Gay Sunshine, “A Journal of Gay Liberation,” Spring 1974. “William Burroughs: An Interview.” Cover photograph by Allen Ginsberg.
Gay Sunshine was founded in Berkeley, California in 1971, by Winston Leyland. It sooned moved its operation to San Francisco, where it published until 1983. It covered gay sex history, politics, culture, and included essays, poems and interviews from people such as Allen Ginsburg, William Burroughs, Christopher Isherwood, John Rechy, and Gore Vidal. It featured groundbreaking coverage of gay history. In 1973 it was the first American publication to run an article about gay concentration camp prisoners in Europe who wore the pink triangle, and urged the use of the symbol as a memorial to them. In 1976, John Wojtowicz, who the movie Dog Day Afternoon was loosely based on, published his side of the story in Gay Sunshine. (Read his story here: http://bit.ly/8uNVjp.) The publication was a link to gay writers and activists of all kinds around the country. New York writer Richard Hall describes his first experience with Gay Sunshine: “I bought a copy and took it home. It had the dirtiest poetry I had ever read. Forests of cocks exploded with awesome regularity. There seemed to be one orgasm per column inch. I loved it.” In 1975, Leyland founded Gay Sunshine press, which he describes as “the world’s oldest continuing gay book publisher.” He has gone on to edit countless books and anthologies, including the popular Meatmen erotic comic book series. There are several good collections of Gay Sunshine available at Amazon.com. For more on the history of Gay Sunshine journal and Gay Sunshine Press: http://www.leylandpublications.com/.
