View the full episode transcript.

Drag as an art form dates back centuries, but as shows like MTV’s RuPaul’s Drag Race have grown a worldwide following, drag has become more visible than ever.

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The show’s namesake and host, RuPaul, arguably the most famous drag queen in the world, is now the most decorated television host in Emmy history. Not Johnny Carson, not Barbara Walters … RuPaul.

But there is also a heated debate coursing through statehouses and on some media programs about whether or not drag queens are appropriate entertainment for adults and children alike. Florida, Montana, Tennessee and Texas all have laws that, though unenforceable due to a federal court order, would ban drag performances.

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In San Francisco, this debate over drag is long settled.

“Drag is as crucial to the identity of this city as the cable car,” said Peaches Christ, a San Francisco drag performer, director and provocateur for the last three decades. “Straight people have wigs in this town!”

Drag has been breaking ground and creating a community for San Franciscans for almost a century.

But how did it get that way?

Drag has been an active part of the entertainment scene in San Francisco since the 1930s.

“Early drag in San Francisco was presented in a way that was safe for straight audiences,” Christ said. “It traditionally has meant a cis man who dons women’s clothes, for entertainment purposes, usually pretty fabulous and flamboyant.”

Finocchio’s Club was an institution for 60 years in the North Beach neighborhood and featured “female illusion.” This was light-hearted fun. None of the heavy stuff and definitely no politics. But that was about to shift.

A black and white photo featuring eight drag queens posing on a multi-tiered stage, wearing gowns. — Finocchio’s nightclub was known for its “female impersonators” who entertained patrons nightly. This 1958 photo shows the cast of the floor show. (San Francisco History Center, San Francisco Public Library)

Her Royal Majesty, Empress of San Francisco, José I, The Widow Norton

At The Black Cat Club, another North Beach hot spot, Jose Sarria was a cocktail waiter turned drag queen who sang operatic arias. During Sarria’s performances, she started to encourage patrons to stop living double lives and to come out of the closet.

In 1961, Sarria ran for a San Francisco Board of Supervisors seat. He lost, but his campaign was an early demonstration of the power of the gay voting bloc that would eventually elect Harvey Milk.

A person wearing a white full body leotard and a pink tutu and white angel wings and a crown. They are gesturing toward the camera, as if to take flight. — Jose Sarria, a.k.a. The Widow Norton, dances as the Sugar Plum Fairy during the Dance-Along Nutcracker in 2006. (LEA SUZUKI/The San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images)

After the political defeat, Sarria would proclaim himself “Her Royal Majesty, Empress of San Francisco, José I, The Widow Norton,” and create the Imperial Court. That network of LGBTQ charities is still in operation today and holds a visible presence in San Francisco.

Compton’s Cafeteria Riot

In the Tenderloin, at Taylor and Turk Streets, a 24-hour diner called Compton’s Cafeteria was a generally safe spot for the neighborhood’s queer, gender non-conforming, drag, trans and sex-worker population.

“Female impersonation” was illegal in the sixties, and police regularly harassed people who appeared to be in violation.

In August 1966, diner staff called the police one night and reported that the patrons had become rowdy. Though police records from the time no longer exist, an officer reportedly grabbed a trans woman to arrest her and she responded by throwing a cup of coffee in his face.

“It broke out into a rebellion that took to the streets,” Christ said, “and it’s worth noting that these trailblazers existed. They were trans women and drag performers who were fighting police on the streets of the Tenderloin.”

The Compton’s Cafeteria Riot didn’t result in the widespread change that Stonewall would a few years later but it is the first known act of widespread resistance to police harassment in U.S. history.

The Cockettes

In the sixties a counter-culture drag troupe called the Cockettes was breaking down walls in drag expression.

“They were hippies. They would put glitter in their beards, and they lived together like a commune,” Christ said. “They were an inclusive drag troupe that included straight people, cis women, men, trans women.”

