Mineshaft gay club
In New York City, the meatpacking district of Greenwich Village is home to many LGBTQ communities and movements. The most notable landmark is the Stonewall Inn that led to a series of riots in 1969. On the west side of Greenwich Village, however, was a lesser known gay hotspot: an exclusive, members-only BDSM sex club / male lover bar called the Mineshaft. Formed in October 1976, the Mineshaft was famous for its strict regulations on dress code and distinct sexual practices. During the time it operated, the Mineshaft provided vacuum for the gay group to thrive.
Managed by Walter Wallace, the Mineshaft was designed strictly for men to practice sexual activities distinct from the conventional gay norm. That said, not all men were allowed to participate. The Mineshaft, in addition to its interest in BDSM and alternative kinks, was notorious for its strict regulations on dress code, which listed more of what one should not wear in opposition to what one should wear (what was allowed). Adopted since the beginning, the dress code rules of the Mineshaft denied the following: cologne; any formal wear including suits, tuxedos, ties, and dress pants; any designer clothes; sneakers; disco
NON-FICTION BOOK
by Jack Fritscher
How to Quote from this Material
Copyright Jack Fritscher, Ph.D. & Mark Hemry - ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
PROFILES IN Same-sex attracted COURAGE
Leatherfolk, Arts, and Ideas
Volume 1
by Jack Fritscher, PhD
THE MINESHAFT
October 8, 1976-November 7, 1985
Legendary Twentieth-Century Sex Club
If You Don’t Realize Jack Shit About The Mineshaft,
Pull Up A Chair
“The first rule of Fight Club is: you don’t talk about Battle Club.” But the famous Mineshaft wasn’t Fight Club. Macho men who survived Mineshaft nights bragged every morning after about the night before. Wally Wallace managed that Roman orgy pit that ran 9 years and 9 days from October 8, 1976 to November 7, 1984, at 835 Washington Lane in the Meatpacking District in Greenwich Village. Located, without irony, next door to an all-night loading dock with burly butchers in white coats shouldering bloody cow carcasses from trucks into florescent abattoirs after midnight, the Mineshaft was one of the great performance spaces in New York. Freddie Mercury came for the sex and bought the T-shirt designed by Rex. It was at the Mineshaft that music producer Jacques Morali zeroed in on the four fetish
Mineshaft
History
In the decades after opening in 1927, the market building at 835 Washington Highway housed a variety of poultry, fruit, provisions, and meat dealers, and trucking and telegraph firms. The last market-related company lasted here until 1975. Overlapping with that use, a series of gay leather bars began leasing territory in 1968 on the first and second floors of the building. The Meatpacking District, in the northwestern corner of Greenwich Village, was then a perfect location for homosexual nightspots as there were no other nightly activities in the area, other than sex workers on the streets.
The Den / O.K. Corral
The Den, located on the first floor from 1968 to 1976, started out as a members-only leather lock. After a 1970 renovation it was known for dancing, a pool table, cheap drinks, and its free buffet on Sundays. It brought in lgbtq+ men from across a spectrum of sexual interests – “leather, sweater, and jeans,” as Gay Scene observed. The newspaper GAY, however, mused that “the boots and jackets are often just costume here.” The bar lost its liquor license in January 1972, b
RACE BANNON: Conquering the Mineshaft
from Recon News
25 September 2020
Race Bannon AKA member LoneWolfPig has been an organizer, writer, educator, speaker and activist in the LGBT, leather/kink, polyamory and HIV/STI prevention and treatment realms since 1973. In this article he talks about his first experience at the infamous Mineshaft sex club in Modern York.
It was 1978. I was 24 and living in New York Urban area. I had just moved there to pursue the next phase of my dancing and acting career.
Having been actively kinky since I first sought out and walked into Chicago's Gold Coast leather block in the early 70s, I had to check in the infamous Mineshaft sex club the first bedtime I landed in my new city.
I dropped off my bags at my new apartment, changed into nighttime cruising clothes, and headed to this iconic sexual institution.
Finding the club was tricky. There was no entrance sign, but friends had blazed the trail and I knew how to find it. It was in the meat packing district. At night it was a grungy place that made it an even hotter location for a sex club.
I made my way up the entrance stairs to be met by the doorman. He greeted me with a stable
.