Mary's First and Last Chance

{{Short description|Historic lesbian bar in Oakland, California}}

{{Infobox restaurant

|name=Mary’s First and Last Chance

|street-address=2278 Telegraph Avenue,
Oakland, California, U.S.

|coordinates={{Coord|37.812459|-122.268600|display=inline,title}}}}

Mary’s First and Last Chance ({{Circa|1948}} – 1956) was a lesbian and gay bar located at 2278 Telegraph Avenue in Oakland, California, U.S..{{Cite news |last=Flanagan |first=Michael |date=March 15, 2015 |title=Once Upon a Time in Oaktown |work=Bay Area Reporter |url=https://www.ebar.com/story.php?ch=arts__culture&sc=culture&id=173481}} It was once the focus of the 1950s California Supreme Court lawsuit Vallerga v. Dept. Alcoholic Bev. Control, when the bar challenged a state law for the right to serve gay patrons and won in 1959.{{Cite web |title=Vallerga v. Dept. Alcoholic Bev. Control - 53 Cal. 2d 313, 347 P.2d 909, 1 Cal. Rptr. 494 - Wed, 12/23/1959 |url=https://scocal.stanford.edu/opinion/vallerga-v-dept-alcoholic-bev-control-29822 |access-date=2023-06-21 |website=California Supreme Court Resources, Stanford Law School}}{{Cite book |last=Boyd |first=Nan Alamilla |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xZ4lDQAAQBAJ |title=Wide-Open Town: A History of Queer San Francisco to 1965 |date=2003-05-23 |publisher=University of California Press |isbn=978-0-520-20415-7 |pages=182–183 |language=en}}

The bar was opened in {{Circa|1948}} by Mary Azar, and her brother-in-law, Albert L. Vallerga.{{Cite book |last=Agee |first=Christopher Lowen |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TGsYAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA88 |title=The Streets of San Francisco: Policing and the Creation of a Cosmopolitan Liberal Politics, 1950-1972 |date=2014-03-31 |publisher=University of Chicago Press |isbn=978-0-226-12231-1 |pages=88 |language=en}} Mary’s First and Last Chance liquor license suspended several times and ultimately revoked in 1956 based on a discriminatory 1955 California state law, and after undercover officers posed as patrons. In December 1959, the court sided with Azar and Vallerga and reversed the revocation, and in a historic decision, the 1955 law was declared unconstitutional.