10 Lessons Learned From 60s-Era Gay Skin Mags

From:  OUT

("Gay Moments in Sports" from Drum #18-19, 1966.)

3. 

"HILL-BILLY TOWN" 

In the a mid-1966 edition of Drum, a reader from Vienna, West Virginia, wrote, "Your little magazine is one of the best I have ever obtained. Where else in this hill-billy town could I get the information and articles like Drum has?" As your own experience no doubt proves, reader, gay media, including skin mags, have been and remain essential vehicles for consciousness-raising and mass organization. They provide the information and in many cases the impetus for serious social change.

4. 

HATERS HAVE AND ARE GONNA HATE

That same issue of Drum featured this note: "The worst thing about Drum are those articles by [editor] Clark Polak who must think he's some sort of intellectual." And that was from a fan! Meanwhile, one anti-gay housewife wrote into a 1967 issue, "Your magazine is disgusting! Shame on you for printing such trash and allowing those photographs to be published!" Trolling is apparently an American tradition.