The Stud is a
queer bar located in
South of Market, San Francisco
South of Market (SoMa) is a neighborhood in San Francisco, California, situated just south of Market Street. It contains several sub-neighborhoods including South Beach, Yerba Buena, and Rincon Hill.
SoMa is home to many of the city's museums ...
. It was started by associates George Matson and Alexis Muir (Alexis was a transgender woman then known as Richard Conroy) on May 27, 1966.
[Freeman, M. (1994). The Stud: A Dreamspace for Queer Angels. The Bay Area Reporter.] According to George Matson it was a "bar for people, not just pretty bodies".
Originally the Stud was located at 1535 Folsom Street; in 1987 it moved to its current location at Ninth and Harrison Streets.
[Brook, J., Carlsson, C., and Peters, N. J. (1998). Reclaiming San Francisco: history, politics, culture. San Francisco: City Lights] The Stud is known for its themed parties,
drag and burlesque shows, and community events. It was also home of the famous
Trannyshack
Trannyshack is a San Francisco drag club started by drag queen Heklina in 1996 as an offshoot of Klubstitute, and was a weekly fixture at The Stud bar in San Francisco for 12 years, drawing large crowds on a regular basis. The Tuesday night ...
, a weekly drag show that featured all different types of drag and drag stars from 1996 until 2008.
History and ownership
![The Stud bar in San Francisco - full view](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4a/The_Stud_bar_in_San_Francisco_-_full_view.jpg)
The Stud was originally started by George Mason and Richard Conroy in 1966. (Richard Conroy was a transgender woman later known as Alexis Muir; this name may be a reference to
John Muir
John Muir ( ; April 21, 1838December 24, 1914), also known as "John of the Mountains" and "Father of the National Parks", was an influential Scottish-American naturalist, author, environmental philosopher, botanist, zoologist, glaciologist, a ...
, who was her great-uncle.
) In the early 1970s, George sold his half to Richard. Richard then sold it to Jerry "Trixie" Jones, Heidi Steffan, and Jan Hill. Jerry "Trixie" Jones was also a partial owner of
Hamburger Mary's
Hamburger Mary's Bar & Grille is a Drag_(clothing), drag-themed hamburger, burger restaurant chain that started in San Francisco, California, in 1972. The eateries are often in Gay village, gayborhoods and are intended to represent stereotypical ga ...
, an iconic gay restaurant, across the street. In 1974, the Stud was bought out by Jim "Edie" Fleckenstein.
Edie died in 1994, leaving the Stud to his partner and resident DJ Larry Holloway aka LaRue and his accountant Ben "Fiesta" Guibord. They then partnered up with Michael McElheney.
LaRue died in the 1990s due to complications from
HIV/AIDS
Human immunodeficiency virus infection and acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (HIV/AIDS) is a spectrum of conditions caused by infection with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), a retrovirus. Following initial infection an individual ...
.
Ben "Fiesta" Guibord died in 2011, at the age of 63, also due to complications from HIV/AIDS.
In the summer of 2016 the Stud was given a very large rent increase and Michael McElheney decided it was time to retire. When the bar was faced with closure, members of the local community began to organize in hopes of preserving the historic bar.
[Kukura, J. (December 7, 2016)]
"The Stud Announces New Two-Year Lease, And Plans To Move To New Location After That"
. SFist. Retrieved April 20, 2017. This organizing resulted in the formation of a collective of nightlife professionals, which bought the business from Michael McElheney.
Members of the collective include artists, DJs, and performers such as
Honey Mahogany
Honey Mahogany (born December 30, 1983) is an American activist, politician, drag performer, and singer. She first came to national attention on the fifth season of ''RuPaul's Drag Race'', followed by releasing her debut EP ''Honey Love''. She w ...
, Siobhan Aluvalot, Vivvyanne Forevermore, and Rachel Ryan. The collective took ownership of the Stud on December 30, 2016, making it, according to collective member Nate Allbee, "the very first
co-op
A cooperative (also known as co-operative, co-op, or coop) is "an autonomous association of persons united voluntarily to meet their common economic, social and cultural needs and aspirations through a jointly owned and democratically-control ...
nightclub in the United States."
[Kane, P. (February 15, 2017)]
"How the Stud was saved"
''SFWeekly''. Retrieved April 20, 2017.
South of Market gay culture in the 1960s and the Stud's significance
In the 1960s, San Francisco's primarily gay areas were
Polk Street
Polk Street (also sometimes referred to by its German name, ''Polkstrasse'') is a street in San Francisco, California, that travels northward from Market Street to Beach Street and is one of the main thoroughfares of the Polk Gulch neighborhood t ...
