BROWN, Ricardo J. 1927-1999

PERSONAL:

Born 1927, in Stillwater, MN; died 1999.

CAREER:

Journalist. Worked as a courts reporter for the Alabama Journal, courts reporter and sports editor for the Fairbanks Daily News Mirror, Fairbanks, AK, and as Minneapolis bureau chief for Fairchild Publications. Military service: Served in the U.S. Navy.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Minnesota Book Award nomination for autobiography and Triangle Award nomination for nonfiction, both 2002, both for The Evening Crowd at Kirmser's: A Gay Life in the 1940s.

WRITINGS:

The Evening Crowd at Kirmser's: A Gay Life in the 1940s, edited by William Reichard, University of Minnesota Press (Minneapolis, MN), 2001.

SIDELIGHTS:

Ricardo J. Brown was a life-long journalist who wrote one book, The Evening Crowd at Kirmser's: A Gay Life in the 1940s, which was published posthumously. Brown was born near St. Paul, Minnesota, and was in high school when he realized that he was gay. He moved to Greenwich Village in New York, but was upset by the openly gay culture and joined the U.S. Navy. He was discharged in 1945 after revealing his homosexual orientation to his commanding officer. Returning to St. Paul, he looked for other people like himself and discovered Kirmser's, a small neighborhood bar owned by a German immigrant couple. Working-class customers frequented the bar during the day, but at night it was the unofficial meeting place of the gay community. Library Journal contributor Jeff Ingram, who called this a "remarkable little book," noted that in a time when being outed could mean losing one's job "the real men and women portrayed here display extraordinary courage and emotional resiliency."

Brown writes of various people, including queen Bette Boop; his friend Dale, who lost his job when someone told his employer that he was gay; Flaming Youth, a middle-aged man whose nickname of earlier years had stuck; and Dickie Grant, a gentle young man who was imprisoned for writing bad checks and was murdered there. Brown notes that couples refrained from using pet names for each other in private for fear of slipping up in public. For the most part, they met in Kirmser's, not daring to venture into the greater Minneapolis area, but they sometimes went to roadhouses on the outskirts of town for a change of scene and companionship. Martha E. Stone wrote in the Gay and Lesbian Review Worldwide that although Brown provides biographical information and includes many photographs, "Kirmser's itself is the major character in this lively, intimate book."

Brown recalls an incident when he intervened as Flaming Youth was being bashed by two bullies. In this pre-Stonewall era, when gays chose not to rally to each other's aid, he was asked by another gay man named Lucky why he had gotten involved. Brown writes that he "was stricken silent by the question. Why? What did he mean, why did I get into it? I didn't know how to reply to such a stupid question. Were we all supposed to sit there while two guys kicked the shit out of an old man like Flaming Youth? Could we call the cops? Not us. We were the criminals." Brown consistently refers to himself and his gay friends as being inferior to straights. He calls his group "tainted meat," which was originally to have been the book's title. Instead of criticizing the behavior of straight men who bantered about sports and bragged about female conquests, they emulated them, remarking about pinup queens like Betty Grable and Rita Hayworth, opening doors for women, and giving up their seats while riding the bus.

Tom Roach wrote in the Ruminator Review that "while this sounds like typical closet behavior, the sort that might make some queer readers squirm in quasi-nostalgic recognition, Brown is neither resentful nor ashamed of having to play it straight. And in this sense Kirmser's is unnervingly refreshing: it is willing to explore the identification many gays had—and still have—with straight culture." While Jim Gladstone commented in a Lambda Book Report assessment that because Brown did not have time to polish the manuscript before he died, the published work is "much less of a gem than one might hope for." Nevertheless, he added, "From time to time, Brown does hit the mark stylistically, with well-etched descriptions of his lesbian friend, Ruth, and perfect sound bites of queeny bar dialogue." A Publishers Weekly contributor more enthusiastically wrote that the author "convincingly, honestly, and intelligently portrays the pain and the deep sense of community" among his friends, concluding that The Evening Crowd at Kirmser's is "a major contribution to gay and lesbian, as well as urban studies."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

BOOKS

Brown, Ricardo J., The Evening Crowd at Kirmser's: A Gay Life in the 1940s, University of Minnesota Press (Minneapolis, MN), 2001.

PERIODICALS

Gay and Lesbian Review Worldwide, January-February, 2002, Martha E. Stone, review of The Evening Crowd at Kirmser's: A Gay Life in the 1940s, p. 37.

Lambda Book Report, October, 2001, Jim Gladstone, review of The Evening Crowd at Kirmser's, p. 23.

Library Journal, August, 2001, Jeff Ingram, review of The Evening Crowd at Kirmser's, p. 141.

Michigan Historical Review, fall, 2002, Larry R. Peterson, review of The Evening Crowd at Kirmser's, p. 187.

Publishers Weekly, June 25, 2001, review of The Evening Crowd at Kirmser's, p. 63.

Ruminator Review, spring, 2003, Tom Roach, review of The Evening Crowd at Kirmser's, p. 20.

Washington Post Book World, December 23, 2001, review of The Evening Crowd at Kirmser's, p. 11.*