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adventuresinobx · 2 years

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The Advocate - Chapter 1

AU Rafe Cameron x fem!reader

Summary: Rafe Cameron looks like he has it all. He’s 32, has a great job as a lawyer and what seemed like the perfect marriage. Only it wasn’t behind closed doors and now he’s in the middle of a divorce, forced to return to his hometown in the Outer Banks. Back where it all began, with all the bad memories, can one resident help him get his life back together or will he slip into old habits?

A/N: Sooo here it is! Chapter one of a new AU Rafe fic! @starkeyobx and I have been throwing ideas around for this and I think we both love how it came out. 💕

Warnings: Very light hints of controlling (not Rafe being controlled / doing the controlling), Rafe struggling a little emotionally.

It had been years since Rafe Cameron had made it back to the Outer Banks. His family still lived here - and a few of his old friends - but life had just got in the way. Firstly there was his job, then he met the woman of his dreams, and well, he just never seemed to be able to make it back to North Carolina. His life moved on, and he wondered whether the others had got out of here too.

He turned the corner sharply, his flashy 2022 plate Tesla screeching as he made his way through The Cut and into Figure Eight. This had been his stomping ground for years, but returning to this town, he felt more out of place than ever. He was 19 when he walked out of here to study law and he never looked back, and whilst everything looked the same, it looked different too.

When he walked out at 19, he had needed the new start. His older teenage years had been plagued by his drug addiction, him desperate to hurt himself after causing so much pain to his first love. He broke her heart and so he felt something had to give too, and his addiction was a way for him to cope with what he had done. He couldn’t save her from the pain so he decided to cause his own.

He had been clean for 12 years, nine months and 16 days now. Something he always reminded himself of in bad times. He just hoped being back in his hometown wouldn’t skew his hard fought progress.

His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of his phone going off; it was his assistant from the New York office of his legal firm, where he had his base for years, but now he was being forced to move back to the Outer Banks, no longer able to support his own luxury lifestyle in New York and that of his soon to be ex-wife’s too.

“Yep, hi,” he said rather sharply, as he answered the phone and quickly swerved to avoid hitting a chicken that had escaped from one of the Pogues’ gardens nearby, “Talk to me.” There was a moment of silence before he heard a voice the other end of the phone.

“Uh hello Mr Cameron. Lovely to finally speak to you,” the voice came through the phone. She was obviously new and trying to impress. “It’s Maria here, from the office in New York. It’s about your case, do you have time to talk? I’m just finalising your paperwork for the Williams and Garcia case. It’s all come through from the court now.”

“Yep go on, please,” he said, listening as she double checked a few details with him. He pulled up at some traffic lights, tapping his fingers against the wheel as he waited for them to change from red to green, surveying the crossroads in front of him. It was then he spotted someone he knew very well.

“Maria is that all you need from me today?” he asked, desperate to wrap up the phone call, as she told him it was. “That’s great, thank you love, thanks for doing that. Call me if you need anything else from me. Bye, bye.”

The lights went green and Rafe swerved across the other lane to pull up next to the sidewalk.

“Top, hey Topper,” he shouted, jumping out the car and heading over to his friend he hadn’t seen in years.

“Rafe?” he said, surprised to see him back in Figure Eight after so long. “Hey buddy, how have you been?” His daughter stood there close by, waiting to be introduced and Rafe immediately made a fuss of the little one, kneeling down to her level to say hello.

“And who’s this? Hi princess,” he said, smiling at the shy little girl who was holding her daddy’s hand and swinging the edge of her dress nervously.

“Eden, this is your uncle Rafe,” he said, introducing his little girl to his best friend. Him and Topper had spoke a few times over the years, but they had fallen out of contact for the last couple. It wasn’t like anything had changed in their friendship though, it was like jumping back into old habits and old times straight away. Life has just got in the way, as it always seemed to do.

“Hi sweetheart, how are you today?” he asked the little girl, her looking back at her dad unsure whether she should approach the stranger.

“Go on, it’s ok,” Topper said, lightly tapping his daughter’s shoulder and she took that as a sign it was all ok and made a few steps towards him.

“Hey princess, so nice to finally meet you. I only saw you on FaceTime a few times when you were a little baby, and now you’re so grown,” he said in a cute singsong voice. “How old are you now?”