Four performers in exaggereateid costumes on stage. — The Cockettes perform Tinsel Tarts in a Hot Coma in New York in July 1971. (Jack Mitchell/Getty Images)

The Cockettes are remembered for their outlandish parties at the Palace Theatre in North Beach and for their gender-bending expression of drag that pushed the boundaries beyond the usual ‘cis man in a dress’ drag formula.

“The Cockettes were fueled by glitter and drugs and lots and lots of talent,” added Christ.

It’s worth noting that LGBTQ recording artist and San Francisco disco legend Sylvester, best known for the song You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real), was once a Cockette. The larger group would fizzle out almost as quickly as they began, but some members still perform today.

The Ministry of the Sisters

During the 80s and early 90s, AIDS wreaked havoc on the city’s gay population. A ragtag group of charitable drag queen nuns sprang into action to try to save lives and became de facto spiritual leaders in the wake of the loss, fear and uncertainty.

“It was scary. Nobody knew what it was. All people knew was that gay men were getting sick and dying,” Sister Roma said. She joined the Sisters in 1987 in the midst of what she called AIDS hysteria. “I remember checking my tongue for white spots and feeling my lymph nodes.”

Roma and the Sisters created and distributed a safer-sex pamphlet, Play Fair!, believed to be the first to use sex-positive language and humor, to the LGBTQ community, along with boatloads of condoms.

“We went out almost every night, through all the bars, getting condoms into hands, getting condoms into people’s minds,” Roma said, “Because we wanted to protect people and to save lives.”

When they weren’t educating the community, the Sisters fought for the visibility of the AIDS crisis at a time when the federal government wouldn’t acknowledge the problem.

“There was a real consensus among some people that HIV/AIDS wasn’t an issue because it was killing all the right people,” Roma said. “It was intravenous drug users, prostitutes and faggots. Who cares, right?”

As medications began to move HIV from a death sentence to a manageable disease, the Sisters’ ranks continued to swell with community activists and philanthropists simply delighted to play with their gender expression in interesting ways.

Seven "sisters" in their drag nun attire stand in front of Dolores Park in San Francisco. Near them is a sign that says "wear a mask." They are all wearing masks as well. — The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence showed up to spread best practices during the COVID-19 pandemic, just as they did at the start of the AIDS crisis. (Courtesy of Sister Roma)

The Sisters are now a worldwide organization but are just as active in San Francisco as ever. You can find the Sisters at community events, pride festivals, marches and they host the massive Easter in the Park featuring the Hunky Jesus and Foxy Mary contests. That event attracts tens of thousands of all ages and orientations to Dolores Park each Easter and has for 45 years.

The Early Aughts

In the late nineties and early 2000s, the drag scene in San Francisco was getting edgier. A gritty show called “Trannyshack” was packing The Stud, a tiny bar in SoMa, on Tuesday nights for a wild party that completely broke the rules of drag.

“Trannyshack was wild,” said Christ, who got her start in San Francisco drag at Trannyshack, “it was artistic, it was crazy, it was outrageous, it was drug and alcohol-fueled, and it was pure.”

“[The word ‘tranny’ was] an irreverent and endearing way to refer to people who fell outside of the gender norm. It referred to drag queens, trans people, transvestites, cross-dressers, and it referred to every little nuance in between,” Christ said. “Trannyshack, a place where all these people could go and be accepted and party and to have fun.”

Over the next two decades the host of Trannyshack, drag queen Heklina, became a beloved figure in San Francisco’s LGBTQ community despite her abrasive on-stage persona.

A drag queen wears a orange-peach sequined gown. They are standing in front of a red curtain, speaking into a microphone. They have a big blonde wig, and lots of jewelry. — Heklina performs onstage at the Roast Battle at the 2019 Clusterfest. Her on-stage persona had edge, but behind the scenes, Heklina was a kind person interested in charitable work. (Jeff Kravitz/FilmMagic for Clusterfest)

“Heklina presented herself in many ways as an unapologetically greedy bitch,” joked Christ, adding that though Heklina was always helping the community behind the scenes, “she was uncomfortable getting the credit for it. She was a secret nice person.”

