Improper Bostonians: Lesbian and Gay History from the Puritans to Playland »

Surprising, fun, and magnificently illustrated with two hundred images, Improper Bostonians is the first book to depict Boston's three centuries of gay and lesbian life, and—since it treats the American city with the longest gay and lesbian history—the most comprehensive and meticulously researched gay city history ever written.

Library Journal

Compiled by a nonprofit volunteer group of historians, archivists, and writers known as The History Project, this book stems from research begun in 1980 and first presented as an exhibit at the Boston Public Library in 1996. By turns informative, amusing, and heartbreaking, this marvelously illustrated culmination documents 300 years of gay and lesbian life in the U.S. city with their longest history. Research draws on newspapers, diaries, oral history, archives, and even advertising. Both women and men are discussed equally, and the accounts of life in the 19th century--of Boston marriages and the bohemian group, The Visionists--are particularly informative. There is an extensive list of documentary notes and photo credits that will aid future researchers. This first-of-its-kind book on Boston straddles the line between George Chauncey's more scholarly Gay New York (BasicBks., 1994) and Jim Van Buskirk's more visual San Francisco history, Gay by the Bay (LJ 4/1/96). This remarkable work is highly recommended for public and academic libraries.--Lisa N. Johnston, Sweet Briar Coll. Lib., VA