“Three,” she said, beaming at him, “And did you know I have a little brother on the way? Then I will be a big sister and I get to boss him around.” Rafe looked up at Topper, shocked at her words; he had no idea him and Amelia were expecting another baby.

“Top, another one?” he said excitedly, standing up to give his friend a congratulatory hug. Seeing her dad hug Rafe must have made Eden more comfortable too and she moved closer to hug Rafe’s leg.

“Oh Eden come here,” he said, pulling away from Topper and lifting the little girl up and sitting her on his hip, “How about a group hug eh?” The little girl nodded excitedly and stretched her arms out and around Rafe’s neck, holding onto him tightly like her life depended on it.

“What brings you back to the Outer Banks then?” Topper asked, rubbing his daughter’s back reassuringly as he clung onto Rafe, excited to be seeing the world from a different perspective now she was in the arms of someone who was 6 foot 4 in height.

“Life,” Rafe said and Topper instantly realised it wasn’t the best thing for him that he was back. “I’ll fill you in some other time, but me and Grace have, you know, consciously uncoupled. Is that what they call it now?” There was almost a hint of laughter in his voice, probably masking the pain that he felt that his relationship hadn’t worked out now they had both hoped.

“Oh I’m sorry man,” Topper said, taking Eden off him and resting her on his hip. She grimaced at the sudden change in height; she was about eight inches lower down in the world now. Topper patted his friend’s shoulder in a reassuring way. “But it’s nice to have you back here. Maybe we should grab a beer sometime?”

Even after all this time, it was like they were back to the old times. Just older now with kids (well on Topper’s part) and life behind them.

“A beer sounds great Top, still on the same number?” Rafe asked and Topper nodded in response.

“Same house too, my parents have moved out to be closer to my Aunty, so yeah, we have the family home now,” he said, “You should come over sometime; come and see Amelia and bump. We could go take a boat on the river, for old times’ sake.”

“Sounds awesome, I’ve gotta go, but give Millie my love,” he said, before putting his arms out and bagsying one last cuddle with Eden. “I’ll see you soon princess,” he said, his voice going back into that singsong variety as she excitedly hugged him goodbye.

“Bye Uncle Rafey,” she shouted back, waving excitedly, after he handed her back over to Topper. Rafe smiled to himself as he walked back to his car; maybe being home wasn’t going to be too bad after all.

He was two streets away from the family home of Tannyhill when he saw Y/N for the first time. She was almost ethereal; like an angel sent from above. Nothing like the women he had encountered in New York.

Her summer dress hugged her perfectly, it floating along with her which made her seem like she was walking on clouds. He admired how beautiful she was, even from afar. It had been a long time since he felt that way about any woman; the last time was when he had met Grace.

She was beautiful. A goddess was the wrong way to describe her but it’s the only word he could manage to think of. There was something about her that drew him to her and even though she was physically long gone now, he couldn’t get her out of his mind. As he turned into the drive of his family’s home, he shook his thoughts of his mystery woman and tried to focus on the here and now.

Rose and Ward were there to greet him when he drove up to the front doors of the house. Smiles on their face as they waved at him and Rose excitedly rushed to hug him. He was ready for that line - the one everyone said now that he and Grace had split. As he stepped out the car, he prepared himself for it - and it came almost instantly.

“How you holding up son?” Ward asked, hugging him reassuringly. And then came Rose with the other line he had heard so many times over the past month.

“It gets better Rafe, I promise,” she said.

He was so tired of those two phrases, but he managed to brush them off, instead turning the conversation over to the two of them and how they were doing. He asked about Sarah, who had moved to South Carolina with her boyfriend, and Wheezie, who was at college now, as he settled back into his life in the Outer Banks.

They all sat down in the kitchen, catching up about life - but Rafe tried not to mention too much about the divorce. Frankly, it was all a bit raw - and anyway his mind was on that woman he had seen. He couldn’t get her out of his head. He felt almost drawn to her.

“I know you said not to make a fuss, but you’re our only son, and it’s a privilege having you at home,” Ward began over the table as they all sipped fruity tea from perfect china tea cups, “So we’re organised a little welcome home party tonight. Some of the neighbours are coming and then there’s your friends. You know Topper, Kelce, um.” He paused. “Yeah it’ll be good.”

