Out on the Air: The Bay Area’s LGBTQ Radio Legacy Live (SF)
KALW | 220 Montgomery Street, San Francisco, CA
Event Details
Submitted by the Event Organizer
Join KALW & the GLBT Historical Society for a journey through the queer history of Bay Area broadcasting with the voices who were there.
Hear the voices that documented, shaped, and celebrated queer life in the Bay Area, from Stonewall through the AIDS crisis.
Queer Power Hour host David Boyer welcomes pioneering broadcaster Randy Alfred, producer and host of The Gay Life; radio producer Chana Wilson, host of Radio Free Lesbian on KPFA; and broadcast journalist Eric Jansen, lead producer and co-host of Out in the Bay. Through audio excerpts and live conversation, they’ll reflect on how queer people used radio to find one another, document their communities, challenge mainstream narratives, and create a public record of lives too often left out of history.
Out on the Air celebrates Revisiting The Gay Life, a new documentary series from KALW’s Queer Power Hour. Produced in collaboration with the GLBT Historical Society and Randy Alfred, the series revisits The Gay Life, the groundbreaking program that aired on KSAN from 1977 to 1984 and became the first regularly scheduled LGBTQ-focused show on commercial radio in the United States.
Drawing from newly restored archival recordings, the series offers a vivid portrait of LGBTQ life in San Francisco during the years between Stonewall and the AIDS crisis. We’ll hear stories from the city’s gay underground of the 1950s, the origins of the Imperial Court, conversations with influential queer writers, and voices from LGBTQ activists, judges, filmmakers, and leaders. The recordings also capture some of the earliest radio reporting on the mysterious illness that would later become known as AIDS.
Please become a KALW member today and receive your first drink on us at all 220 Montgomery events.
220 Montgomery St., San Francisco, 2 blocks from BART/MUNI
Reception doors open at 6:00
️ Program begins at 7:00
🆓 The event is free with an RSVP — and you are welcome to donate what you want
Please note:
- The event space is just to the left of the main entrance to the Mills Building at 220 Montgomery Street
- We recommend taking BART/MUNI, exiting at Montgomery, and walking two blocks north
- Ride-shares can drop off and pick up directly in front of the venue
- If you drive, there are several garages within two blocks of the event location
Disclaimer: Please double check event information with the event organizer as events can be canceled, details can change after they are added to our calendar, and errors do occur.
Cost: FREE*