When Heklina passed away suddenly in April of 2023 the San Francisco LGBTQ community organized a large memorial service that shut down the Castro for hours. The community came out by the thousands to mourn.

“The reason thousands of people showed up for her memorial wasn’t just because she was a funny entertainer,” Christ said, though she acknowledged that Heklina was hilarious, “People showed up in San Francisco because she had created community for them.”

Drag Story Hour

In 2015, the first drag performer for Drag Story Hour was Per Sia, who said she was leading a double life.

“I was working at a children’s afterschool arts program during the day and performing in drag at night,” she said. When she was contacted to host the first Drag Story Hour, she said yes but had reservations. ” Up until that point, I kept everything separate.”

The idea behind Drag Story Hour is a representation for children to have glamorous, positive and queer role models and to feel free to play with their own gender expression.

After the first Drag Story Hour, Per Sia knew she’d done the right thing.

“There was this feeling of calmness,” she said, “all of my identities were in one place.”

A drag queen stands, gesturing dramatically while reading from a book. A handful of children sit by her feet. — Per Sia began reading to children at the first ever Drag Queen Story Hour in San Francisco. (Courtesy of Per Sia)

Some conservative groups have criticized Drag Story Hour, but that doesn’t slow the organization or Per Sia down.

“I still push forward because I love what I do,” Per Sia said, admitting that the threats from conservative groups have been scary. But she said it’s all worth it because she is setting an example for the children.

“Little kids have the vocabulary to really identify what’s really going on inside, and that is so special to me,” Per Sia said with pride, “and it’s like, ‘I did that!’”

“There are now 20-something chapters of Drag Story Hour around the world,” Per Sia said, beaming, “I’m just over the moon to think that I am a part of that history.

Defending Drag

As drag becomes more visible and harder to ignore, mainstream society is beginning to wrestle with the issue. By contrast, the San Francisco we know has been forged by drag.

“We have a transgender cultural district, a leather cultural district, the Castro cultural district. We have a drag laureate, ” proclaimed Sister Roma, “San Francisco does remain the beacon of hope to our queer community worldwide.”

“To remove drag would be like taking the city and turning it black and white,” Peaches Christ said. “San Francisco is full of color and fabulousness and by removing drag from it and all of its variations, I think you’d really mute what makes it special. This city is run by drag.”

From North Beach to the Tenderloin, the Castro to SoMa, San Francisco history and drag herstory follow the same path, and often it’s those high-heeled footprints in the lead.

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Episode Transcript

Olivia Allen-Price: In the past decade, drag has become a centerpiece of American pop culture.

[Start Ru Paul’s Drag Race theme music]

Olivia Allen-Price: Maybe you’ve seen RuPaul’s Drag Race on MTV. The show and its host have won armfuls of Emmy awards. And RuPaul is widely regarded as the most famous drag queen in the world.

RuPaul’s Drag Race clip: The time has come for you to lip sync for your LIFE!

Olivia Allen-Price: Then there’s the drag brunches, drag bingo — and more recently, the Drag Story Hour — that have become ubiquitous in many cities.

But growing attention has also led to growing disdain.

News clip: It has everything to do with this being inappropriate.

Olivia Allen-Price: Whether it’s love or hate on the national stage, drag is a hot topic of conversation. And you really can’t understand how we got to this point nationally without heading to San Francisco.

Peaches Christ: Drag in San Francisco is as crucial to the identity of this city as the cable car.

Olivia Allen-Price: We thought it was high-heel time to take a closer look at drag culture in San Francisco. Today, we’re taking a crash course through decades of Drag Herstory to better understand its larger impact on San Francisco and the country.

Peaches Christ: Straight people have wigs in this town.

Olivia-Allen Price: A note: There is some potentially offensive language in this episode.

