LGBT+ History Event

On Thursday 12th February, our Queer Social group attended a queer history event at West Yorkshire Archive Service in Wakefield as part of LGBT+ History Month.

Did you know... That the archive centre in Wakefield is the headquarters for the whole of West Yorkshire?

Photo of the outside of the Wakefield Archive Centre. Steps going up to the entrance and a statue outside of stacked multi-coloured balls.

One of the archivists gave a presentation about West Yorkshire Queer Stories, a project that ran from 2018-2020 to collect a variety of personal queer history from across West Yorkshire. This includes stories from Wakefield, Castleford, and Pontefract. We listened to a story from Steven, AKA "Wakefield's legendary drag queen Madam Connie Lingus", who reminisced of their time of working at Zeus Bar.

You can listen to Steven's story, along with all the other stories from the project on the West Yorkshire Queer Stories website: https://wyqs.co.uk/

Photo of the table of queer artefacts that are part of the West Yorkshire archives, including flyers from the first Bradford Pride event, Trans Mission information leaflet, HIV information provided by Leeds City Council, Bradford Friend phone line poster, Putting the B into LGBT History campaign poster, Leeds Rainbow Plaque Trail map, and photos from inside the Gemini Club in Huddersfield.

After the talk, we were invited to have a tour of the archive centre. We were shown the restoration room and archive library.

Fun Fact! The archive library is encased in concrete to reduce the risk of fire. The temperate and humidity is set to a specific level so the artefacts can be preserved.

Nicole is photographed holding a log of building records from 1914, which was very heavy!

Photo of one of many shelves filled floor to ceiling with boxes of artefacts.

Photo of shelves containing large books containing building records pre-1970. The books photographed are from 1913 to 1914.

We had a fantastic evening learning about our local queer history. This was a reminder of the difficulties faced by queer people and queer history that has sadly been erased, as well as a celebration of diversity and queer joy. The main theme from this event was that we queer people are not alone, highlighting the importance of community, particulrarly through difficult times.

If you have anything that could be donated to the archive service, particularly regarding queer history in the Wakefield District and West Yorkshire, they would be more than happy to look at your objects and hear your stories! Contact information can be found on their website: https://www.wyjs.org.uk/archive-service/contact-us-and-opening-times/west-yorkshire-history-centre-wakefield-archive-service-opening-times-and-information/