Pansy Craze
{{Short description|Period of increased LGBT visibility (1920s to 1930s)}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=May 2025}}
{{Infobox historical era
| name = Pansy Craze
| location = * Mainly the United States
| start = late-1920s
| end = mid-1930s
| image = Karyl Norman, "The Creole Fashion Plate" (cropped).jpg
| alt =
| caption = Painting of "pansy" performer Karyl Norman, titled The Creole Fashion Plate (1923)
| before =
| including =
| after =
| monarch =
| leaders = Gene Malin
Karyl Norman
Ray Bourbon
| presidents =
| primeministers =
| key_events =
}}
{{Periods in US history}}
The Pansy Craze was a period of increased LGBT visibility in American popular culture from the late 1920s until the mid-1930s.{{Cite web |last=Imig |first=Nate |date=June 6, 2022 |title=Tracing the roots of Wisconsin's drag history, dating back to the 1880s |url=https://radiomilwaukee.org/story/uniquely-milwaukee/tracing-the-roots-of-wisconsins-drag-history-dating-back-to-the-1880s/ |access-date=October 27, 2022 |website=Radio Milwaukee |language=en-US}}{{Cite web |last=Bullock |first=Darryl W. |date=September 14, 2017 |title=Pansy Craze: the wild 1930s drag parties that kickstarted gay nightlife |url=http://www.theguardian.com/music/2017/sep/14/pansy-craze-the-wild-1930s-drag-parties-that-kickstarted-gay-nightlife |access-date=October 27, 2022 |website=The Guardian |language=en |issn=1756-3224}} During the "craze," drag queens — known as "pansy performers" — experienced a surge in underground popularity, especially in New York City, Chicago, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. The exact dates of the movement are debated, with a range from the late 1920s until 1935.{{Cite web |title=Pansy Craze |url=https://www.pbslearningmedia.org/resource/fp22-pansycraze/understanding-lgbtq-identity-educators-toolkit/ |access-date=October 27, 2022 |website=PBS LearningMedia |language=en}}
The term "pansy craze" was first coined by the historian George Chauncey in his 1994 book Gay New York.{{Cite web |last=Halley |first=Catherine |date=January 29, 2020 |title=Four Flowering Plants That Have Been Decidedly Queered |url=https://daily.jstor.org/four-flowering-plants-decidedly-queered/ |access-date=October 27, 2022 |website=JSTOR Daily |language=en-US}}{{Cite journal |last1=Cohen |first1=Lizabeth |last2=Chauncey |first2=George |date=September 1997 |title=Gay New York: Gender, Urban Culture, and the Making of the Gay Male World, 1890-1940. |url=https://doi.org/10.2307/2952659 |journal=The Journal of American History |volume=84 |issue=2 |pages=685 |doi=10.2307/2952659 |jstor=2952659 |issn=0021-8723|url-access=subscription }}{{Cite web |last= |date=September 28, 2022 |title=The Work of George Chauncey, LGBTQ Historian and Kluge Prize Honoree September 27, 2022 By Neely Tucker |url=https://www.yonkerstribune.com/2022/09/the-work-of-george-chauncey-lgbtq-historian-and-kluge-prize-honoree-september-27-2022-by-neely-tucker |access-date=October 27, 2022 |website=Yonkers Tribune. |language=en-US}}{{Cite book |last=Heap |first=Chad |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Pcs6T-NVz0wC |title=Slumming: Sexual and Racial Encounters in American Nightlife, 1885-1940 |date=November 15, 2008 |publisher=University of Chicago Press |isbn=978-0-226-32245-2 |pages=319 |language=en}}
The Craze
New York's first drag balls were held in Harlem's Hamilton Lodge in 1869.{{Cite web |last=Stabbe |first=Oliver |date=March 30, 2016 |title=Queens and queers: The rise of drag ball culture in the 1920s |url=https://americanhistory.si.edu/blog/queens-and-queers-rise-drag-ball-culture-1920s |access-date=October 27, 2022 |website=National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution |language=en}}{{Cite web |last=Fleeson |first=Lucinda |date=June 27, 2007 |title=The Gay '30s |url=https://www.chicagomag.com/Chicago-Magazine/November-2005/The-Gay-30S/ |access-date=October 27, 2022 |website=Chicago Magazine |language=en-US}}
In the 1920s, female impersonators were hired to perform at cabarets and speakeasies in many major cities, including New York, Paris, London, Berlin, and San Francisco.{{Cite web |date=May 11, 2018 |title=The Pansy Craze: When gay nightlife in Los Angeles really kicked off |url=https://www.kcrw.com/culture/shows/curious-coast/the-pansy-craze-when-gay-nightlife-in-los-angeles-really-kicked-off |access-date=October 27, 2022 |website=KCRW |language=en}} The target audience was straight, which gave the performers broader social acceptance.{{Cite web |last=Pruitt |first=Sarah |title=How Gay Culture Blossomed During the Roaring Twenties |url=https://www.history.com/news/gay-culture-roaring-twenties-prohibition |access-date=October 27, 2022 |website=History |date=June 12, 2019 |language=en}}
Gene Malin — known as the "Queen of the Pansy Craze" — achieved relative mainstream success, appearing in both Hollywood films and Broadway shows.{{Cite web |last= |date=September 3, 2021 |title=Jean Malin: Queen of the pansies {{!}} American Masters |url=https://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/jean-malin-queen-of-the-pansies/18420/ |access-date=February 5, 2023 |website=American Masters |language=en-US}} Malin worked primarily in New York City in the early 1930s; however, his career was cut short when he died in an automobile accident at the age of 25.
