Sex and the City: Saskatoon was a Wide-Open Town

In the May 18, 1978, issue of the Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, next to announcements for bingo at the Legion, sewing alterations, and piano lessons, is an eye-catching advertisement: “The Erotic Experience of 1977, Fantasm!” featuring pornographic film star John Holmes. 

Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, 18 May 1978, pg 16.

Films like Fantasm, Candy, Threesome, Keyhole Exposé, Campus Teasers, Sexual Fantasies, Sex Fever, Check My Oil Baby, Harry and the Hookers, and many other erotic films were commonplace throughout the city’s many “blue theatres” – movie houses that showed explicit and erotic films.

Theatres such as the Broadway, the Capitol, Midtown Cinema, Paramount, and the Skyway Drive-In all showed special and triple X films starting in 1969 and continued throughout the 1980s. Saskatooners were enthusiastic consumers of porno-chic, and later much more hardcore films.

Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, Nov 24, 1977, pg 20.

According to John Lou, a projectionist at the Broadway Theatre since 1981, erotic films were frequented by regulars such as single men and the occasional heterosexual couple. Filmgoers enjoyed double and triple features on Fridays and Saturdays.[1] Perhaps most shockingly, there is little evidence of public pushback or protest. Lou does not recall a single raid, objection letter, or action group against these films or theatres.

Saskatoon-Star Phoenix, May 24, 1972, pg 37.

How could pornographic films be shown with little fanfare for over a decade in a city known for its strict liquor laws, conservative politics, and pious religiosity? If Saskatoon was indeed a strict temperance colony, then how did so-called smut seem to thrive uncontested in the city?

Contrary to popular and middle of the road histories, the records show that since its inception, Saskatoon and the surrounding area was a hotbed for sexual vice.[2] Sex and sexuality, including brothels, gambling dens, queer people, and bootleggers were very much a part of Prairie and heartland communities. Some were even a welcomed integral part.[3] Even though sex work, gambling, alcohol, and same-sex sex were illegal throughout much of the 20th century, citizens, business owners, and even the police consistently and routinely broke the law.

Since the turn of the 20th century through to the late 1920s, Saskatoon was flush with sex for trade.[4] According to historians such as James Grey and Sarah York, Saskatoon was a wide-open town for sex, gambling, and alcohol, ready to serve the needs of newly arrived rail workers, agriculturalists, farmhands, and merchants.[5]

People were able to circumvent sex and prohibition laws, partly due to the fact that the Northwest Mounted Police (NWMP) were some of the brothel keepers’ best customers, gamblers, and drunks. NWMP officers were sometimes even encouraged by their superiors to visit sex workers, in part to curb growing concerns of homosexual deviance.[6] By the early 1900s, several NWMP officers had been discharged for what was called “unnatural acts” at the time. For example, in 1897, an officer was dismissed from the force because he was caught performing oral sex, also known as sodomy, on a shopkeeper.[7] Two NWMP officers were discharged after another had discovered them performing fellatio on one another.[8] 

It wasn’t just officers who were found guilty of these offences. In 1895, Regina’s “Oscar Wilde” trial caused a sensation throughout the province. Well-respected businessman Frank Hoskins was caught having sex with two younger men and charged with “gross indecency of an unnatural character.”[9] Rather than serve jail time, he was asked to leave the community and never come back.[10] Throughout the 1890s and into the 1940s, hundreds of men were charged with similar “unnatural acts.” Their so-called “crimes” were published in Prairie newspapers.

Women’s offences were also published in newspapers. However, due to social differences around gender and sexuality, they were rarely charged. For example, dozens of women, such as Margaret Dixon in 1924, were “discovered” to be living as men. Once exposed, they were brought into court under charges of vagrancy.[11] These charges were often dropped once the woman agreed to wear female attire and go back to her “normal” life.  

Saskatoon Daily Star, Feb 27 1924, pg 7.

Women’s same sex desire was also often pathologized rather than criminalized.[12] Such was the case with “Perplexed,” a woman who wrote in to Mrs. Thompson’s advice column in the Saskatoon Star-Phoenix in 1936. “Perplexed” asked what she should do with the romantic and sexual feelings she felt towards her friend.[13] Mrs. Thompson responded that Perplexed was “emotionally unemployed,” and “afraid of men,” as a result of possible “retarded development.”[14] This response was a far cry from the jail sentences and lashes being handed out during the same time period to men charged for engaging in same-sex sex.

Newspapers published these court cases, “masquerades,” and personal questions, showing that Saskatoon and people within the province were very much part of the changing progressive sexual landscape throughout the Canadian Prairies. Widespread prostitution and same-sex sex were a part of Saskatchewan’s early history, and this sexual discourse did not simply disappear. Rather, throughout the early and mid- 20th century, vice and its prohibitions shifted as white settler communities grew and flourished with an influx of newcomers.

