Lesbian Herstory Archives: The Keepers of Lesbian History
In the Park Slope neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York, stands an unassuming home. Just one of the many plain houses on a tree-lined street, its modest exterior hides its immeasurable significance.
I learned about the Lesbian Herstory Archives (LHA) a few years ago. It found me as a teenager, when I needed it the most — needed the comfort of knowing I had ancestors: people that loved like me, with whom I shared experiences, struggles and joy.
Since then, I’ve spent hours with their digital collection, which ranges from videos, photos and newsletters, to T-shirts, buttons and more. The digitalization is a recent effort by the volunteer-run Archives to give lesbians around the world access to materials relevant to their lives that are otherwise hard to find.
I stand in front of the Archives for the first time in late November, during a trip to visit my best friend in New York City. When I enter, I am greeted by flyers, clothes, pictures and other memorabilia hung on the walls of the homely entryway. On the ground level, which looks like a living room, fully-stocked bookshelves fill the wall space with a wide-ranging collection of lesbian literature. Subject files are organized alphabetically in big drawers. Stairs lead to a second level which is filled with boxes of magazines, pamphlets, newsletters, zines and more. And all over the house there are pictures of lesbian leaders, lovers and friends.
The building comes alive with the endless stories it houses of all the different lives lived. The LHA is the largest collection of materials by and for lesbians. With minor exceptions, everything has been donated to the Archives. This year is significant for the Archives — 2024 marks the 50th anniversary since its humble birth.
According to their website, the LHA were founded in the early ’70s when a group of women involved in the Gay Academic Union realized that lesbian history was “disappearing as quickly as it was being made.”
Deb Edel, 80, an original co-founder of the archives recalls that during this time it was especially impossible for lesbians to find material about lesbians.
“A few of us said ‘Hey, why don’t we just start our own collections? Why don’t we put together what we have and build from there?’” she recalled in a recent interview posted on the Archive’s website.
Edel and the other co-founders set up a space in a back room of co-founder Joan Nestle’s Upper West Side apartment, in which they displayed things they already owned. Word in the community spread quickly, and with an increase in visitors and donors, the collection expanded as well. In 1993 the group pooled money to purchase the Park Slope home where the collection still stands. The neighborhood was later dubbed “Dyke Slope” due to its thriving lesbian community.
Today, visitors can sign up for two-hour time slots to spend time at the Archives.
After a brief introduction from a volunteer, she releases my group of visitors. Overwhelmed with where to begin, I simply stand in the middle of the room for a while, observing the people I am sharing this experience with.
I can tell that some of them have been here before, they inhabit the space comfortably. Others, determined, take on the material with a precise mission — a project for class or research for an academic thesis — they dive into their examination immediately. And others are just there to be there, in no particular rush. They sit down on the couch and leisurely look through a comic book or memoir.
My inclination is to visit the photo collection first. I find that it doesn’t matter how much time passes, vintage pictures of lesbians never lose their allure. They are loud and full of life — a life the common man’s history often purposely leaves out.
But where institutions have sought to erase, the lesbian community has done the work to ensure their visibility, becoming a narrator in the story of time.
Handwritten letters from donors accompany many of the pictures. The letters are filled with humor and personal dreams, for the writers themselves and for those who will come after them. It strikes me what a vulnerable act this is —- donating the artifacts of your life.
Guests visiting the archives. Credit: Hannah Brueske
Though much of the writing is from decades past, I understand the writers well. The personal has become communal with time. In their first newsletter, published in 1975, the founders wrote: “We undertook the Archives not as a short-term project, but as a commitment to rediscovering our past, controlling our present and speaking to our future.”
The Newsletter calls for lesbians to start taping their lives and telling their stories. “When you have the time and the impulse, sit down and tell us something about yourself and send it to us. It’s important!” they wrote. Believing the founders’ conviction and foresight, many donated their time, goods and stories.
How fast two hours can fly by! As my time at the Archives comes to an end, I am filled with humility, gratitude and a newfound sense of purpose. It is undeniable that this space is a project of love started out of a deep care for community. During times when societal shame often made community efforts futile, this place has successfully been a home to lesbians from around the world for 50 years. What a privilege it is to now have access to these materials.
Regions: Brooklyn, New York City