Hobby Directory instructions

Digital Document
Metadata
Content Type
Content Type
Digital Document
Collection(s)
Collection(s)
Hobby Directory
Description
Description
Instructions on placing a personal ad in the magazine Hobby Directory.

Hobby Directory (1946-circa 1952) was a small publication in which male hobbyists could publish personal ads and meet friends who shared their interests. The magazine quickly acquired a large gay male readership, and gay men used their ads to connect with one another. The men's descriptions of their hobbies -- for example, ballet, interior decorating, or collecting photographs of weightlifters -- were designed to signal that they were gay, as well as genuinely describing themselves to romantic prospects.

Hobby Directory was a fairly mainstream publication which was sold in craft stores and advertised in the magazines Popular Mechanics and Popular Science. Its reasons for ceasing publication are unknown, but historians have suggested that it may have fallen victim to enforcement of the Comstock Laws, which forbade sending "obscene" materials through the mail.
Resource Type
Resource Type
Text
Identifier
Identifier
GLBT-PER
Extent
Extent
1 item
Subject
Subject
Gay men
Date Created Qualifier
Date Created Qualifier
approximate
Date Created
Date Created
1946 to 1952
Publication Note
Publication Note
This public digital collection was supported by funding provided by the State of California, administered by the California State Library.
Rights
Rights

Courtesy of the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender (GLBT) Historical Society, San Francisco CA. This work is made accessible for purposes of education and research.

Transmission or reproduction of materials protected by copyright beyond that allowed by fair use requires the written permission of the copyright owners. Works not in the public domain cannot be commercially exploited without permission of the copyright owner. Responsibility for any use rests exclusively with the user. 

Contact the GLBT Historical Society Archivist for more information about reproduction and permission requests and our Take-Down Policy.

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