“Oh I saw Top today, in town, he didn’t mention it,” he mused as Ward had explained it was meant to be a surprise, but “you’re not 16 years old anymore son”.

“Dad, that’s kind of you, but I don’t need a happy divorce party,” Rafe added, confused on why everyone had to make a big deal of his split, tell him it was all going to be ok, the usual. If there’s one thing Rafe hated, it was a pity party. He dealt with divorces every day of his life. This, apart from being his, was no different at all.

Rafe was sat upstairs in his old bedroom, it still exactly the same as the day he left. He wondered how it ever went so wrong; how he ended up going from being such a successful lawyer to now living back with his parents with a failed marriage under his belt.

19-year old Rafe would have been happy he made it through the last few years, but 32-year-old Rafe was just disappointed this is how it all ended. He had dreamt of a great job, falling in love, marrying the girl of his dreams, buying a dream house with her, maybe even starting a family one day. That wasn’t to be, for now at least.

But if there’s one thing Rafe Cameron was good at, it was fronting. He was great at that and as his dad called him downstairs for the party, that’s exactly what he planned to do. Front like his life depended on it.

“Coming,” he shouted back, feeling like he was 16 again as he responded to his dad’s call. He paused for a second, stopping to fix his shirt in the mirror, smoothing it down. He didn’t have his life together, but he wanted it to seem like he had. Desperately wanted it all to look ok, even if it wasn’t. It would be. It would be.

Downstairs, he did exactly as he planned. Said hello to the Smiths - some of the elderly neighbours - listened as they told him he would “get her back soon”. He stayed quiet, his hand balling into his fist beside him as he tried to brush off all the anger he felt. Inside he was fuming, externally he looked like the most relaxed man on the planet. Fronting, that’s what he had planned to do.

He managed to excuse himself after a few minutes, heading towards the house for a brief moment of calm before everyone started arriving. His mind was in overdrive already, and it was made worse when he saw a big sign hung by the back doors, which read “Welcome home son”. Like cmon, why did this have to be such a big thing? It was normal, happened to everyone. He saw it happen in front of his eyes every single -

“Oh shit, I’m so sor-,” he said, taking a step back, shaking his head in confusion, before looking up at the person he had just collided into. It was her.

He recognised her almost instantly. The girl on the sidewalk. The aura surrounding her was even more powerful now she was up close, smoothing her dress as he finally realised he had almost spilt his drink on her. He couldn’t speak, words failing him as he tried to mutter out another sorry, apologise for being so clumsy.

Say something, Rafe. Say anything. Speak.

“Did I hurt you?”

Ok don’t say that, that doesn’t even make sense.

“No you’re fine, you must be Rafe. Ward’s told us a lot about you. I’m sorry to hear about what happened.” This was not the first impression he wanted to leave.

“Hi nice to meet you,” he said, putting out his hand to shake hers, “I’m Rafe - Rafe Cameron - but uh you know that already so that’s uh pointless for me to say.” He paused, thinking what was best to say next. “Your name, um, yeah, so what’s your name?”

“Y/N,” she replied, taking his hand in his. She shook it, her grip strong but not too iron fisted. The moment their hands met, he felt like sparks were flying off each of his fingers. She must have felt it too, he thought, as she almost went to step back for a moment but her hand clung onto his for dear life. “It’s really nice to meet you Rafe. I’ve heard so much about you,” she repeated.

“And not all bad, if that face of yours is anything to go by. You can smile,” she joked, making him suddenly realise he must have looked so miserable. A smile quickly appeared on his face, him desperate not to appear so - moody - that was not the impression he wanted to give her. It wasn’t the impression he wanted to give anyone, but especially her.

It sounded crazy to him, to even admit to himself, but it felt like her soul was speaking to him. Her warm smile, the way she was looking at him and that softness behind her eyes. He hadn’t seen that in someone for a long time. He didn’t know how to explain his feelings but they were all bubbling up; every single emotion coursing through his veins. He felt sad that his divorce was being made into some big spectacle, but without it, he could have never laid eyes on this beautiful woman now in front of him. Ethereal, it was the best way to describe her.