I’m Olivia Allen-Price. Stick around for Bay Curious.

[Sponsor Message]

Olivia Allen-Price: On any given night in San Francisco you can step into any number of bars in the city and find a drag queen at the center of the action. Like Betty Fresas at Midnight Sun on Thursday nights. She cracks jokes, lip-syncs, celebrates birthdays with shots … and light humiliation. It’s a blast!

But in San Francisco, our queens do so much more than entertaining bar patrons. They serve their communities through fundraising, political activism and even by holding public office.

KQED’s Christopher Beale spoke with three of San Francisco’s drag icons, starting with Peaches Christ.

Christopher Beale: What is a drag queen?

Peaches Christ: A drag queen is someone who likes to use fabulous costumes and exaggerated performance to entertain people. And a drag queen, traditionally, has meant a cis man who dons women’s clothes for entertainment purposes, usually pretty fabulous and flamboyant.

Christopher Beale: There are examples of what we might call drag today dating back centuries. The first time it was actually called, that is believed to have happened around 1870. In the time since drag queens have evolved from underground entertainment to queer community leaders to international megastars.

Peaches Christ: We’re kind of queer preachers in a way. We create fellowship, we create community, we make people laugh, we make people feel good about themselves, and when the shit hits the fan and stuff needs to be done, you often see it’s drag queens who are community organizers and the ones mobilizing to take care of a need.

Christopher Beale: In San Francisco, drag dates back to at least the 1930s, but this isn’t a comprehensive history. The scene is too vibrant, and it could take hours — and many, many costume changes — so what I want to do is hit on a few key moments when drag culture left big impacts on San Francisco.

Peaches Christ: Early drag in San Francisco, it was an art form that actually wasn’t seen as that queer because they sort of presented it in a way that was safe for straight audiences.

Christopher Beale: Remember the opening scene of the Robin Williams movie The Birdcage? Think of a straight nightclub featuring female illusion.

Peaches Christ: In San Francisco, the longest-running nightclub that featured drag was called Finocchio’s over in North Beach. And it was around for decades

Christopher Beale: From the mid-30s to the late 90s, these clubs in North Beach would feature drag queens lip-syncing pop songs and making jokes for largely straight audiences. This was light-hearted fun. None of the heavy stuff, and definitely no politics. But that was about to shift.

Peaches Christ: And when that shift happened is when San Francisco really became different, and sort of special and unlike other drag communities.

Christopher Beale: This drag queen named Jose Sarria started making noise about gay rights from the stage at another North Beach hotspot called, The Black Cat Club, encouraging people to stop living double lives.

Sarria would grow his influence and go on to become the first openly gay candidate for public office in the United States in 1961, when he ran for a board of supervisor’s seat. He didn’t win, but he did reveal the power of the gay voting bloc in San Francisco and helped forge a path for Harvey Milk to be elected almost 20 years later.

Jose Sarria didn’t take the electoral loss lying down, he continued his community work in drag and went on to inspire the creation of the Imperial Court system, an international network of charities still in operation today.

Christopher Beale: A few years later, in 1966, drag performers were part of a pivotal moment in San Francisco and LGBTQ history. The night the Tenderloin became a tinder box of activity.

Peaches Christ: Compton’s Cafeteria was a late-night dining spot.

Christopher Beale: A clean, safe, well-lit 24-hour diner in the Tenderloin.

Peaches Christ: Trans folks, drag performers, sex workers, the community could go there, this was a known place for people to gather.

Christopher Beale: “Female impersonation” was still a crime in the 60s and the police regularly harassed people outside the gender binary. Even in the relative safety of the Tenderloin, which was then seen as a gay neighborhood, queer people were never truly safe. And on one hot August night, workers at the cafeteria called the police to deal with what they deemed rambunctious diners. Police records from the time don’t exist anymore, but a police officer is said to have grabbed a trans woman to arrest her.

Peaches Christ: And the community fought back.

Christopher Beale: She responded by throwing a cup of coffee in his face.

