LESBIAN INFORMATION LINE - VANCOUVER, BC - CALL NOW:
(604) 734-1016
LESBIAN INFORMATION LINE - VANCOUVER, BC - CALL NOW: (604) 734-1016
The Gay Community Calendar, established in September 1977 by Harvey Hamburg, was a pre-recorded message service about gay events in Toronto, updated weekly. By calling 923-GAYS at 416-923-4297, community members could hear about events happening over a ten-day span. The line was supported by community organizations, whose ads appeared on the messages, as well as by caller donations [1].
Harvey Hamburg, an active member of Toronto Area Gays (TAG), established the Gay Community Calendar (GCC) in 1977. Hamburg organized funding, wrote scripts, and recorded the messages for the GCC until 1979, when he stepped down to make way for a more formal structure of the organization [2]. The GCC’s primary support came from other Toronto organizations, such as TAG, the Lesbian Organization of Toronto (LOOT), and The Body Politic (TBP), among others, and Hamburg saw the interconnection of those services as being a key benefit of the GCC.
The GCC was regularly advertised in TBP as well as other publications, such as the Metropolitan Community Church newsletter, and in turn advertised those publications alongside its events. These primary sponsors were guaranteed a certain number of slots in the weekly program while smaller contributors were included on a case-by-case basis, depending on the amount of time available on the recording [3]. A 1979 TBP article proclaimed, “Harvey tells it all,” reading the messages “at a breakneck speed” in order to fit as much in as possible [4].
923-GAYS created a centralized overview of what is happening in the community, offering a wide array of options that could be shown in a single place, even if the internet is unquestionably faster than physical newsletters.
In a 1978 letter to potential supporters, Hamburg writes:
Many community groups are in written communication with their members, and most, but not all, of these mailings include a reminder to their members to keep in touch with 923-GAYS for information updates. The sort of cross-fertilization of community energy which this makes possible cannot be over-estimated, so I urge you to continue with, or to initiate, these reminders [7].
Harvey Hamburg at the Gay Community Calendar Booth.
Hamburg says in his “Request for the Granting of Community Funds” that “Gay men and women need to know what is taking place, and when it is happening, and that information should be readily available upon request [5].” In this sense, the GCC served the community a great purpose by keeping everyone informed in addition to supporting other small coalitions, and their initiatives, in the city.
Peter Zorzi’s webpage about the bathhouse raids [6] shows the importance and immediacy that 923-GAYS was able to achieve alongside this goal, with the possibility of a new message being posted within twenty-four hours of the raids. The function of the GCC seemed to fill a gap in queer community organization that is still useful today. In the present, the comparison could easily be made between social media pages for single businesses or events which often reach their existing audiences primarily and the newsletters or publications in the 1970s that advertised on the Gay Community Calendar.
923-GAYS had a much wider reach than individual publications—scripts for the GCC include a range of events from club nights and bathhouses to book launches and card/board game meet-ups (an example of a script can be found in Hamburg’s proposal documents, titled: “Hypothetical 3 Minute Script [8]”). That diversity meant that someone did not need to be a part of a specific niche in the community in order to receive up-to-date news about current events.
Despite wide reach and broad community support, the GCC regularly featured appeals for funding and notices about budget shortfalls, and Hamburg often single-handedly financed the phone line in its early days [9]. Additionally, there were repeated attempts from outside the community to shut down or disrupt the line, causing a few outages that were reported in TBP [10].
In 1981, Hamburg started 530-GAYS, a similar line featuring stories of queer youth, designed to help other queer youth connect to the community [11]. 530-GAYS used voice-actors to read stories and pointed callers to resources such as chat lines for queer youth [12].
923-GAYS Newspaper Ad.
923-GAYS Paper Airplane Ad.
Bibliography
[14] Caplin, Michael. “530-GAYS: Providing a Painless First Step.” The Body Politic 84, June (1982): 32.
[2] “Request for Granting of Community Funds.” 923-GAYS: Toronto’s Gay Community Calendar fonds, The ArQuives: Canada’s LGBTQ2+ Archives, Toronto, ON.
[5] Ibid. [7] Ibid. [10] Ibid.
[6] “The Man Behind the Voice.” The Body Politic 57, October (1979): 13.
[1] McLeod, Donald W. Lesbian and Gay Liberation in Canada: A Selected Annotated Chronology, 1976–1981. Homewood Books, 2016.
[4] “The March Message from 923-GAYS.” 923-GAYS: Toronto’s Gay Community Calendar fonds, The ArQuives: Canada’s LGBTQ2+ Archives, Toronto, ON. [9] Ibid.
[11] Typescript of letter to GCDC Supporters. 923-GAYS: Toronto’s Gay Community Calendar fonds, The ArQuives: Canada’s LGBTQ+ Archives, Toronto, ON.
[13] “Young Gays Get the Message.” The Body Politic, 79, December (1981): 10.
[8] Zorzi, Peter. “The 1981 Bathhouse Raids.” Queer Catharsis, 1990, http://onthebookshelves.com/raids.htm.
[12] “923-GAYS Is Alive and Well.” The Body Politic, 76, September (1981): 14. “923-GAYS Is Back!” The Body Politic 65, August (1980): 13.