“So I guess you’re sick and tired about talking about your divorce eh, so tell me about you,” she began, a smile forming on his face at her words, “And I mean you as you. Not as one half of someone else.”

Rafe tried his best to hold in a big grin. No one ever asked about him. Since their engagement, it was always about him and Grace and when they’d be getting married (“October 3 2020”) or when they’d have kids (“soon when the time is right”). But no one ever asked about him, his dreams and hopes and ambitions.

“Um where do I start?” he said, a light chuckle filling the room. He began to tell her about his childhood, growing up in the Outer Banks, his friends, family. He couldn’t stop; it was like word vomit. She stood there for what felt like hours - probably only a few minutes - her eyes scanning over his, a grin spreading on her face which broke out into a laugh as he recalled the time he fell off his motorbike and scraped his leg really badly.

“Didn’t hurt your pretty face though did it,” she chimed in, her eyes instantly locking with his. The heat rose to his cheeks at her words; him keeping that solid gaze on her. The tension in the room rife.

Suddenly, as if he’d returned back to earth, he laughed off his embarrassment, covering his overeager grin with an awkward cough. He was just about to speak when the sound of a kid shouting interrupted them.

“Mommy, mommy, need you,” the little boy screamed as he ran into the kitchen where the two of them had been talking. Rafe awkwardly stepped back from her on hearing another voice as he realised what was going on; it was her son. She had kids.

“Hey baby, how are you?” she said, instantly bending down to her son’s level.

“Hi mommy, who’s this?” the little boy said, spinning around to look at Rafe, who immediately crouched down too, knowing his 6’4 frame could be intimidating for someone so small. Still, he had to look up to look at Rafe.

“Hi buddy, I’m Rafe. What’s your name?”

The little one suddenly went shy, mumbling something incoherent and covering his face in his mum’s chest.

“This is my son, Oliver,” she said with a smile as she looked at Rafe, him smiling back at the kid. He was obviously shy but Rafe had a way of getting him out of his shell as he spotted a clue on his t-shirt.

“Hey do you like the Knicks?” Rafe said, glancing down to the shirt. The little boy nodded, looking back at his mum and fidgeting with his hands, obviously nervous. “They’re my favourite too.”

“Who’s your favourite player?”

That was all he needed to say and suddenly Oliver settled in completely, he loved talking about the Knicks. He was obsessed with basketball and told Rafe how he had always dreamed of going to a game one day. The two got caught up in an animated discussion - players, the game and all of that as Rafe told him what it was like being at a match. He promised to take him one day.

Rafe’s eyes kept flicking back to Y/N, his gaze constantly switching. He couldn’t keep his eyes off her. She was so beautiful, so captivating. And it was the way she looked at her son too, her eyes lighting up the more animated he got. She loved seeing him so comfortable with a stranger; maybe it was Rafe’s energy that helped him settle quickly. Either way she was grateful for it.

“Oh my gosh mommy, guess what? Rafe said he’d take me to a game. Mommy, mommy,” Oliver said, so excited by the idea of it. He could barely contain himself.

“That’s very kind of Rafe,” she said, her eyes flicking from her son to Rafe’s as she smiled at him sweetly, his heart beating extra hard after meeting her gaze. “What do you say to Rafe?”

“You’re the best oh my gosh, I love you,” the kid said, running back over to Rafe, who chuckled as he was nearly knocked down in the process. He immediately opened his arms, wrapping them around Oliver and picking him up. He sat him on his hip, the little one still clutching onto his neck for dear life, so excited by what Rafe had proposed as they continued to talk about it.

Y/N watched on silently, smiling to herself at their interaction, completely captivated by how good Rafe was with Ollie. As they chatted, the little boy moved his hands and started to play with Rafe’s chain which hung around his neck. Rafe didn’t seem to notice, but she did.

“Don’t do that please sweetheart,” she told him as he looked over, smiling guiltily.

“Oh no it’s ok, I don’t mind,” Rafe jumped in, the boy settling back in his arms and continuing to play with the chain on his neck, his tiny fingers running over the gold metal. “It’s fine with me.” He gave the boy a reassuring smile, rubbing his back to settle his nerves.

“What’s going on here then?” a softly spoken but firm voice came from the other side of the room.