Peaches Christ: It broke out into a rebellion that took to the streets.

Christopher Beale: Sugar shakers were thrown through the restaurant windows and drag queens were seen beating police with heavy purses. A newsstand on the corner was set on fire.

Christopher Beale: The Compton’s Cafeteria riot didn’t lead to the changes that Stonewall would a few years later, but it stands as the first known example of collective militant queer resistance to police harassment in U.S. history.

Peaches Christ: It is worth noting that these trailblazers existed and that they were real heroes and really brave and they were trans women and drag performers who were fighting police on the streets of the Tenderloin.

[Start 1960s era music]

Christopher Beale: Drag expression was undergoing a huge change during this era as well. In the late 1960s, The Cockettes burst onto the scene. They were as counter-culture as you could get and were some of the first to break the traditional “cis man dressed as a woman” mold for drag.

Peaches Christ: I guess you could say they were hippies; they would put glitter in their beards, and they lived together like a commune. They were an inclusive drag troupe that included straight people, cis women, men, trans women…

Christopher Beale: The Cockettes became notorious for these wild midnight movies at the Palace Theater in North Beach, where drag performers would sing and dance in the aisles during films from greats like John Waters.

Peaches Christ: They were fueled by glitter and drugs and lots and lots of talent.

[start “Mighty Real” by Sylvester]

Christopher Beale: Divine — the controversial and influential drag queen from some of those John Waters movies — has performed with the Cockettes, and at one point, San Francisco recording artist and LGBTQ pioneer Sylvester was a Cockette.

[End music]

Christopher Beale: The Cockettes became so popular, so fast, that the group began to splinter into cliques and eventually fell apart, though some members still perform today.

The Cockettes over the top, irreverent, no-holds-barred style of drag would help inspire generations of queens to push the envelope.

[Somber music starts]

Sister Roma: Around 1982, HIV AIDS started to ravage the community.

Christopher Beale: That is philanthropist, drag queen and member of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, Sister Roma.

Sister Roma: It was scary. Nobody knew what it was. All people knew is that gay men, mostly, were getting sick and dying. I remember checking my tongue for white spots and feeling my lymph nodes. It was like AIDS hysteria.

Christopher Beale: Americans began seeing TV reports like this one demonizing the LGBTQ community.

Archival Tape: …The lifestyle of some male homosexuals has triggered an epidemic and a rare form of cancer.

Christopher Beale: In 1987, Roma was looking for a way to help when she discovered and quickly joined this fairly new ragtag order of drag queen nuns called the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence.

They’d been founded on Easter Sunday in 1979.

Two of those early sisters were medical professionals, and as soon as HIV and AIDS was discovered to be sexually transmitted, the Sisters sprang into action.

Sister Roma: We went out almost every night, went through all the bars, getting condoms into hands, getting condoms into people’s minds, into their forefront. Because we wanted to protect people and to save lives.

Christopher Beale: They created the first safer sex pamphlet known to feature sex-positive language, practical advice, and most importantly, humor. When they weren’t doing safer sex outreach in the clubs, the Sisters were…if you’ll pardon the pun…raising hell in the streets.

Sister Roma: Raising picket signs and bullhorns just to get people to even acknowledge that we were dying, that we needed help. Because there was a real consensus among some people that HIV AIDS wasn’t an issue because it was killing all the right people. It was intravenous drug users, prostitutes, and faggots. Who cares, right?

Christopher Beale: There was a time when about a third of San Francisco’s 60,000+ gay men were dying of AIDS, and the Sisters became beacons of hope for the community.

As AIDS became less prevalent, the Sisters ranks continued to fill with people who wanted to give back, and the Sisters have continued to grow in influence and visibility.

Sister Roma: Today we’re talking about a worldwide organization with probably a thousand members.

Christopher Beale: Easter in the Park with the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence is an annual tradition that attracts thousands from all over to Dolores Park. It’s a big, boisterous celebration that’s become quintessentially San Franciscan.

