Guest Blogger: Backintheday

The winter weather horror continues unabated, there's continuing bad news about the economy, and my car is still in the shop. So if you're wondering why I haven't been blogging lately, there are a few reasons. Fortunately our friend Backintheday has stepped in with another tale of Detroit Gay Days Past! This time we get to hear about long-defunct drag bar Gagen's. Your gay education continues now ...


Gagen's: Wiggin' Out in the 70s

Imagine if you will, the world of a questioning youth nervously venturing out to see what tender mercies might await him beyond the walls of his beige bedroom in beige Harper Woods on a fall evening in 1973. Join him on his quest for the attentions of a quiet man who might resemble Gonzo from Trapper John M.D. or – dare one hope – be half as handsome as Adam West.

The only place this boy had heard of where an assignation of this type might have even the slightest chance of taking place was in a far-away land called Palmer Park. Specifically in a place called Gagen’s. ‘Round and ‘round the block he circled in his mother’s Dodge Dart, summoning the courage to enter this strange new world. ‘Round and ‘round his head spun visualizing the intimate setting he would encounter as he passed through the doors and into the arms of Ryan O’Neal, or at the very least Bobby Sherman.

Okay. So this “tender youth” was me. I said it was 1973.

That first night at Gagen's … after several beers I finally calmed down. And after a few more beers I went home with the man of my dreams. Who knew at the time that this Adonis was actually a hairdresser from Clawson with absolutely no finesse when it came to penetrating a nervous virgin - whose dream of tenderness in the arms of another man was shattered with a couple of extremely painful thrusts? Coming out lesson #1: true love and tricking are not the same thing. But, I digress…

Gagen’s was a drag bar that started out life as a straight supper club called Frank Gagen’s. And make no mistake about it, it was swanky! One big room with a bar along the right wall, and a raised dance floor at the rear with a stage behind it. The bulk of the space was filled with circular red leather banquettes; the ceiling over each was a concave circular depression covered in gold leaf and lit indirectly. Very moderne and very plush. By the time it had ceded to the reign of the queens, it was a little worn around the edges. A closer inspection of those red leather banquets revealed a fair amount of red carpet tape enlisted to keep it all together.


But the decor was only part of the magic. When you filter the experience through the lens of a terrified boy who had only lately been attempting what David Bowie had been urging (“Turn and face the strange." Ch-ch-changes indeed), it was like the club scenes in Baz Lurmann’s Moulin Rouge complete with whip pans, manic editing and breakneck sensory overload. A red and gold explosion of music, dance and theater.

And Sunday nights were smokin’ hot. The line-up included the likes of Buttons La Walker, Jennifer Foxx and Betty Clarke. Miss Clarke could be seen donning a forties style swimsuit and sipping a huge Cuba Libra while singing (well, lip-synching) “Rum and Coca Cola” by the Andrews Sisters – all the while roller skating through a crowd gone wild with the spectacle of it all. Hummin’ Helen “sang” Patsy Cline’s “Crazy” in a nightgown as she dragged out an ironing board, set it up, plugged into a head-full of curlers and proceeded to iron the very rag she wore.

Miss Betty Clark, an artist's remembrance.

One major show-stopper was Sharene Dennis “singing” a wicked version of “It Should Have Been Me” by Yvonne Fair, a wrathful, ghetto screed about watching your man walk down the aisle with another woman. As the song reached a fever pitch, Sharene moved into the audience, pulled a knife out of her purse and brandished it at the imaginary couple.

One night she got so worked up she tore the wig off her head and threw it on the floor. This unheard-of act of improvisation was too much for the aging emcee for whom illusion was paramount. With microphone in hand, he fired her on the spot. The rest of the girls recognized Miss Dennis’ actions for what they were – an uncontrollable act of passion fully in line with the sentiment of the song – and tore their wigs off in a show of solidarity. After all the screaming and crying was over the emcee was forced to apologize. Hell hath no fury..!

I worked with Hummin’ Helen (a.k.a. Bill) at the Roostertail while I was in college. He was a sly and amusing guy out of drag but a real handful in character. Through this connection I found myself escorting him to an awards show for female impersonators. The affair was every bit as elegant as its location would have you believe: The United Dairy Workers Hall in Highland Park. I was a bit embarrassed by it all. Watching drag behind closed doors at Gagen’s was one thing, but escorting a six foot tall glamour-puss with impressive deltoids and a fearsome baritone to a sold-out extravaganza in a cinderblock building alongside the railroad tracks was a bit much for my closeted suburban sensibilities.