Rafe immediately clammed up, noticing how Y/N had stepped towards him and made a grab for her son.

“Oh sweetheart this is Rafe, Ward’s son,” she said.

Sweetheart. But that must mean -

“Rafe, this is Alex, my husband.”

A/N: Ahh so that’s it for chapter one! Let me know what you think and if you’d like a second chapter 🤞🤞

tagging all my taglist and some people i think *might* want to read it and other people i’m inspired to write AU rafe by but pls feel free to ignore if you’re not keen 💕 i won’t be offended 💓

main taglist (pls let me know if you want to be added 🥰)

@starkeyobx @lovelyhedgehog44 @gryffindorpouge11 @jjmaybankmakesmecry @pankowforlife @bayy2452 @proactivetypeofgirl @hoebx @fangirlfree @severa-kane @lovedetlost @slutforsmutsstuff @drewbooooo @raiinyhood @samxslaughter @valeriiecameron @burgstead @mayceelou @my-baexht-ls @i-always-come-back-xoxo @0fucsgivenon @heesbestlover @babeyglo @infatuatedjanes @ailee-celeste @malums-trash-can

@wannabestarkeysgirl @storytellingwitht @mackenzielovee @strokesofstokes

#the advocate #rafe cameron #rafe cameron au #rafe cameron fanfic #rafe cameron fanfiction #rafe cameron fic #rafe cameron imagine #rafe cameron fluff #rafe cameron x reader #rafe cameron x y/n #rafe cameron x you #obx #outer banks fanfiction #outer banks fic #rafe outer banks #rafe x reader #obx fic #obx fanfic

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edgarmoser · 4 months

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jon voight on the cover of the advocate (september 1969)

#john voight #the advocate

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thexfridax · 2 years

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How A League of Their Own Is Changing the Game for Queer and Black Women

Stars Abbi Jacobson and Chanté Adams and original player Maybelle Blair chat with The Advocate for our digital cover story about making the gayest, most inclusive League yet.

By Tracy E. Gilchrist, August 12 2022

Partway into the pilot of the hotly anticipated Prime Video series A League of Their Own, Max Chapman — a ringer of a pitcher — arrives at the field where tryouts for the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League are under way. On that Midwestern field in the 1940s, the women are literally hitting it out of the park, sliding into home, and catching pop-up balls behind their backs with ease. There’s a sense of joy among them, some housewives, others young women just out of school, for whom ballplaying was purely avocational, something they couldn’t take seriously if there were a meal to cook, laundry to fold, dishes to wash — that is, until the major leagues were gutted during World War II. With the male players off to war, they finally got their chance.

While players like Abbi Jacobson’s Carson and D’Arcy Carden’s Greta revel in the hope of becoming among the first women to play ball professionally, Max is turned away without a shot because she’s Black. Before exiting without a tryout, she fires a ball a few hundred yards over the heads of the women, umpires, and executives trying to make a buck off “girls’ baseball.” (“Who was that?” Carson exclaims.)

It’s the first scene in the series from creators Jacobson and Will Graham and queer executive producers Desta Tedros Reff and Jamie Babbit (who also directs) that signals to the audience that this is not your mother’s A League of Their Own. The 1992 Penny Marshall film that starred Geena Davis, Lori Petty, Rosie O’Donnell, and Madonna is a beloved piece of nostalgia that did much to tell the story of the forgotten women who played professional ball for a time. But the series goes deeper than that slice of all-American apple pie and hands back narratives to Black women who were barred from the AAGPBL, Latinx women who were a part of the league but not amplified, and queer women who found an abiding community with one another, whose stories were just under the surface in the film (O’Donnell confirmed to The Advocate in 2020 that she considered her character Doris to be gay, even if it wasn’t explicitly said).

Light spoilers ahead...

“I haven’t put anything out into the world that felt like I put so much of myself into it in a number of years. I’m feeling all the things and very excited because I feel really proud of it,” says Jacobson, whose married Carson falls for Greta while her husband is away at war. Jacobson — perhaps best known as one half of the hilarious, charming duo of best friends in Broad City (along with Ilana Glazer) who smoked weed, got into shenanigans, and loved each other deeply above all — says she’s nervous about League dropping because she cares so much about the show that’s been in the works since before the pandemic.

