'Important' phone from gay helpline on display at Bristol Museum

BBC News

11-07-2025

A telephone used to provide support to thousands of LGBTQ+ people has been described as a piece of history as it goes on display.Bristol Lesbian and Gay Switchboard was started by the late Dale Wakefield from her family home in Totterdown, and ran from 1975 until 2012.The phone is part of a new exhibition at Bristol Museum & Art Gallery called Gender Stories, 50 years after the helpline was set up."That phone connected me to all of the people reaching out who needed help and support and to feel less alone. It's history and it's important we don't forget," said former volunteer Tash Walker.
Andrew Foyle, from oral history group OutStories Bristol, said: "The very first call (on 1 February 1975) was from a straight man. "He identified himself as a cross dresser - not a term we would use now - who was worried that he might be mistaken for a homosexual."For the first three years, from 1975 to 1978, Dale just fielded all of these calls night and day, at times on her own. She was hugely important, a key gay activist."
In the early days, all the calls were logged, with details of the caller, why they were ringing, who dealt with it and what information was passed on to them.Decades later, as the internet and then mobiles gave LGBTQ+ people the chance to connect online, the calls to the switchboard started to dwindle and it closed in 2012.Ms Walker was a volunteer in the 2000s when she was a student in the city.
The switchboard had by then moved to a new premises.She said: "I knocked on the door really nervous. I had no idea about anything, all I knew was I was gay. "On the side was the phone, the very phone here (in Bristol Museum), and I just started answering calls in this tiny room".
The red hardback logbooks that recorded each call are now stored in Bristol Archives, but to maintain people's confidentiality, much of the information will not be available to be seen for more than 80 years.Gender Stories runs at Bristol Museum until 12 October, before moving to Brighton and Liverpool.