pulp fiction was hot! Publishing houses sprang up everywhere , often run by shady businessmen who knew a cash cow when they saw one. For the next two decades a slew of lesbian pulp novels hit the newsstands, with titles like Lavender Love Rumble, Bitter Love, and Lesbo Lodge. These trashy dime-store novels were treasured by lesbian readers, as Lesbian Pulp Paperbacks and Literature 200 they depicted the lives of regular people like themselves, even though the stories all had the obligatory tragic ending: suicide, murder, or some other payback for sin. In 1950, Fawcett Publications launched Gold Medal Books. Among their lesbian titles were Spring Fire (1952) by Vin Packer and We Walk Alone through Lesbos’ Lonely Groves (1955) by Ann Aldrich, both pseudonyms of Marijane Meaker. Although popular with readers, Packer’s books were vilified by lesbian group the Daughters of Bilitis. A review of one of Packer’s books, The Evil Friendship (1958), in the Daughters’ publication The Ladder in January 1959 read: “It is a sad state of affairs when an admitted lesbian must continuously and vituperatively denounce lesbianism. This well-documented true story of two teenage girls suffering from paranoia coupled with delusions of grandeur hardly represents a picture of typical lesbian relationships. These pitiful children plan and execute the murder of one of their mothers.” Chicago lesbian Jeanette H. Foster, author of the 1956 classic Sex Variant Women in Literature, described, in the August 1960 Ladder, Aldrich/Packer’s writing as “diarrhea of the pen.” In 1959 Chicago’s Newsstand Library Books published First Person, 3rd Sex (1959) by Sloane Britain (real name Elaine Williams), about a schoolteacher coming to terms with her lesbianism. Britain’s early novels were popular, but her later books became increasingly cynical, and in 1964 she committed suicide over her lesbianism. After publishing First Person, Newsstand Books was busted; in 1960 the post office claimed nineteen of their titles were “nonmailable.” First Person, 3rd Sex was listed, as were two other lesbian-themed books, Veil of Torment (1959) and Fear of Incest (1959) by March Hastings (real name Sally Singer). On October 4, 1960, in Washington , D.C., Hearing Examiner Jesse B. Messitte heard the case against Newsstand Books. Saul J. Mindel spoke on behalf of the Post Office testifying the books were “obscene, lewd, lascivious and indecent.” After reading the books, Messitte denounced eighteen as obscene and nonmailable , including those by Sloane Britain and March Hastings. The Chicago Tribune on August 28, 1966, noted that Chicago’s smut publishers were closing up shop: “Down in South State street pornography shops the whole atmosphere has changed. Gone are stares of furtive passion, the wheezes of heavy breathing, replaced by frowns of disappointment and sighs of despair. Suddenly the most daring publication in the house is Playboy—no whips, no chains, no black leather lingerie, not a fetish in a carload. And consider the plight of the Chicago author, Sylvia Sharon, Lesbian Pulp Paperbacks and Literature 201 who specialized in tales of lesbian love for Lancer’s defunct Domino series. ‘You can’t find my books anywhere now,’ complains Sylvia in that distinctive bass-baritone voice. Like most (maybe all) lady pornographers...