“This one is about a lot of big, important things — stories [that are] inspired by real people. And there’s a responsibility behind that,” she says.

“It’s also, you know, a reimagining of people’s favorite movie,” she adds with a knowing laugh.

For Jacobson, who first spoke publicly about being bisexual in 2018, the queer series is personal. It features queer femmes, butches, Black queer characters, trans folks, and several characters on a gender spectrum like the players and friends Jess (Kelly MacCormack) and Lupe (Vida and Fun Home’s Roberta Colindrez), one character representing Latinx players denied their stories.

Jacobson was just a kid when the film came out, but she remembers it fondly. It was the first time she felt validated in movies or TV as a girl who was into sports. For fans of the movie who may have trepidation about a “remake,” Jacobson assures the series isn’t that and it’s so much more.

“This movie does not need to be remade, but the stories of this generation of women who not only dreamed of playing baseball but were fucking good at it were not fully told in the film, right? The real estate of a two-hour film versus [that] of a television show to really show those marginalized stories and the stories that the film overlooked [makes a difference],” Jacobson says. “Some of the aspects of that league that were overlooked in the film, we thought were really important. I don’t think of it as a remake…the movie will be right over here whenever you want to watch it. And ours, hopefully, can exist right next to it. [The series] is expanding the lens a little bit to show more stories of athletes at the time.”

For Chanté Adams, who plays Max, a church-raised young woman who works at her mother’s hair salon while dreaming of the big leagues (and has a fling with the preacher’s wife on the side), A League of Their Own is part of her mission to share untold stories.

“When I envision my perfect career, this is the type of work that I want to continue to keep on doing,” Adams says about playing a character who pays homage to three Black women ballplayers in the Negro Leagues who never got their due — Toni Stone, Connie Morgan, and Mamie “Peanut” Johnson.

“Through this story, I feel like I’m honoring my family. I feel like I’m honoring my ancestors. I’m from Detroit. I’m a Midwestern girl. My dad is a historian, our family historian, and so [our story] involves the great migration and moving up from the South to find a better life in these factories,” Adams says.

Max is also queer and later discovers that her mother’s sibling was ostracized by the family for being trans — a story that resonates with Adams.

“When we [Adams, Jacobson, Graham] sat down and talked, I told them about…an uncle that was estranged from the family because he was gay. And he was Black. And it was the ’40s,” Adams says. “He ended up moving to San Francisco. I don’t know much about him; all I know [is] that his name was accurate. And I’ve been trying to research and find as much information on him as I can these past couple of years. [The creators] so graciously allowed the father of my character to be named Edgar in honor of my uncle, who passed away back in the ’80s.”

Max’s uncle represents an LGBTQ+ person of a silent generation making their own community, while the queer women of the central team, the Rockford Peaches, discover one another through friendship and romance. The love story that unfolds between Carson and Greta is sure to become a fan favorite. A queer femme, Greta, along with a friend and chosen family member, team slugger Jo (Melanie Field), has found a code to survive in a time when being queer could land a person in jail and ostracized from society. But others are queer too, including Lupe and Jess. And O’Donnell turns up halfway through the series playing someone who is queer and finally gets to say it, unlike her 1992 character.

Adams, who starred in the Laverne Cox vehicle Bad Hair, isn’t surprised by the nuanced storytelling, given the care taken behind the scenes to ensure as many voices as possible were represented. She recalls meeting the folks in the writers’ room over Zoom. “I got choked up…. There were Black women, queer people, trans people. It was exactly how it should be when doing a show of this caliber and in doing a show that is going to be representing so many different groups of people,” she says, adding that the makeup of the writers’ room is also reflected across the set.

“I’ve never been on a show that had this many queer people and this many people of color,” she adds.

If the fact that several Peaches in the series and many women from the other teams are queer (many of whom Lupe and Jess get to know intimately) seems like an outsized number, AAGPBL player Maybelle Blair, who came out publicly at 95 at a screening of the series at Tribeca in June, begs to differ.

“Out of 650 [players], I bet you 400 was gay,” Blair, who was dubbed “all the way May” for her prowess on the diamond, said at a panel for the series at the Frameline Film Festival a week after coming out.