, the
Tenderloin district, and
South of Market
South of Market (SoMa) is a neighborhood in San Francisco, California, situated just south of Market Street. It contains several sub-neighborhoods including South Beach, Yerba Buena, and Rincon Hill.
SoMa is home to many of the city's museums ...
.
South of Market became the hub of the
leather subculture
Leather subculture denotes practices and styles of dress organized around sexual activities that involve leather garments, such as leather jackets, vests, boots, chaps, harnesses, or other items. Wearing leather garments is one way that pa ...
in the gay community in 1961 when the gay bar the Tool Box opened its doors as the first leather bar in the neighborhood.
When the Stud, along with Febe's, opened up on
Folsom Street
Folsom Street is a street in San Francisco which begins perpendicular to Alemany Boulevard in San Francisco's Bernal Heights district and ends perpendicular to the Embarcadero on the San Francisco Bay. For its southern half, Folsom Street runs no ...
in 1966, other gay leather bars and establishments catering to this subculture followed creating a foundation for the growing gay leather community.
The Stud and the other establishments in this neighborhood created a safe space for gay people to gather, be themselves, and create a community. The Stud was also originally a
Hell's Angels hangout; by 1969 it had become a
dance bar
Dance bar is a term used in India to refer to bars in which adult entertainment in the form of dances by relatively well-covered women are performed for male patrons in exchange for cash. Dance bars used to be present only in Maharashtra, but la ...
for
hippie
A hippie, also spelled hippy, especially in British English, is someone associated with the counterculture of the 1960s, originally a youth movement that began in the United States during the mid-1960s and spread to different countries around ...
s on the margins of the leather scene and had a
psychedelic black light mural by
Chuck Arnett
Charles "Chuck" Arnett (February 15, 1928 in Bogalusa, Louisiana – March 2, 1988 in San Francisco, San Francisco, California) was an American artist and dancer. His best known work is the Tool Box mural (1962).
History
Arnett grew up in Boga ...
.
Trannyshack
One of San Francisco's longest running drag shows,
Trannyshack
Trannyshack is a San Francisco drag club started by drag queen Heklina in 1996 as an offshoot of Klubstitute, and was a weekly fixture at The Stud bar in San Francisco for 12 years, drawing large crowds on a regular basis. The Tuesday night ...
, was started in 1996 by
Heklina
Heklina is the stage name of Stefan Grygelko, an American actor, drag queen, and entrepreneur in San Francisco. Grygelko's mother is Icelandic, and having been born in the U.S., he lived in Iceland in the 1980s; he named his drag character after ...
, a well known San Francisco drag queen. Many famous drag queens and celebrities graced the stage at Trannyshack, including many contestants from ''
RuPaul's Drag Race
''RuPaul's Drag Race'' is an American reality competition television series, the first in the ''Drag Race'' franchise, produced by World of Wonder for Logo TV (season 1–8), WOW Presents Plus, VH1 (season 9–14) and, beginning with the f ...
'' and
RuPaul
RuPaul Andre Charles (born November 17, 1960; stylized as RuPaul) is an American drag queen, television personality, actor, musician, and model. Best known for producing, hosting, and judging the reality competition series ''RuPaul's Drag Race'' ...
himself. Due to controversy over the use of the word "tranny", the show's name was called into question, prompting Heklina to end it and rebrand.
In 2008 Trannyshack ended its run at the Stud.
[Barmann, J. (May 21, 2014)]
"SF Institution Trannyshack Changing Name Amid PC Pressure"
. SFist. Retrieved (April 20, 2017)
Honors
Alexis Muir, a cofounder and former owner of The Stud (see above), was honored in 2017 along with other notables, named on bronze bootprints, as part of
San Francisco South of Market Leather History Alley
The San Francisco South of Market Leather History Alley consists of four works of art along the Ringold Street alley, at 8th Street, in San Francisco's SOMA district honoring leather culture; it opened in 2017.
Artworks
Collectively titled ''Lea ...
.
The Stud is part of the
Leather and LGBTQ Cultural District. The
San Francisco Board of Supervisors
The San Francisco Board of Supervisors is the legislative body within the government of the City and County of San Francisco.
Government and politics
The City and County of San Francisco is a consolidated city-county, being simultaneously a c ...
established the district with legislation signed into law by the mayor on May 9, 2018.
A ribbon cutting was held on June 12 that year outside the Stud for that.
[
]
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Stud (bar), The
1966 establishments in California
Leather bars and clubs
LGBT nightclubs in California
South of Market, San Francisco