True to form, Helen got loaded, fought with the other girls, and passed out in my car on the way back to her apartment. Much to my horror, I realized my tank was on empty. At two in the morning I found myself coasting into a service station somewhere in the vicinity of Hamilton and Grand Boulevard. I could only pray that my date would remain comatose in the passenger seat – bouffant bobbing, dress up around her knees, bucket between her legs.

The attendant, a polite African American gentleman of a certain age, couldn’t help but notice my stylish powder blue tuxedo (I forgot to mention that?) and the uncertain mess slumped next to me and said, in an embarrassed attempt to make sense of the scene, “My, my. That sure is a pretty lady you got with you.” To which the “pretty lady” lifting her head up in a sudden burst of consciousness replied basso profondo, “FAAAAAAAACKYOU!!” before collapsing once again into a swarm of organza. All in all, a lovely evening.

It’s no secret what killed drag. In a word: disco. I remember the night we decamped from Gagen’s and walked a few doors west to check out the opening of a new place called Menjo’s. Menjo’s would go on to have a few drag shows now and then to spice things up but it was definitely not about drag. Eventually Gagen’s went on to gain greater fame as Bookie’s Club 870, the premier punk club in Detroit. But by then the place had been stripped out and painted black. I guess all that deco decay had no place in a new wave world.

Somewhere along the way the place burned to the ground. Maybe it’s for the best. The building, like the entertainers it housed, might best be thought of as some great illusion the likes of which Detroit hasn’t seen since.

Guest Blogger: Backintheday

Our friend Backintheday has checked in with another tale from times past. This time he shares a little history of The Woodward Bar in New Center - opened in 1951 and either the oldest gay bar in Michigan or the USA, depending on the person you are talking to.


“TONIGHT’S THE NIGHT” – Andy Karagas and The Woodward Bar



The Woodward Bar sits on a rather forlorn block of Woodward Avenue just south of Grand Boulevard. Back in the day things weren’t a whole lot different. By day, straights from General Motors headquarters and the Fisher building walked in off Woodward for a drink and a burger during their lunch hour. By night, an unmarked door off the alley was the point of entry. While you might think that such a covert entrance must have had “shame” written in neon overhead, it felt more like the door to a secret realm of possibilities – straights need not apply.

I started going there around 1974. I’d like to tell you I was under-aged but I’m trying to be unflinchingly honest in my writing. I can at least say that, in the wisdom of the enlightened politicians of that era, the drinking age in Michigan had been lowered to 18. And, I believe it’s safe to say, I was Chicken.



Upon entering, the door would slam in announcement of the latest arrival. And emerging from a short darkness into the main bar, one found the entire place eager to see who it was. My entrance and that of any number of the younger crowd would provoke Andy Karagas, the fifty-something Greek-American owner to shout out in his gravely voice “HOT NUMBER!” I always met this greeting with a wan smile. I was young and nervous and leery of attention (all the while, fiercely wanting to be desired). As the years went on, Andy’s cry of “HOT NUMBER” began to carry less and less enthusiasm. Whether he became tired of his own schtick or I became less and less a hot number won’t be debated here but his great personality never wavered. We all loved Andy.

Another famous line of his was “TONIGHT’S THE NIGHT” which he’d bellow at any random moment giving us all a sort of cheer of encouragement. And on the weekends a middle-aged waitress called out “ANYBODY WANNA?” then paused before finishing up in a quieter tone with “drink?” thus clarifying her intentions. She had the kind of hair that earned her the nickname “The Governor” after Ann Richards, governor of Texas and the proud owner of a sky high, Lone Star State beehive.

If all this sounds corny, it was. They knew it and we knew it. And that’s what made it so great. In the typically overheated, sexually charged atmosphere of any gay bar full of horny little twenty year olds, a little comedy goes a long way in defusing the tension.

"Hot number!"

As much as Andy made you feel welcome, he also knew the draw of a handsome boy behind the bar. And there were more than a few over the years. The one that will always stay in my mind was Robbie. Robbie of the long curly hair long after anyone had long hair. Robbie of the angelic face and languid eyes. Robbie of the gentle but completely masculine demeanor. When I first crossed the threshold of The Woodward, I knew if he was gay than it was okay to be gay. And all I could think of when Andy yelled in my direction “HOT NUMBER” was “Did you hear that Robbie? Did you? I’m a hot number!” Never mind that the phrase was repeated over and over with every new arrival.