“It was wonderful.… So many of the girls came in from the farms and they came in from all over the United States. And a lot of them thought they were alone too. And we had quite a time. There were so many gays in the league. It was amazing. Oh, but you know…let’s face it, we’re good athletes,” she said.

The series leans into a lot of joy — of playing ball, of finding love, and friendship. But it’s not naïve about the real threat of being found out as a queer person, a line that the charismatic and flirty Greta cautiously straddles.

“Those days…you wouldn’t dare be caught being gay. You have no idea how fearful it was. A lot of the girls that were in the service would come and visit us as our friends,” Blair says in a phone interview. “I had a lot of friends [who were] kicked out of the service on account of being gay. We had to be very careful.”

A League of Their Own has been in the works for about five years, and Jacobson met Blair in 2018. Between the time Blair came on board as a consultant — she’s now an integral part of the show’s press and screening tour — the documentary A Secret Love, about AAGPBL player Terry Donahue and her wife, Pat Henschel, wowed viewers on Netflix. Donahue, who died in 2019, was a friend of Blair’s. The relationship that developed between Blair and the show’s creative team became a critical piece of the series and a living example of the power of storytelling.

“We were developing the show and we sort of told her about our own lives. And she shared with us. It was important because she had not come out publicly until Tribeca,” Jacobson says. “I felt so privileged that she did that with us and felt that trust between us.”

While the series touches on difficult issues of race, gender presentation, queerness, and women’s rights, she sees it ultimately as one of joy in our current times when conservative politicians are seeking to shove queer people back into the shadows with anti-LGBTQ+ laws.

“I feel honored to tell those stories that were kept a secret,” Jacobson says. “And hope that that they might inspire people to feel like they’re not alone, wherever they are, if it is a place that is not accepting.”

---

This story is part of The Advocate’s 2022 History issue, which is out on newsstands August 30. To get your own copy directly, support queer media and subscribe — or download yours for Amazon, Kindle, Nook, or Apple News.

Source: https://www.advocate.com/exclusives/2022/8/12/how-league-their-own-changing-game-queer-black-women

#The Advocate #August 2022 #Full article #A League Of Their Own #ALOTO spoilers #Chanté Adams #Abbi Jacobson #Maybelle Blair #Max x Carson #Black History #LGBTQ+

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popculturelib · 10 months

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This week, we are featuring four publications that covered LGBT/queer news in the 1970s.

The Advocate is the oldest active LGBT magazine, and was originally founded in 1967, two years before the Stonewall Riots. This issue - vol. 4 no. 11, July 22-August 4, 1970 - was printed in the aftermath of Stonewall's one year anniversary and features articles about marches across the country. Transcriptions of the articles are below the read more.

The Browne Popular Culture Library (BPCL), founded in 1969, is the most comprehensive archive of its kind in the United States. Our focus and mission is to acquire and preserve research materials on American Popular Culture (post 1876) for curricular and research use. Visit our website at https://www.bgsu.edu/library/pcl.html.

“13 Hours of Hell: Advocate writer arrested in bar, says cops beat him” by Darby Summers

(Darby Summers is the pseudonym used by a regular contributor to the ADVOCATE who reviews plays and other theatrical events for this newspaper.)

My story is so incredible that, even though it has happened to me, I can scarcely believe it myself. However, I assure you, every word of it is true. It is a story so shocking and disgusting that I tremble with nausea as I look back upon it.

My body is still racked with pain and my throat is so raw and on fire that it is difficult to swallow.

It is amazing that this should happen almost before the ink was dry on the newsprint of the issue of the ADVOCATE in which I reviewed the plight of four prisoners at the hands of sadistic guards in The Cage.

It all began at 1:30 on the morning of June 25th at a straight bar, Christine’s, 2028 West 7th St. in Los Angeles. A straight friend of mine, Chuck, invited me to have a nightcap with him. Normally I don’t drink because a past bout with hepatitis makes any drinking unwise. However, to be sociable, I will take an occasional drink now and then.

I was dressed in a sharp, ‘different-looking’ pair of slacks I had just bought at Jean’s West on La Cienega. I also had on a denim jacket that was custom designed for my by Phyllis Says of Beverly Hills. There is nothing quite like it, but then, there is nothing in our laws that states we all have to dress alike.

