Glad Day Bookshop is an independent

bookstore Bookselling is the commercial trading of books which is the retail and distribution end of the publishing process. People who engage in bookselling are called booksellers, bookdealers, bookpeople, bookmen, or bookwomen. The founding of librari ...

and restaurant located in Toronto, Ontario, specializing in

LGBT ' is an initialism that stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender. In use since the 1990s, the initialism, as well as some of its common variants, functions as an umbrella term for sexuality and gender identity. The LGBT term is a ...

literature. Previously located above a storefront at 598A

Yonge Street Yonge Street (; pronounced "young") is a major arterial route in the Canadian province of Ontario connecting the shores of Lake Ontario in Toronto to Lake Simcoe, a gateway to the Upper Great Lakes. Once the southernmost leg of provincial Hi ...

for much of its history, the store moved to its current location at 499 Church Street, in the heart of the city's

Church and Wellesley Church may refer to: Religion * Church (building), a building for Christian religious activities * Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination * Church service, a formalized period of Christian communal worship * C ...

neighbourhood, in 2016. The store's name and logo are based on a

painting Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called the "matrix" or "support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush, but other implements, such as knives, sponges, and ...

William Blake William Blake (28 November 1757 – 12 August 1827) was an English poet, painter, and printmaker. Largely unrecognised during his life, Blake is now considered a seminal figure in the history of the poetry and visual art of the Romantic Age. ...

. Since the closure of New York City's

Oscar Wilde Bookshop The Oscar Wilde Bookshop was a bookstore located in New York City's Greenwich Village neighborhood that focused on LGBT works. It was founded by Craig Rodwell on November 24, 1967, as the Oscar Wilde Memorial Bookshop. Initially located at 291 Mer ...

in early 2009, Glad Day is now the oldest surviving LGBT bookstore in North America.

History

Opened in 1970 by

Jearld Moldenhauer Jearld Frederick Moldenhauer was born in Niagara Falls, New York on August 9, 1946. He has been a gay activist from his college years onward, and was the founder of the Cornell Student Homophile League, the University of Toronto Homophile Associa ...

, it was the city's and Canada's first bookstore targeted to the

gay ''Gay'' is a term that primarily refers to a homosexual person or the trait of being homosexual. The term originally meant 'carefree', 'cheerful', or 'bright and showy'. While scant usage referring to male homosexuality dates to the late 1 ...

community. The bookstore originally operated out of Moldenhauer's 65 Kendal Avenue apartment located in

The Annex The Annex is a neighbourhood in Downtown Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The traditional boundaries of the neighbourhood are north to Dupont Street, south to Bloor Street, west to Bathurst Street and east to Avenue Road. The City of Toronto recognizes ...

, which also served as the original offices of ''

The Body Politic ''The Body Politic'' was a Canadian monthly magazine, which was published from 1971 to 1987.

''."Glad Day now oldest gay bookstore"
, ''

Xtra! ''Xtra Magazine'' (formerly ''DailyXtra'' and ''Xtra!'') is an LGBTQ-focused digital publication and former print newspaper published by Pink Triangle Press in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The publication is a continuation of the company's former pr ...

'', February 6, 2009. Moldenhauer later moved to a house in

Kensington Market Kensington Market is a distinctive multicultural neighbourhood in Downtown Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The Market is an older neighbourhood and one of the city's most well-known. In November 2006, it was designated a National Historic Site of Canad ...

, where the bookstore and magazine operated out of a shed in his backyard. The store moved to its Yonge Street location in 1981, and relocated to Church Street in 2016. In 1979, Moldenhauer opened a second location in Boston, Massachusetts. A fire destroyed the Boston building in 1982, but the store reopened in a different location a few weeks later."Sad Day for Glad Day Bookshop". ''

Publishers Weekly ''Publishers Weekly'' (''PW'') is an American weekly trade news magazine targeted at publishers, librarians, booksellers, and literary agents. Published continuously since 1872, it has carried the tagline, "The International News Magazine of B ...

'', June 26, 2000. Norman Laurila, an employee of Glad Day in the 1970s, moved with his partner

Richard Labonté Richard Labonté (1949 – March 20, 2022) was a Canadian writer and editor, best known as the editor or co-editor of numerous anthologies of LGBT literature.A Different Light. Moldenhauer sold the Toronto location to John Scythes in 1991, but retained ownership of the Boston store and continued to be involved in the Toronto store's operations. After the Boston store's landlord decided to convert the building into condominiums, Moldenhauer closed the store in 2000 when he and manager John Mitzel faced difficulty finding a suitable new location. From 1998 to early 2005, the science fiction bookstore

Bakka-Phoenix Bakka-Phoenix Science Fiction & Fantasy Bookstore is an independent bookstore in Toronto, Ontario, which specializes in science fiction and fantasy literature. It was started on Toronto's then-bohemian Queen Street West in May 1972 as a combined ...

was located on the main floor of the same building as Glad Day's Toronto store. After

This Ain't the Rosedale Library This Ain't the Rosedale Library was an independent bookstore located in Toronto, Ontario."Can we keep the indie spirit?" ''Xtra!'', March 17, 2005. Located in the Church and Wellesley neighbourhood for much of its history, the store moved to Kensin ...

left its Church Street location to move to

in 2008, that store's former landlords offered Glad Day first dibs on taking over the space, although due to high rent the store opted not to move. In late 2011, Scythes announced that he was putting the store up for sale due to declining revenues;"Toronto’s Glad Day Bookshop up for sale"
''

Toronto Star The ''Toronto Star'' is a Canadian English-language broadsheet daily newspaper. The newspaper is the country's largest daily newspaper by circulation. It is owned by Toronto Star Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary of Torstar Corporation and part ...

