LGBT | May 20, 2009 | 11 comments

Gay Colonial America

source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larry-kramer/homo-sex-in-colonial-amer_b_205399.html

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UrbanGypsy
Here's a piece from Larry Kramer from the Huffington Post in which he addresses the history of gays in colonial America ever since its inception in Jamestown. Here's an excerpt:

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"Jamestown was initially an all-male settlement. ...in subsequent years...male colonists outnumbered women by roughly six to one in the 1620's and four to one in later decades... It is difficult to believe that a group of young and notoriously unbridled men remained celibate for an extended period of time. It seems likely that some male settlers deprived of female companionship would have turned to each other instead.

"Settlers in the seventeenth-century Chesapeake often paired off to form all-male households, living and working together. ...it would be truly remarkable if all the male-only partnerships lacked a sexual ingredient... IT SEEMS REASONABLE TO ASSUME, [my caps and bold], that much of the sex that took place... was sodomitical."

These words are from Sexual Revolution in Early America, by Richard Godbeer an associate professor at UC Riverside and published by Johns Hopkins.

My own research for my book, The American People, has revealed that not only were male-only partnerships quite in evidence, but services were often conducted to join the partners "under God," and that, of equal interest, was their adoption of Indian children to raise as their own.

I hope it will not be too much longer before scholars will be able to deal with the fact that Jamestown was in fact not only America's first colony but its first homosexual community.

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The rest of this VERY interesting article delves into the topic much deeper and I highly recommend you all go the the link and read it for your own pleasure and education.
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  2. tags:
    History,  LGBT,  Homosexuality,  Gay History,  2 more
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