Gay bar wilmington

On June 11, during the Port City Pride Festival in downtown Wilmington, well over a thousand people filled Dock Street between Front and Second streets, which had been blocked off for the occasion. People waved Pride flags big and small and wore all manner of rainbow-strewn gear and wild, colorful costumes. From a stage in the middle of the street, DJs blasted dance club hits to a thick crowd of dancers.

Several drag queens performed, raking in flocks of bills from the audience. For Tara Nicole Brooks, who's been performing drag in downtown Wilmington for more than 30 years, "It was great to see it. Looking out at everyone from the stage, it was a little overwhelming," she said.

There was a time, however, when being "out and proud" in Wilmington was dangerous. One of the first so-called gay bars in Wilmington that anyone can remember was called The Flying Dutchman.

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It existed in the s on South Front Street between Dock and Orange streets, in part of the building that now houses the South event space. It had a nautical theme, and was "one big room, with a big balcony on the back of it" bar overlooked Market House Alley, said John Laughter, who moved to Wilmington in to attend UNCW and later worked drag shows at several bars downtown, performing as Voluptua Pontoon.

Once, Laughter said, during the Azalea Festival, a group of women walked beneath the Flying Dutchman balcony, which was packed. Many people remember David's Lounge, where the Pinpoint Restaurant is bar. It was around during the '80s and perhaps even the s but was gone by the early '90s. After a heavy rain, Laughter said, sewage would sometimes bubble up from the alley and flood the entrance to David's.

People came anyway. In the '80s and '90s, there was a large bar called The Palladium on South Front Street where the Rebellion restaurant is now. The entrance wasn't on Front, however, but at the back of the building. In the early '90s, the Mickey Ratz nightclub opened on South Front Street where Prost is wilmington, quickly becoming the go-to downtown gay bar and drawing a sizable straight crowd with weekly drag shows and dance nights.

There was a reason, however, that gay bars in Wilmington tried to keep a low profile, even into the '90s. More: Veteran Wilmington drag queen on being trans, kids at shows and 'idiotic' legislation. Ina gay called the Park View, where Greenfield Lake Yacht Club is now, and which was a haven of sorts for Wilmington-area lesbians, became notorious after a gay woman named Talana Kreeger was raped and brutally murdered by a trucker who said gay give her a ride home.

InMickey Ratz made national news after wilmington U. Marines were charged with assault shortly after entering the bar. All three Marines were eventually acquitted of assault. Mickey Ratz patron Crae Pridgen, who died insued the Marines in civil court. Ten years later, things had progressed in some ways, but not in others.

It's largely retained that status ever since, hosting weekly drag shows and dance nights downstairs, with a more chill bar area upstairs. InCostello's, which closed in the late s, was ground zero for Wilmington to celebrate the U. Supreme Court's legalization of gay marriage.