Order the book from Colossive Press.
We all got through the lockdowns of 2020 and 2021 in our own ways. Some of us were ambushed by cake and forced to attend parties (eye roll), but most of us did our best to stay away from other people.
To stop myself going crazy I began arranging some interviews via Zoom. Some were with Sussex Lancers that I was in contact with (Brighton-based gay leather bikers 1980–2000), and a couple of them mentioned going to a disco on a farm in Kent in the mid 1980s. This was news to me so I investigated further.
A fruity farm
Slowly the story of Tim Day, a gay fruit farmer, and the parties he organised at his farm, Hazelpits in Headcorn, began to reveal itself. The local gay group – Medway Area Gay Independent Community aka MAGIC – took over the running of the events and they just got bigger and bigger.
A ground-breaking hotel
While doing some research in old Gay News for a different project, I came across some adverts for The Hotel Roger Dee opening in 1972. Three things made it unusual – it was explicitly gay, one of the owners was a cabaret artiste, and it was in Angmering near Worthing.
A zoo, no seriously, a zoo
Then after lockdown had eased, I started chatting to a man in a pub and he mentioned he used to be a DJ in Bognor Regis. I said I had spent two years in Bognor in the mid 1980s and he said that was around the time he was a DJ in the gay bar, in the zoo!
Community spaces
The three stories felt connected in some way, and over time I realised that these were people creating much-needed LGBT spaces, however unusual the location. When some photos from the farm surfaced, I felt they deserved a wider audience and decided to put everything together in a book.
The very talented Fraser Dickson agreed to do the design for me, and he introduced me to the lovely people at Colossive Press who have a DIY ethos which fits really well with me. I was thrilled when writer and researcher Janes Traies (Now You See Me: Lesbian Life Stories) agreed to write the introduction for me.
If you like the sound of the book it’s available from City Books and the Kemptown Bookshop in the Brighton area, as well as being available to order from the Colossive Press website.
ISBN: 978-1-3999-6787-7