With the advent of the 1960s, through the 70s, and into the early 80s, Saskatooners continued to participate in the worldwide social and sexual revolutions. This period was also a time of unrivaled economic prosperity as potash and agricultural sectors boomed. Saskatoon’s entertainment and restaurant scene exploded even in the face of draconian liquor laws leftover from the prohibition era. Saskatooners were enthusiastic for entertainment outside of their home – homes that had one French and two English television stations well into the 1980s. People spent their cash in newly minted popular lounges, supper clubs, and restaurants such as The Imperial Room, Jay Dee’s, The Smuggler’s Den, Golf’s Steak House, and Brother John’s.[15]  

As the 1970s wore on, Saskatoon’s restaurant and entertainment scene continued to grow. One important cultural space was a restaurant-turned-discotheque, called Fast Freddie’s, established in the spring of 1977. It first opened as a licensed dining room with an attached lounge and an entertainment endorsement, all within the Park Town Hotel. Its popularity exploded.[16] People enjoyed food service until 9 pm. Past that, they could continue enjoying live music and alcoholic beverages.

Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, Nov 19, 1977, pg 26.

While people were able to dance and drink, they could not do both simultaneously. Legally, alcoholic beverages had to be consumed while seated at a table. Owners Elizabeth Smith and Fred Assaly stated that they “were at the mercy of [liquor] agents and [musician’s union] groups.” This was due to prohibitively expensive union fees for licensed musicians and draconian liquor laws – laws that made dancing illegal unless there was a live three-piece band.[17] Customers were also not allowed to move around the club with their drink in tow – a server had to move it for them, and from bar to table only. With these ongoing struggles of liquor and live entertainment laws, combined with mediocre live music from bands brought in from the Midwestern United States, Fast Freddie’s popularity soon waned.

To stimulate new business for New Year’s Eve 1978, Smith and Assaly decided to host a “New Year’s Eve Orgy.” This included an all you can eat buffet with suckling pig, lobster, crab, and other delights, as well as a room for the night at the Park Town Hotel.[18] While the turnout was not great, it was quite memorable for those who attended. Still, this event did not drum up enough business. Fast Freddie’s needed a new intervention. Manager Phil Lloyd had the answer.

New Years Eve Orgy, Dec 1977. Courtesy of Courtney Tuck-Goetz.

Richard Smith, owner Elizabeth Smith’s son (who worked underage at the club), said that Lloyd came up with ingenious ways to circumvent and thwart the liquor commission. First, Lloyd played popular disco music during the live band’s break. Much to the performer’s chagrin, people would only get up and dance during these “interludes.”[19] The liquor commission got wind of it, and soon shut the practice down. Never to be foiled, Lloyd hired three local women to play bongos softly while loud disco music played over top. This was a hit, and Fast Freddie’s soon became known for a fun place to dance to disco, albeit illegally.

Saskatchewan was one of the last provinces to acquire legally registered discotheques. Still, in late-1979, the liquor act was amended, and discos were finally allowed licenses in the city.[20]

After that, Fast Freddie's flourished, as did new discotheques, nightclubs, and entertainment-based restaurants. Many of them were designed by the late architect Jim Parsonsons. As well as Fast Freddie's, Parsonsons was responsible for designing some legendary restaurants and nightclubs across Western Canada. These included Cathedral in Regina, Umberto's in Vancouver, and The Cave Restaurant, which still thrives in Saskatoon.

Established in 1976, The Cave became a romantic hot spot for couples. Specific tables at The Cave became notorious for expressive couples to canoodle privately. According to the restaurant's first manager, George Kosmas Sr., couples became quite affectionate within certain intimate dining cave spaces. In an interview from 2014, Kosmas stated that “Back in the heydays of the seventies and eighties, because of the privacy, servers would have to clang dishes as they got closer because there’d be quite affectionate couples in there.”[21] One specific seat, the Fire Cave, hosted much “heavy petting and necking,” and offered a sort of privacy within a public space.[22] This space would eventually disappear with the growing popularity of the cell phone. As cameras became easily accessible, twosomes became more enamoured with social media rather than each other.

Even though these entertainment spaces were mostly heterosexual, Fast Freddie’s did have a connection to the burgeoning queer scene in Saskatoon. Frank Lloyd, Fast Freddie’s manager, was a gay man. He wanted to create an after-hours space that could appeal to folks within and outside the gay community.

Lloyd struck an agreement with Elizabeth Smith. For him to continue managing Fast Freddie’s, she would have to invest in his after-hours club.[23] Smith agreed and in late 1979 After Midnight was born. After Midnight was initially an underground after-hours bar on Avenue B and 22nd that served .5 % alcohol content beer. It was an after-hours club that had a lax attitude about clientele and their subsequent behaviour.

According to Richard Smith, attendees were a mix of heterosexual and homosexual people, but this soon turned “heavily gay.”[24]  Eventually, After Midnight evolved into Numbers (which would later become Diva’s), one of the first a private members club for gay men and women in the city. Thus, from the owner and manager of Fast Freddie’s emerged a gay underground hotspot.