Other stars during the Pansy Craze included Karyl Norman and Ray Bourbon, as well as the gay pianist and singer Bruz Fletcher, who gained fame in Los Angeles during the Pansy Craze.{{Cite web |last=Grey |first=Charlie |title=Listen: This campy star of the '30s Pansy Craze was gloriously shady and super gay |url=https://www.queerty.com/listen-campy-star-30s-pansy-craze-gloriously-shady-super-gay-20221018 |access-date=October 27, 2022 |website=Queerty|date=October 18, 2022 }}{{Cite web |title=Bruz Fletcher: Remembering a Gay Voice |url=http://www.tyleralpern.com/bruz.html |access-date=February 5, 2023 |website=www.tyleralpern.com}}
End of the era
Beginning in late-1933 and escalating throughout the first half of 1934, American Roman Catholics launched a campaign against what they deemed the immorality of American cinema. This led to restrictions in the public visibility of homosexuality through the Hays Code.{{cite web |last=Doyle |first=Dave |title=The 'Pansy Craze' Pioneered LGBT Acceptance in America |work=The Syncopated Times |date=December 30, 2023 |url=https://syncopatedtimes.com/the-pansy-craze-pioneered-lgbt-acceptance-in-america/ |language=en-US |access-date=May 2, 2025}} Police simultaneously began strict crackdowns on the public presence of homosexuals during the Great Depression, as calls for politicians to "clean up" downtown nightlife came from progressive reformers.{{cite web |last1=Fleeson |first1=Lucinda |title=The Gay '30s |url=https://www.chicagomag.com/chicago-magazine/november-2005/the-gay-30s/ |website=Chicago Magazine |access-date=July 25, 2023}}
Legacy
Some scholars have argued that the Pansy Craze broadened the range of acceptable behaviors for men, even though restrictions on gender conformity and LGBT visibility were tightened after this period.{{Cite book |last=McCracken |first=Allison |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/894746159 |title=Real men don't sing : crooning in American culture |date=2015 |isbn=978-0-8223-5917-3 |publisher=Duke University Press Books |location=Durham |oclc=894746159}} In later decades, drag queens such as Divine and RuPaul again starred in Hollywood films, and performers such as Jinkx Monsoon appeared on Broadway.{{cite web |last1=Street |first1=Mikelle |title=Jinkx Monsoon Was Always Destined to Make Broadway History |url=https://www.wmagazine.com/culture/jinkx-monsoon-chicago-broadway-interview-drag-race/ |website=W Magazine |date=February 2, 2023 |access-date=July 25, 2023}}
See also
References
{{Reflist}}
Further reading
- George Chauncey: Gay New York: Gender, Urban Culture, and the Making of the Gay Male World, 1890–1940 (Basic Books, 1994), especially Chapter 11: "Pansies on Parade"
- Chad Heap, Slumming: Sexual and Racial Encounters in American Nightlife, 1885–1940 (University of Chicago Press, 2009), especially Chapter 6, "The Pansy and Lesbian Craze in White and Black"
External links
- Queer Music Heritage: [http://www.queermusicheritage.us/may2010.html "The Pansy Craze: the Story and the Music] by JD Doyle
- [https://web.archive.org/web/20100709090322/http://www.queerculturalcenter.org/Pages/Bentley/Index.html Queer Cultural Center – Bentley Profile].
- [https://peabodyballroom.library.jhu.edu/home/ballroom-history/1930s-pansy-craze/# Baltimore Afro American contemporary articles]
{{Drag performance}}
Category:LGBTQ history in the United States
Category:Musical theatre in the United States
Category:1930s in LGBTQ history
Category:History of gay men in the United States