At the age of nineteen, I was drinking Old Grand Dad bourbon and water because my dad drank Old Grand Dad and water. And I can tell you that at The Woodward they were 90¢ a piece because I sat in Robbie’s section staring, love-sick across the bar drinking one after the other until I had ten dimes in change lined up in front of me. At which point, unproposed to, I left him with that whopping tip and pointed myself in the direction of the car. Night after night this played out but I was never able to convince my Adonis to rescue me from my “well of loneliness.” Years later I saw him naked at the gym in Royal Oak. I confess I pleasured myself in the whirlpool.

Back then I fell in love every other day. But of all the boys I felt completely lovesick over, few came close to Robbie. Living life fully means puppy love, infatuations and having your heart broken, and – even though it’s unbelievable at the time – getting over it and moving on. While writing this, I inquired about Robbie through old friends only to find out that he died a few years back. He couldn’t have been more than 50.

By the looks of its web site, The Woodward lives on today catering to a gay African-American crowd. The bar itself was never anything special, just two narrow rooms and a few tables – it was Andy and his crew that made the magic happen. It would be great to think that on any given night, the current owner is giving some insecure little newbie a shout out of “HOT NUMBER”, and letting him think for just a moment, “Hey. Maybe I am!”

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Guest Blogger: Backintheday

Meeting cool new like-minded people has been a great unanticipated benefit of writing this blog.

Today's guest blogger lived in Detroit for years but is now on the west coast. One of the topics we've discussed in our e-mails has been the history of gay bars in Detroit, and I asked him to share some of his memories from back in the day.

In his first undertaking he shares a little history on the now-defunct Detroit eastside gay bar The Deck, which was located right at Jefferson and Alter on the Grosse Pointe/Detroit border.


The Deck – 1979

There have been national articles written about the Detroit-Grosse Pointe border. Perhaps no other place in America so graphically displays the disparity between the haves and the have-nots. It was even more so in the 70’s when property values in the Pointes were secure and Detroit’s East side was a virtual no man’s land. Sitting on the corner of Alter Road and Jefferson Avenue, tucked just inside this no man’s land was The Deck. I worked as a bartender there around 1979 before I hit the “big time” – T.N.T. and later, Menjo’s.

The Deck welcomes you! Well, welcomed you.

The Deck was a long-standing neighborhood joint. An old brick building, it had a long narrow room with a wooden bar and a row of small tables along the side. The front door had a one-way glass window and a buzzer controlled entry. Don, the owner, had “dolled the place up” with lattice over the windows and wallpaper with a sort of “forest floor” theme, but he couldn’t really hide its blue-collar origins. In the back it was a bit wider and opened up to a pretty nice little patio area. There were a few apartments overhead where Don “entertained” and Pete, the manager lived.

The Bar had settled into life as a place where straight locals, mostly retired, could gather around 3 o’clock and drink cheap shells of beer until the first of the gay clientele started to arrive off the buses they rode from their jobs downtown. The day crowd was pretty good-natured about the gays. The old married couples would look at each other and say “Time to pack it up, darling” and off they’d go, wobbling down the street to their apartments up and down Alter Road.

Miss Beverly had been a sales lady at Jacobson’s. Don had worked at “Dodge’s” while his wife Marge kept house. And Chuck was a 55 year old alcoholic stock boy at the party store two doors down. Even though it was more expensive, he drank his first beer of the day out of a bottle because his hands shook too much to hold a shell. They all looked forward to an appearance from Jean, the local bookie, as she made her rounds up and down Jefferson conducting business in the local watering holes.

Interior circa 1979

Week nights were never too crowded. A mix of Grosse Pointe boys and blue-collar East Side guys. This mix always seemed to tantalize. The blue-collar group turned on by a pair of khakis and a Polo shirt and the Grosse Pointers looking for a working class hero.

On the weekend the place was jammed with Topsiders, Brooks Brothers and Izod. Ralph Lauren had recently reinvented the preppy look with his Polo wear and the insular world of the Ivy League had never seemed so accessible. At the same time, while not exactly “out” gays were certainly feeling a sense of community with each other.

Being the only gay bar in the area meant that if you lived on the East side and were just cracking open the closet door, you’d probably do it by checking out The Deck. As a bartender there, I witnessed many an otherwise quiet weeknight when a somewhat terrified young guy would sit nervously apart from the rest of the customers and order a drink. It didn’t take long before he was sitting in front of half a dozen drinks paid for by a hopeful group of regulars. If he made it out of there alive it was on the arm of some old player who knew best how to pluck a chicken.

One quiet night a young Grosse Pointe kid came in and asked for a middle-aged regular by name. I told him I hadn’t seen him that night, thus unwittingly outing him. The kid replied in a fury “Well, I’m his son and I knew he came here. Tell him not to come home anymore.”

