Events tagged with "Thorp Street"
Gay Village
Birmingham's Gay Village stretches the length of Hurst Street and everything to the right towards Bristol Street. The top end of Hurst Street has been a focus of gay life since the 1970s with the Jester, Windmill and Thorp Street Nightingale all serv...
Hurst Street
Hurst Street has become the heart of Birmingham's vibrant Gay Village over the last fifteen years. Previously a run down warehouse district characterised by post war industrial units and Victorian shops and housing, cut off from the rest of the ci...
Lesbian and Gay Community Centres
In February 1976 a group of about a dozen people began regular meetings to discuss and plan the setting up of a gay community centre in Birmingham. They were drawn from all the gay groups operating in the city and from the commercial gay scene.A buil...
Nightingale Thorp Street
A two storey building on Thorp Street at the side of the Hippodrome Theatre, previously the Birmingham Anglers Club. The entrance was simply a door on the street with a small viewing hatch. You walked down a short corridor and entered a spacious indo...
The Nightingale
Opened in 1967, at 40 years old, The Nightingale, or Gale, is the oldest surviving gay venture in the city. It has a special place in the city's history as it was set up as much as a community venture as a commercial one, a place run for gay people b...
Tin Tins
Situated at the top end of Smallbrook Queensway in the 1960s Bull Ring Shopping Centre. The club was set on two levels, a long thin bar downstairs with a large dance area with bar upstairs. The club was a popular alternative to the Nightingale on Tho...
Memories tagged with "Thorp Street"
Clubbing at the Powerhouse 1985
“Eventually I made friends and got the confidence to go out on the scene. There was a one nighter at the Powerhouse. Thursday night was gay night, and it was the best venue in Birmingham. It’s still there, called something else. It has been a club si...
Competition from the Nightingale
"The Nightingale, which was in Camp Hill then (1969), moved to outside the Villa Ground, by the Holt pub (in 1975), for years, then (in 1981) they moved to Thorp Street, so I had to decide what I would have to do to keep the punters coming out of tow...
Description of the Nightingale 1981
“The Nightingale moved to Thorp Street in 1981, the opening night they had an evening with Quentin Crisp which was quite dramatic. It was very ambitious to move from a small two roomed club in Witton Lane in Aston, with water running down the wall of...
Development of the Gay Village
Mike was asked about the rate of development in Birmingham and he explained that a big change was prompted by the change of the Nightingale's premises from Thorp Street to Kent Street after the return of the lease to the Hippodrome. Because this was ...
Digbeth Police object to Thorp Street Gale, 1981
During the process of moving from Witton Lane, Aston to Thorp Street in the City we, the Committee, were advised that Digbeth police would be objecting to our 'Special Hours Certificate' on the grounds of 'parking provision was not going to be provid...
First steps on the gay scene
Paul found a copy of Gay Times, which listed the Jester and Peacock (looked for but couldn’t find it) so he went to The Jester first. “When you go down the stairs everyone can see you going in, it’s very daunting, with fear, trepidation and excitemen...
It's a Knockout
"Birmingham's "Five Days of Fun" originated in the Grosvenor house Hotel. It was the Grosvenor against the Nightingale, I think when that happened, the Nightingale was still in Aston (pre-1981). This became the precursor to Pride, so the Grosvenor st...
New Queer Bashing Threat 1993
This article in 'Outspoken' May 1993 reports on an increase in Queer Bashing in the Gay Village area.NEW QUEER BASHING THREAT IN BIRMINGHAMAn alarming increase in violent attacks on gay men in Birmingham has been reported in the last month, writes Ma...
Nightingale Robbery
This article from 'Lesbian and Gay News West Midlands' describes a particulalry brutal robbery, which occured at the Nightingale Club in 1991.£10.000 STOLEN FROM 'GALE' BY MASKED RAIDERSBurglars armed with a knife stole £10,000 from the Nightingale C...
No women in the Gale
The Jug’s main competitor in 1986 when Steve came to Birmingham was the Nightingale, then in Thorp Street. He recalls that there were two dance floors on one level and it was about half the size of the current club. Male strippers formed a regular pa...