Ogunquit's gay-friendly reputation was born from protest and rebellion

Yahoo

01-06-2025

Jun. 1—Two dozen protesters stood outside Valerie's, a restaurant and bar in Ogunquit, on the last Saturday in May 1975, holding up handwritten signs. "Gay, straight, we are human." "No more fear and oppression, gay is good."
Days earlier, a group of young gay people had been kicked out of the bar for dancing with their same-sex partners. Among them was Steve Bull, who grew up in nearby Kennebunk and was one of the people asked to leave Valerie's.
"You had to be discreet. It's the discretion that we were rebelling against, because we couldn't just be open and be ourselves," said Bull, an LGBTQ+ and civil rights activist who helped organize the protest to show they were not afraid to demand fair treatment.
Others gathered across the street to yell at the demonstrators, Bull remembered. A man pulled up in a car and spit in the face of one of the protesters. Police from four or five nearby towns showed up, prepared for a confrontation.
The protest ended peacefully, but it was a pivotal moment in LGBTQ history in Ogunquit, which had long been a place where gay people from across the Northeast gathered in the summer.
Almost exactly 50 years later, Ogunquit is kicking off Pride month with its annual three-day celebration next weekend.
Longtime residents reflected on how the town weathered a period of protest and violence in the 1970s and 80s, evolving into a community often touted as one of the most gay-friendly tourist destinations in the country. Some liken it to a "mini-Provincetown," a nod to the popular LGBTQ+ destination on the tip of Cape Cod.
"We've been through a lot in this town," said Randy Coulton, who has run businesses in Ogunquit with his husband, John Cavaretta, since the 1970s. "A lot of people just don't know the history. They don't have a clue about who marched and who protested. There's a lot of angst we all went through."
BECOMING 'A GAY HAVEN'
Ogunquit's identity as an artist colony, which later evolved into an LGBTQ enclave, was shaped in the late 1800s as artists discovered the beauty of Perkins Cove, a small, picture-perfect fishing community.
After the first bridge to Ogunquit Beach was built in 1890, summer visitors began flocking to town. Grand hotels, bed and breakfasts and restaurants were built to accommodate tourists arriving on trains and carriages.
By the 1970s, Ogunquit's thriving arts scene drew in many members of the LGBTQ community. There were art museums and galleries around town and the Ogunquit Playhouse was a popular stop for notable actors.
"It was a very bohemian crowd with people escaping the city and finding companionship up here," said Cavaretta, who moved to Ogunquit in 1966.
Coulton said there were lots of "interesting characters" who came to Ogunquit to be part of the artist community and to open businesses.
"It became a gay haven," he said.
But tensions simmered.
Not long before the protest at Valerie's, Cavaretta opened Anabel's, the first gay dance club in Maine, right in the middle of downtown.
There were other clubs where gay and straight people mixed, Coulton said. But Valerie's, which had a piano bar, was listed in guides for gay travelers as a gay-friendly business, although patrons were expected to be discreet.
A few miles up Route 1 in Wells, a gay bar called The Stage Door had been the center of controversy after it was denied a liquor license in February 1975. Activists from the Seacoast Area Gay Alliance said in a letter to town officials that the license denial was "clearly discriminatory and bias toward gay people."
After the dancers were kicked out of Valerie's, Bull and other activists decided it was time to speak out about that incident and what had happened at The Stage Door.
They gathered early on May 31, 1975, at The Stage Door and made their way to Wells Town Hall, where they picketed for hours. They then went to Ogunquit to protest in front of Valerie's. Bull said he and others were prepared to be arrested.
He recalled one moment vividly, when two older gay men in a Cadillac with Texas license plates pulled up alongside the picketers. One man spit in Bull's face, telling him, "You're ruining it for the rest of us."
"We straddled two eras," Bull said. "There were a lot of folks who were very comfortable in the closet, where they spent their whole lives. And there were some of us out there saying, 'You know, this is not enough.' We were rocking the boat and some people didn't like that."
'HUGE BACKLASH'
Coulton, who grew up in Wells, clearly remembers the pushback against the gay community that continued into the early 1980s.
Police targeted gay men in the dunes at night. There were beatings on the beach and a lot of name calling. Businesses frequented by gay visitors felt targeted by town officials, who they said selectively enforced local ordinances. High school seniors wrote in the yearbook that their goal in life was to beat up gay people, Coulton said.
"There was a huge backlash," he said.
In 1982, a canister of tear gas was thrown into the door of The Front Porch, a bar opened by John Revere two years earlier that was especially popular with gay customers. The second floor piano bar was packed with people at the time, Coulton recalled.
"All these people were crowded upstairs, choking on gas, and people panicked and threw tables and chairs through the windows," he said. Luckily, no one was seriously injured.
Tensions intensified when two articles were published describing Ogunquit as a gay community. One, a travel article in Torso magazine, said "Ogunquit, Maine, (is) certainly a booming gay village."
Soon after, a group of local businessmen formed a group called Integrity for Ogunquit, urging town officials to crack down on businesses that defied local ordinances, including two gay nightclubs.
"We just want to preserve the character of this town. The places that violate the rules just happen to be owned by gays," Graham Cookson, a local theater owner, told a reporter in 1982.
Gay business owners, however, felt they were being unfairly targeted.
"They (residents) feel the gay people coming in are hurting the town. They are afraid of people finding out Ogunquit is a gay community," Harold Felberg, owner of The Club, a gay bar that had come under attack for allegedly violating the noise ordinance, told a reporter at the time.
OGUNQUIT PRIDE
By the late 1980s, the AIDS epidemic had been raging nationally for years. Ogunquit was not spared, but townspeople showed up to support those who became sick.
"We were losing members of our community," Cavaretta said. "People came and helped out dealing with people who were sick and dying at home."
Gay residents, including Coulton and Cavaretta, vocally criticized the federal administration for its handling of the crisis. In 1991, more than 1,500 activists from across the Northeast converged on President George H.W. Bush's home in Kennebunkport to demand a national plan to combat AIDS. The demonstration ended with a die-in on the street.
It was then, Coulton said, that Ogunquit became what it is now.
The town settled into its reputation as a popular tourist destination for all kinds of people, preparing each year to see its population swell by tens of thousands between Memorial Day and Labor Day.
"By the '90s, things started mixing a lot more," Cavaretta said. "It just seemed so homogeneous where people were not looking at gay or straight, they were just looking for a good time in the summertime."
These days, Ogunquit is dotted with pride flags throughout the year — and a rainbow sidewalk is permanently painted in the center of town. But it's in June that celebrations really ramp up.
Planning for the annual Pride celebration starts months in advance and incorporates businesses throughout town, said Ron Nassef, the general manager of the Meadowmere Resort and chair of the Ogunquit Chamber of Commerce Pride Committee.
Ogunquit Pride has grown into one of the largest and longest-running Pride celebrations in the state. This year, it includes a kick-off party with live music on Friday night, free films, karaoke and a Dueling Drag Divas show. On Saturday, a unity flag raising will be held at 10:30 a.m. in the middle of town, followed by a parade to Dorothea Jacobs Grant Common for a "Pride in the Park" picnic.
Throughout the weekend, businesses will host a variety of events.
"It's electrifying. The community coming together and it's an amazing feeling," Nassef said.
Nassef, who is adopting two children with his husband, plans to speak during the flag-raising ceremony about what pride means to him. He started coming to Ogunquit 22 years ago and found a community "where people are so welcoming" that he knew he wanted to be a part of.
"You can go there and be yourself. Nobody judges you," he said. "That's the intense thing about this community."
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