[Music transition]

Christopher Beale: In the mid-90s, after the horror of AIDS began to wane, the LGBTQ+ community in San Francisco galvanized and began to go out like never before. Bars, clubs, and parties were packed as the community collectively blew off steam. In 1996, a drag queen named Heklina started a legendary SoMa party that put the spotlight on San Francisco’s unique blend of drag.

Heklina performance clip: Many stars have been born on this stage. This very very special stage. I would kiss this stage right now if it wasn’t covered with blood and shit.

Peaches Christ: Heklina in many ways was the truest embodiment of Punk rock to drag,

Christopher Beale: Heklina’s show was called Tranny Shack.

Peaches Christ: She created it. And proceeded to produce a different show every week at midnight, on a Tuesday, with packed houses for 13 years.

Heklina performance clip: I have wigs older than you are.

Christopher Beale: Back when the show was launched, Heklina chose the word “tranny” with an eye toward inclusivity. It was a slur, yes, but like a lot of slurs, it came to be reclaimed/adopted by the group it aimed to harm.

Peaches Christ: An irreverent and endearing way to refer to people who fell outside of the gender norm. Tranny back then referred to drag queens. Trans people. Transvestites, cross-dressers. And it referred to every little nuance in between because between all those things, there’s a lot of gray area, and between those things, there’s overlap.

Peaches Christ: And what Tranny Shack was, was a place where all these people could go, and did go, and be accepted and party and to have fun and it was wild. It was artistic. It was crazy. It was outrageous. It was drug and alcohol-fueled, and it was pure.

Christopher Beale: Over the next two decades, Peaches saw Heklina become a community leader, always helping to raise money for causes big and small, which was sort of the opposite of her on-stage persona.

Peaches Christ: She presented herself in many ways as an unapologetically greedy bitch.

Christopher Beale: But that was just a persona, Heklina loved to help people.

Peaches Christ: She was uncomfortable getting the credit for it.

Christopher Beale: When Heklina suddenly passed away in 2023, the city’s queer community came out by the thousands as if to honor a fallen hero.

Clip from Heklina’s funeral: So the event is simply, Heklina a memories. She would have hated this. Yes, yes, she would.

Peaches Christ: The reason thousands of people showed up for her memorial… it wasn’t just because she was a funny entertainer. Yes, that’s true. But people showed up in San Francisco because she had created community for them. She was a secret nice person.

[Music starts]

Per Sia: Drag is not just about entertainment. Drag is also community work.

Christopher Beale: Next, I want to introduce you to a not-so-secret nice person.

Per Sia: Persia or Persia. Either one works. Trust me. I’ve been called way worse.

Christopher Beale: A few years back Persia was performing in drag at night, but during the day…

Per Sia: I was working at a children’s afterschool arts program here in San Francisco, so I was leading a double life.

Christopher Beale: She was approached by a group planning to organize Drag Story Hour…where a drag queen reads a book to kids. The idea is representation, for children to have glamorous, positive, and queer role models and to feel free to play with their own gender expression. This was a new concept, but it hit Per Sia in the heartstrings. So, in December 2015…

Per Sia: Drag Story Hour started here in San Francisco. And I was the first performer to be part of that.

Christopher Beale: This was sort of a meeting of two worlds for Persia.

Per Sia: I was really nervous because up until that point, I kept everything separate.

Christopher Beale: But she got up in front of a room of kids, and she read to them.

Per Sia reading to kids: Again, my name is Per Sia. And I’m a drag queen. Welcome to Drag Story Hour.

Per Sia: I just remember just being so, so nervous. I had students of mine with their families come in. And at that moment, everything really hit. I was merging my lives together,

Christopher Beale in scene: Do you remember what book you read?

Per Sia: I read something unicorn. And then. A bear book. I don’t know.

Christopher Beale in scene: Unicorns and bears. That’s the takeaway.

