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The Boys of Boise
Furor, Vice and Folly in an American City
John G. Gerassi
With a New Foreword by Peter Boag
"Written in 1965 about a same-sex sexual scandal that occurred in 1955 in Boise, Idaho, John Gerassi's classic study depicts both middle America's traditional response to homosexuality and an era in the country's history before the modern gay rights movement really got underway. Because much of what Gerassi wrote about persists in today's struggles over gay and lesbian issues, his book still has much to tell us about how contemporary society reacts to, and misunderstands, homosexuality."-Peter Boag
On the morning of November 2, 1955, the people of Boise, Idaho, were stunned by a screaming headline in the Idaho Daily Statesman, THREE BOISE MEN ADMIT SEX CHARGES. Time magazine picked up the story, reporting that a "homosexual underworld" had long operated in Idaho's staid capital city. The Statesman led the hysteria that resulted in dozens of arrests-including some highly placed members of the community-and sentences ranging from probation to life imprisonment.
Peter Boag's Foreword places the book in historical perspective, summarizing the popular psychological theories and legal conceptions that helped to shape Gerassi's research. He discusses advances in Idaho's public approach to homosexuality and ways in which the provincialism chronicled by Gerassi persists to this day.
Series: Columbia Northwest Classics
Table of Contents:
Foreword to the 2001 Paperback Edition
Preface to the 2001 Paperback Edition
Introduction to the original Edition
Chronology
Crush the Monster
The Repairman and the Banker
The Client
The Boys
From Whores to Adults
High Eagle
The Curtain Falls
The First Day of Reckoning
The homosexual and the Analyst
The Gay World
The murderer and the West Point Cadet
Public Poverty and Private Power
Mormons, Negros and Birchers
The second day of reckoning
"The Communist Plot"
The Trial-Round One
The Trial-Round Two
The Trial-Round Three and Knockout!
Conclusion
Appendix A: Motion for Withholding Judgment
Appendix B: Motion for New Trial
Appendix C: Smith's Affidavit
Appendix D: Dr. Butler's Affidavit
Appendix E: The Prejudice of the Press
Appendix F: The Uninspected Confession
Index
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Pub Date:
2001
ISBN:
PAPER:
0-295-98167-9
9780295981673
Price:
Paper: $22.50s
Subject Listing:
Western History
Political Science
Bibliographic information:
360 pp., appendix, index, 5.5" x 8.5"
Territorial rights:
world
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