“Gay” Paradise

[Essay]
The other day I went in to Provincetown MA otherwise known affectionately know as “P’town.”

I figured that it would be deserted, but when I came down Cromwell St. and went to turn on to Bradford St. there people everywhere and turning on to Commercial St. I had to wait for an opening in the foot traffic. Down Keegan St. and over the rainbow crosswalk to the parking lot.

The parking lot on McMillan pier was full. I had to drive around it a couple of times to find a space, I saw a family of five heading down one of the aisle so with parking skills developed over decades, I stalked them, so with my car in stealth mode running on the electric motor I followed them and was rewarded with a parking space.

As I was waiting to for them to back out of their space a lesbian couple walked by, the kids in the family that I stalked did do anything when they saw the couple, no giggling, poking elbows… it was a non-factor.

Walking down Commercial St. I heard my name called and I looked around but all I saw was masked faces. Someone called my name again and he pulled down his mask… Ah. It was my contractor sitting on the park bench in front of the town hall. I wanted to say why are you not working to install my new windows, but instead I said "Hi" and made smalltalk.

As I continued walking along Commercial St. you can’t help notice all the rainbow flags and a couple of trans and Bi flags flying, almost every store has one flying.

I have a theory why P’town at the very tip of Cape Cod is so “LGBTQ+” friendly. As we were driven out of other towns and places they keep heading father and father out toward the tip of the Cape and finally Provincetown was the last place they couldn’t be driven out because there was no other place to go.

The visit Provincetown website says,

Gay and Lesbian History of Provincetown: Tolerance, Harmony, and Open Spirit
It is no coincidence that for more than 50 years, the gay and lesbian community returns every summer to Provincetown. The recent development/tourism development of Provincetown owes much to this community here where one can find a place to feel at home.

In reality it probably became so gay friendly because of the artists and the writers. P’town was a sleepy Portuguese fishing village until the Roaring Twenties. The Cape was a bootleggers dreams, and P’town at the end of the Cape and other towns had harbors and inlets where the smugglers could unload.
When the railroad came to Provincetown, according the New England Historical Society…

The railroad, though, brought tourists to enjoy Provincetown’s wide, sandy beaches. So did the steamer from Boston and later, Route 6. Portuguese families discovered they could make a little extra money by taking in boarders. While the Portuguese men were away fishing, their wives accommodated visitors, often nice single men. They returned year after year, and they grew friendly with their hostesses.

From then and there, Provincetown was only a few steps away from becoming a gay mecca. But the town’s unique subculture had its roots in a long-ago past.
[…]
Unlike other colonial towns, Ptown didn’t get a charter. And unlike other Puritan towns, it didn’t have to support a minister. The residents lived outside of the Puritans’ strict social order. Well outside.

Then came the playwrights, poets, and artists, Tennessee Williams and Eugene O’Neill, and artist like Marsden Hartley and Charles Demuth with miles and miles of deserted beaches and dunes no body cared what happened on the beaches and dune shacks.

The Atlantic House (also known as the A-House) may possibly be the oldest gay nightclub in the U.S. It was built by Provincetown’s first Postmaster, Daniel Pease, in 1798, and was a hangout for some of America’s most well-known writers in the 1920s. The town became truly “gay-friendly” back in the early 1950s and has remained so to this day. It is one of the largest LGBTQ-friendly communities in the country.

The movie “Packed In a Trunk: The Lost Art of Edith Lake Wilkinson” is about a lesbian artist who lived in P’town in the twenties when Provincetown was the host to the artist colony.

When I was around thirteen my parents and a neighbor rented a cottage for 2 weeks in North Truro my parents took it for a week and the neighbors took for a week so us kids had two weeks in the Cape and our parents go a week vacation with out the kids. I remember when we went into P’town my father use to call it bohemian lifestyle. When we walked the streets there were street artist galore, every nook and cranny had a portrait or character artist in it. Now looking back at that I realize that “bohemian lifestyle” was a code word gays. Little did I know back then that I would have cottage just down the road from P’town and that I would be attending Fantasia Fair one of the oldest trans conferences in the US. Besides Fan Fair, there is Bear Week and Women’s week which is just before Fan Fair.

And then there is Carnival!

Two years ago I went to see the parade on Thursday… it was amazing!

Provincetown goes from a population of 3,000 to almost 100,000 for the parade.

I would have to say P’town is “The” most friendly LGBTQ+ accepting place on the east coast and free thinking for the common people. Northampton is also very LGBTQ+ but I think P'town won just by a nose;  I have heard that on the west coast that Palm Springs is the same way but from what I have seen it is for the rich “GAYs” and sadly P’town could be heading the same way.

One of the biggest problems that they have on the Cape is finding cooks, waiters, store clerks and other employees. At one time they lived in apartments above the stores but now they all have been converted into condos… condo that sell for $200,000 or $300,000. When I was looking for a cottage the real estate broker had a condo that was one room with a sleeping loft on Commercial St. with no parking that was almost $300,000!

The towns around P’town are trying to build low income housing but the residents keep shooting the zoning changes down and then they complain that they can’t find summer help.

Like all coastal towns P’town is in metamorphosis, where it ends up we have to wait and see. Will it be inundates the nouveau riche driving land prices out of sight? Will mega yachts take over the harbor? Will cruise ships dump thousand of passengers on the streets of P’town?
[/Essay]

These are the links I used for the essay:
You Think You Know Provincetown? Check Out These 9 Facts!
Gay and Lesbian History of Provincetown
How Ptown Got So Gay, Gay, Gay