Like most gay bars, the place had its day and then it passed. There were attempts to extend its popularity – drag shows, piano players, Sunday brunch. But after its short stint as the “in” place, it settled into life as a cozy neighborhood hangout. This life too must have run its course, the last time I was in Detroit, The Deck was just another boarded up building waiting for whatever comes next.

The Deck today.

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Guest Blogger: Woodward's Friend

It's time for another guest blog post from our pal, Woodward's Friend. This time around the story isn't specifically gay, but it's a nice downtown slice-of-life story and I think you'll see why I wanted to post it.

Dear Supergay,

I was at the RenCen Marriott for a meeting Friday, and so was the Benny Hinn revival. Benny Hinn (for those of you who don't know) is a faith healer. He's a rock star in the voodoo doll/witch doctor sects of Protestantism.

I'm on the elevator with a couple of true believers and some normal people when one of the Normals asks, "Who is Benny Hinn?" The True Believers - dressed in their finest Branson-chic couture - are shocked that someone is unaware of a man as great and Godly as Benny Hinn. A True Believer responds, "He's a very great man anointed by God."

No one says a word. What can one say to that? Our silence upset the True Believers, apparently, because the woman turns around and adds in a cold and angry voice, "Very anointed."

I doubt you Godless heathens knew that there are degrees of anointedness. I like to think of myself as having transactional anointedness. Glory be...

It's very weird coming face-to-face with the true believers of faith healing. One would think such an experience would humanize these people and create some empathy for them. I had the opposite reaction. These people are third-rate morons who deserve the fleecing they get from hacks like Benny Hinn. I don't wish to rationalize a rank conman like Hinn but Jesus H. Christ people, God gave you a brain and that God-given brain should be telling you that no one, let alone a guy in a tacky suit, can cure your gout with a thump on the forehead.

(To read Woodward's Friend's last entry, click here)

Guest Blogger: Woodward's Friend

Supergay Detroit is pleased to present our first guest blogger. "Woodward's Friend" is this guy I know (sorry, no other biographical information available). He wrote me with this compelling tale of gay triumph over modiocrity.

Dear Supergay Forum,

I never thought this would happen to me ...

About two months ago I had a craving for a big plate of buffalo wings. It's a straight guy thing - you wouldn't understand. Unfortunately I was over near Macomb Mall and the only place with with decent wings in the God-forsaken hellhole that is the Gratiot corridor is Hooters.

Here's the thing about Hooters: the food is good, but unless you haven't been laid in the last 36 months the waitrons are less than useless. Usually they aren't that hot and they wear these creepy kevlar pantyhose. They are always dumb as a sack of doorknobs. Worse, they insist on trying to strike up a conversation with you. I guess the duller members of our society assume that they can score a date with a talkative waitress and therefore order more shit. The problem of course is all of that disingenuous flirting ruins what could be an otherwise enjoyable dining experience.

Not real Hooters girls, but real kevlar pantyhose.
This is the last time you will see anything this straight and trashy on this blog.

Anyway, I bite the bullet and go to Hooters. It's a Saturday afternoon, I've got a New York Times, there was a baseball game on the big-screen, and a giant plate of wings sitting in front of me. Could I enjoy any of it? Good Lord no because every five minutes Jeni or Mandi or Tiffani has to stop by my table and "chat." Fucking-A these bitches wouldn't leave me alone. Apparently they all have to sign a cocktail napkin on your table with a sharpie - dotting the obligatory i at the end of their name with a heart. I'm still not sure what I was supposed to do with the signature napkin. Take it home and beat off into it? Not bloody likely. I've got better ways to abuse myself thanks to YouPorn.

So when Tiffani sauntered over for her obligatory 90 seconds of pretend flirting I'd had enough. When she asked "what brings you out today hun?" I replied, with a straight face and mouth full of chicken meat, "well my boyfriend is out of town so I get to eat what I want." Poor Tiffani had no idea what to say after that. Gay men at Hooters? In Macomb County? Good golly, a bona fide sodomite in an upstanding family restaurant like Hooters! Horror of horrors!

It may have been my finest hour. All the little couldn't-cut-it-as-a-real-stripper bimbo waitrons stayed away and I was able to enjoy my wings and New York Times in peace. It was wonderful and I thank homosexuality for making it all possible. So thank you gays. I hope its ok if I continue to pretend to be one of you at Hooters or equally ridiculous places that happen to serve tasty crap food like buffalo wings. And Supergay next time you're at the gay bar stuck in a dead end conversation with some douchey guy, give me a call. I'll pump you full of all the useless sports information you'll need to drive the douche away.


Woodwards Friend
Detroit, Michigan