History of queer Islanders subject of new web series

A  new documentary web series looking at the history of queer Islanders will be launched this coming week. 

Before Grindr: The Secret Social History of Gay and Lesbian P.E.I. is a six-part series of videotaped interviews with LGBTQ Islanders between the ages of 52 and 72. It is hosted by Dave Stewart, and co-produced with Laura Chapin. 

"There is no gay history recorded on P.E.I.," said Stewart in an interview with CBC Radio: Mainstreet P.E.I.'s Matt Rainnie. 

"I just felt like somebody needs to start doing this, and so that in a way fell to me." 

With financial help from Pride P.E.I. and PEERS Alliance (formerly AIDS P.E.I.), Stewart and Chapin began taping interviews. 

'Do the P.E.I. circuit' 

Stewart's seven guests were Julie Devon-Dodd, Jan Devine, Darrin Dunsford, Jim Culbert, Jeffrey Haight, Lee Fleming and drag queen Amber Flames, also known as Danny Evans.  

Amber Flames reflected on her youth, when being openly gay was not common on P.E.I. She and her partner would clear out their apartment one Saturday night per month and have as many as 200 people over for dance parties, she said. 

"It was just open door. Whoever shows up, shows up," she said. "There was [also] a house in Summerside that did it, there was a house in Souris, there was one out in Cornwall. So we had like, party houses, and we'd sort of do the P.E.I. circuit."

'We didn't record what we did'

Stewart said he found it sad that he could record the Island's gay and lesbian history only as far back as the mid-1970s.

"Because of the way gay people operated in society and how we were forced to operate, we didn't record what we did," he said. "I could only talk to people who are here now who could reflect and tell me about their coming out as gay people on P.E.I." 

Stewart said he discovered that many issues for the gay community here were first raised in public by people who had moved to P.E.I. from elsewhere. 

"Without having the boundary of family looking over their shoulder, they were able to live their true lives and say, 'We don't have a support line, we don't have an AIDS hospice, we don't have things like that,' and they were able to get these things going," Stewart said.   

'Don't want to have to hide it'

Stewart himself is gay, and just turned 56. He said growing up gay in P.E.I. in the 1970s and 1980s and not having a place in society for gay people made him hate himself. It wasn't until the 1990s that he began to feel more at home in his skin and on P.E.I. 

"You have to work through that psychology that is beaten into you saying, 'You don't have a place in the world,'" he said. "It's not that we have to stick a rainbow flag on every single thing that a gay person does — it's quite the opposite. We just don't want to have to hide it." 

People who were living openly in decades past may have sometimes been seen as "community oddballs," but that has changed, Stewart said.

P.E.I. can be a very welcoming place for gay people now, he said, while reminding people there have always been gay members of society on the Island.

It's not that we have to stick a rainbow flag on every single thing that a gay person does — it's quite the opposite. We just don't want to have to hide it.- Dave Stewart

Stewart said he has been working on the project for seven years and he's proud and happy to present it to the world. He said while it's not the kind of exciting cinema that includes dramatic re-enactments, it is a series of interesting chats that could be enjoyed over a cup of tea. 

You can find the episodes online at rainbowhub.ca starting Tuesday. 

As for the future, Stewart said there are many more stories to tell, including the early days of the fight for rights for transgender, non-binary and non-gender-conforming Islanders. 

More from CBC P.E.I.