The bartender had just handed me a screwdriver, and I was about to take my first sip when I was struck on the shoulder by a heavy object. I turned to see two police officers confronting me.

“Let’s see your identification,” they barked.

Now I have lived long enough

Continued on Page 8

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“New York City has largest turnout, longest gay march”

by Nancy Tucker

NEW YORK CITY – Some two to three thousand homosexuals, from cities around the East Coast gathered here on June 28th and marched from Greenwich Village to Central Park to demonstrate for “Gay Pride” and “Gay Power.”

The New York Daily News and a local radio station, WINS, carried even higher estimates of the number in the parade. The New said 10,000, WINS, 20,000.

It was called “the most important event in gay history” by the Christopher Street Liberation Day Committee and was planned and supported by a coalition of eastern homophile organizations.

Marchers traveled to New York from Boston, Philadelphia, New Haven, Washington, and as far away as Alabama and New Mexico to commemorate the first anniversary of a spontaneous demonstration by Gays which took place on June 27, 1969 following a raid on the Stonewall Inn by New York City police.

At that time patrons of the bar, located at 53 Christopher Street in Greenwich Village, were put out into the street as police took action against the bar’s management. Groups of Gays gathered and barricaded the police into the bar and then began a series of protest gatherings within the neighborhood. These led eventually to the formation of the Gay Liberation Front and the Gay Activist’s Alliance during the Fall and Winter.

The three-mile march took place in perfect 75° weather, be-

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“1200 parade in Hollywood; crowds line boulevard”

The gay community in Los Angeles made its contribution to Americana on June 28.

Over 1000 homosexuals and their friends staged, not just a protest march, but a full-blown parade down world-famous Hollywood Boulevard.

Flags and banners floated in the chill sunlight of late afternoon; a bright red sound truck blared martial music; drummers strutted; a horse pranced; clowns cavorted; “vice copes” chased screaming “fairies” with paper wings; the Metropolitan Community Church sand “Onward Christian Soldiers”; a bronzed and muscular male model flaunted a 7 ½-foot live python.

On and on it went, interspersed with over 30 open cars carrying ADVOCATE Groovy Guy contestants, the Grand Duchess of San Francisco, homophile leaders, and anyone else who wanted to be seen, and five floats, one of which depicted a huge jar of Vaseline, another a homosexual “nailed” to a cross.

Christopher Street West, they called it.

Sensation-sated Hollywood had never seen anything like it. Probably the world had never seen anything like it since the gay days of Ancient Greece.

Crowds lined both sides of the boulevard up to 10 deep along the half-mile-plus parade route and spilled down the side streets and into the marshalling area at McCadden Place and down Ivar Street where the parade was supposed to disperse.

As the last united rounded the corner at Hollywood and Ivar, people began to stream blocks after them, following the three blocks south to Sunset Boulevard, where other crowds struck out on the sidewalks to watch. Although the marchers on foot had dispersed at Selma, the cars and floats remained mostly together and identifiable as a procession in the heavy traffic of Sunset nearly back to Highland Avenue, a block west of McCadden.

15,000 to 20,000

Laconic police estimates put the number of participants in the parade at anywhere from 400 to 1500, depending on which police source you took, and the number of spectators at 4000 to 5000.

More realistic estimates put the number of spectators at 15,000 to 20,000. Parade officials, using a mechanical counter, obtained a total of 1169 participants.

The turnout appeared to catch the Los Angeles Police Department largely unprepared. Although the police had opposed the parade on the grounds that hostile spectators might turn it into a riot, they had blocked off only one side of the boulevard, as specified in the permit, and permitted traffic to proceed on the other side.

As a result, cars were trapped in the rush of spectators who surged into the street all along the parade route, despite the efforts of a few squad car units and motorcycle-mounted patrolmen to force them back to the sidewalks. Shortly after the parade started, they gave up and began diverting all traffic except the paraders off the boulevard.

No Violence

There was no violence of any kind, and police would acknowledge only three arrests, those of MCC Pastor Troy Perry, Daughters of Bilitis Los Angeles Chapter President Carole Shephard, and Kelly Weiser of HELP, who were hustled away as they began

Continued on Page 6

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