Per Sia: Ha ha ha. Gay.

Per Sia: Afterwards, there was this feeling of calmness. And I had never experienced so much joy. And I’m not going to cry, but it was feeling like all my identities are in one place. And that’s how it felt when I left. And I was just like, oh, like. It’s like, damn I did that.

Little kids have the vocabulary to really identify what’s really going on inside, and that is so special to me.

And to know that now there’s 20-something chapters around the world, and that I was the first one, and that it started here in San Francisco. I’m just over the moon to just think that I am part of that history.

Christopher Beale: Drag Story Hour has received quite a bit of press attention, and conservative groups have targeted them, even showing up at places where queens are reading to children.

Christopher Beale in scene: Does that make you afraid when you go to these libraries or schools?

Per Sia: Yes. But I still push forward. Because I love what I do and if I don’t do that, then what am I going to do? I am already depressed, and anxiety is off the roof. Like, and if I don’t do what I like, then. I’m just going to go back in that hole, you know.

[Music starts]

Christopher Beale: Peaches Christ says the hate drag performers have received is simply a response to progress.

Peaches Christ: We as a community, have existed for many years behind closed doors, performing at night in nightclubs for queer people. We’ve progressed to the point where these families and these people that are so fear-based don’t like seeing us on their televisions. They don’t like seeing us on their kids’ computers or on their social media. They don’t want us in their libraries. They don’t want us in their schools. They don’t want us at their symphony halls. They don’t want us at their baseball stadiums.

Sister Roma: It’s important to realize that this is just the tip of the iceberg.

Christopher Beale: Sister Roma again.

Sister Roma: You can’t take away pride flags and you can’t say don’t say gay. Like we have always been here. Trans people, queer people have always, always been here. And we will always. Always be here. They don’t know who they’re picking a fight with. We have overcome much bigger battles we fought a plague. We showed the world how to, who react with compassion in the face of pandemic that was killing our community, we rose up and showed the world how to respond. We got this.

Christopher Beale: To people like Per Sia, Sister Roma, and Peaches Christ, San Francisco history and drag HERstory are inseparably intertwined. It’s hard to imagine The City without drag queens.

Peaches Christ: It’d be like taking the city and turning it black and white. San Francisco is full of color and fabulousness and by removing drag from it and all of its variations, I think you’d really mute what makes it special. This city is run by drag. It’s a drag oasis.

Almost 100 years have gone by since those first queens graced the stage in San Francisco. The city – and the world! – have been shaped by those that came after.

Sister Roma: We have a transgender cultural district, a leather cultural district, the Castro cultural district. We have a drag laureate, Darcy Drollinger. So many great queer trans drag leaders and so much to be proud of here in San Francisco. And this does remain a beacon of hope to our queer community worldwide.

That was Bay Curious reporter and sound engineer Christopher Beale.

Per Sia: GAY! *laugh & fade*

Olivia Allen-Price: At the end of every Bay Curious episode, you may have noticed we always say …

Voice over: Bay Curious is made in San Francisco at member-supported KQED.

Olivia Allen-Price: To us, member-supported is the operative phrase there. We are so proud that Bay Curious is available for free to everyone, but it does cost money to make.

Sixty percent of our budget comes from listeners. Many give $5, $10, $20 a month … and it adds up! If you’ve thought in the past, “Oh gosh, I really should donate” but haven’t gotten around to it (I’ve been there). This is your sign to make good on those thoughts. Don’t delay. Grab your phone and navigate to donate.kqed.org/podcasts … within minutes you’ll be done and feeling good about supporting shows like Bay Curious. Thanks!

Bay Curious is made in San Francisco at member-supported KQED. Our show is produced by Katrina Schwartz, Christopher Beale, and me, Olivia-Allen Price. Additional support from Jen Chien, Katie Sprenger, Cesar Saldana, Maha Sanad, Holly Kernan and the whole KQED Family.

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I’m Olivia Allen-Price. Have a fabulous week!

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