'', December 27, 2011. the store was ultimately purchased by a collective of 22 community members, spearheaded by teacher Michael Erickson and also including former ''

'' managing editor Marcus McCann, former

Pride Toronto Pride Toronto is an annual event held in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, in June each year. A celebration of the diversity of the LGBT community in the Greater Toronto Area, it is one of the largest organized gay pride festivals in the world, fea ...

executive director Fatima Amarshi, community activists Doug Kerr,

Jill Andrew Jill Andrew is a Canadian politician who has represented Toronto—St. Paul's in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario since June 7, 2018 as a member of the Ontario New Democratic Party (NDP). Education Andrew attended Humber College, where s ...

and Mike Went, lawyer

El-Farouk Khaki El-Farouk Khaki (born October 26, 1963) is a Tanzanian-born Muslim Canadian of Indian origin who is a refugee and immigration lawyer, and human rights activist on issues including gender equality, sexual orientation, and progressive Islam. He was ...

and performer Troy Jackson. Under its new ownership, the store took steps to revitalize its role as a cultural hub, adding an event space to host author readings, performances and community group meetings, and conducting a

crowdfunding Crowdfunding is the practice of funding a project or venture by raising money from a large number of people, typically via the internet. Crowdfunding is a form of crowdsourcing and alternative finance. In 2015, over was raised worldwide by crow ...

campaign on Indiegogo in 2013 to fund and launch an

online bookstore Online shopping is a form of electronic commerce which allows consumers to directly buy goods or services from a seller over the Internet using a web browser or a mobile app. Consumers find a product of interest by visiting the website of the r ...

for LGBT titles. In June 2016, the store launched another Indiegogo campaign to help fund a planned move to a new location on Church Street, which would be more wheelchair-accessible than the Yonge Street store, and would enable the store to add new revenue streams including a coffee shop and licensed alcohol service at evening events. In July, the store announced that it was taking over Byzantium, a bar whose managers had opted to shut down around the same time."Glad Day Bookshop taking over Byzantium space on Church Street"
''

Daily Xtra ''Xtra Magazine'' (formerly ''DailyXtra'' and ''Xtra!'') is an LGBTQ-focused digital publication and former print newspaper published by Pink Triangle Press in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The publication is a continuation of the company's former pr ...

'', July 22, 2016. The space was renovated to become a flexible space that can be reconfigured from a bookstore into a venue for cultural performances and event gatherings as needed, and now serves food and drinks. The new location keeps a smaller selection of books on active display, although it maintains additional inventory in storage that can be ordered or requested. Bar Bük, the bookstore and café that employs Sabi in the television series ''

Sort Of ''Sort Of'' is the debut studio album by the avant-rock Experimental rock, also called avant-rock, is a subgenre of rock music that pushes the boundaries of common composition and performance technique or which experiments with the basic ele ...

'', partially was inspired by Glad Day.

Naked Heart Festival

In 2015, the bookstore launched the Naked Heart Festival, an annual festival of LGBTQ literature. Workshops, panels, readings and other events associated with the festival take place at the bookstore and other community spaces in the Church and Wellesley village.

Social involvement

The business frequently donates books to organizations such as the

Pride Library Western Libraries is the library system of the University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario. In 1898, the university Senate appointed James Waddell Tupper as the University of Western Ontario's first University Librarian. In 1918, John Davis ...

at the

University of Western Ontario The University of Western Ontario (UWO), also known as Western University or Western, is a Public university, public research university in London, Ontario, London, Ontario, Canada. The main campus is located on of land, surrounded by resident ...

. Like its counterpart in Vancouver, Little Sister's, Glad Day's materials have been frequently confiscated by

Canada Customs The Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA; french: Agence des services frontaliers du Canada, ''ASFC'') is a federal law enforcement agency that is responsible for border control (i.e. protection and surveillance), immigration enforcement, and cust ...

during importation as "obscene materials", culminating in the

Ontario Superior Court of Justice The Superior Court of Justice (French: ''Cour supérieure de justice'') is a superior court in Ontario. The Court sits in 52 locations across the province, including 17 Family Court locations, and consists of over 300 federally appointed judges. ...

case '' R. v. Glad Day Bookshops Inc.'' in 2003. During the

COVID-19 pandemic in Canada The COVID-19 pandemic in Canada is part of the ongoing worldwide pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (). It is caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (). Most cases over the course of the pandemic have been in Ontario, Que ...

, the store announced various plans to support LGBTQ artists and performers during the pandemic and the associated shutdown of most venues that they depend on for income, including a crowdfunded Emergency Survival Fund to provide loans and grants, and GD TV, a Zoom-based online channel for LGBTQ artists, writers, musicians, dancers and drag queens to livestream readings and performances.Natalia Manzocco
"Glad Day to stream daily shows by queer artists"
''

Now Now most commonly refers to the present time. Now, NOW, or The Now may also refer to: Organizations * Natal Organisation of Women, a South African women's organization * National Organization for Women, an American feminist organization * Now ...

'', April 10, 2020. When retail stores were allowed to reopen for curbside pickup, the store added a table at its front window to permit the display and sale of a selection of books through the window.

References

External links

Glad Day Bookshop
{{Coord, 43.648544, -79.377594, display=title Independent bookstores of Canada LGBT bookstores LGBT culture in Toronto Censorship in Canada 1970 establishments in Ontario Shops in Toronto LGBT literature in Canada