When Lary Abramson moved to San Francisco from Detroit in July 1960, police raids on gay bars were commonplace. Nightlife existed at the decree of morals cops who could be bought off, and patrons of gay establishments who didn’t play along risked serious personal consequences. “The cops would usually come around midnight, so they’d turn on the lights and say, ‘No dancing!'” Abramson says.
One defiant bar was the Tay-Bush, so named because it stood at the corner of Taylor and Bush. “It was raided,” Abramson says, “and that was the raid where everybody’s name got published in the paper. People lost their jobs. That’s what led to the Tavern Guild,” an organization of gay bar owners that was instrumental in the political awakening of LGBT San Francisco.