During the 1980s Fast Freddie’s also started to cater to young women and men seeking “sugar baby” arrangements. In an advertisement from January of 1984, Fast Freddie’s advertised “Girls – Girls – Girls…Young, available, and affluent men wanting to travel needing companionship.”[25] Saskatoon would later become a trendy place for “sugar baby” transactional relationships. Young people, most often women, exchanged a mix of companionship, sex, intimacy and company for money and gifts from older men. Fast Freddie’s advertised as one such place to do this before the advent of internet arrangements.[26] Fast Freddie’s, based on its advertisements, seemed a central place for sex in Saskatoon.

Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, Jan 20, 1984, pg 15.

Sexually suggestive ads were not just a Fast Freddie’s anomaly. Many people and businesses freely advertised for sex and sexual services in the city’s newspapers. For example, starting in 1976, the Star-Phoenix published ads for the Swingtime News, a magazine established in 1969 for “swinging couples” who were looking for clubs, parties, events, and other people to connect with who were a part of the swinging scene.[27] Also, in 1976, Saskatoon’s first open escort service, Executive Escorts advertised for both jobs and services.[28]

By the early 1980s there were so many erotic service industries that the Saskatoon Star-Phoenix had its own “erotic services” section within its advertisement pages. Sexually suggestive and pornographic ads were commonplace, published alongside ads for piano lessons, bible groups, mortgage lenders, and maternity wear.[29] Pornographic film showings and blue theatres were just one part of the sexual milieu of Saskatoon from the 1970s and 80s. This was part of Saskatoon’s long and ongoing history as a wide-open town for sex and sexuality.

Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, May 18, 1978, pg 16.

This history would change in the mid and late-1980s, as AIDS and HIV threatened queer people, sex workers, and Indigenous folks disproportionately compared to those who were not a part of these communities. Home video and VHS made blue theatres and public showings of pornographic films all but obsolete. In 1984 the Broadway Theatre went back to full-time mainstream film showings.[30]

In 1982 the New Democratic Party was beat out by the Progressive Conservatives, and the PC government was heavy-handed against drugs, strip clubs, and escort services. These actions, combined with a severe economic decline that reverberated through the mid-1980s and 90s, meant that the province would never fully return to its golden age of prosperity.

This legacy of the past 30 years is partly why, in collective memory and consciousness, Saskatoon is seen as a historically conservative temperance community. Indeed, there were technically laws in place throughout the 20th century that both prohibited the selling of sex and booze, and criminalized same-sex sex and desire. Still, these rules were not always heavily enforced, nor did people strictly abide by them. Thus, when the sexual revolution of the 60s and 70s made its way to Saskatoon, people participated enthusiastically. Sex was very much a part of the city, and Saskatoon’s legacy is owed in part to outlaws of the past.

Candice Klein is a PhD candidate in the Department of History at the University of Saskatchewan. She has an MA in history from Simon Fraser University. She is the recipient of several awards, including the University of Saskatchewan Dean's Scholarship and the Joseph-Armand Bombardier Canada Graduate Scholarship. She is very passionate about Prairie history and the history of gender and sexuality in Canada. She is currently working on her dissertation, "'Lacking a Lady One Makes Do': Queering the Canadian Prairies, 1900–1950."

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Endnotes

[1] John Lou, interview with the author, March 2 2020.

[2] James Gray, Red Lights on the Prairies (Markham: Fifth House, 1995) 97; One of the most comprehensive histories on Saskatchewan is by Bill Waiser. His foundational work does not mention homosexuality or sex workers – a glaring omission considering how widespread sex work districts were. See Bill Waiser, Saskatchewan: A New History (Markham: Fifth House Publishing, 2005).

[3] Lyle Dick, Peter Boag, Emily Skidmore, and Nan Boyd document the large populations of cross-dressers, transgendered people, and sex workers throughout the Canadian Prairies and American Midwest before the turn of the 20th century. See Peter Boag, Re-dressing America’s Frontier Past (Berkeley: U of California Press, 2011); Nan Alamilla Boyd, Wide Open Town: A History of Queer San Francisco to 1965 (Berkeley: U of California Press, 2003); Lyle Dick, “The 1942 Same-sex Trials in Edmonton: On the State’s Repression of Sexual Minorities, Archives, and Human Rights in Canada,” Archivaria 68, Special Section on Queer Archives (Fall 2009): 183-217; ); Lyle Dick, “Same-sex Intersections of the Prairie Settlement Era: The 1895 Case of Regina's "Oscar Wilde."” Histoire Sociale/Social History 42, 83 (May 2009): 107-145; Emily Skidmore, True Sex: The Loves of Trans Men at the Turn of the 20th Century (New York: NYU Press, 2017).

[4] Gray, Red Lights on the Prairies, 87; Sarah York, “‘We Have Never Allowed Such A Thing Here...’: Social Responses to Saskatchewan's Early Sex Trade, 1880 to 1920.” (MA thesis, University of Saskatchewan, 2013).

[5] Gray, Red Lights on the Prairies, 97;  York, "We Have Never Allowed Such A Thing Here, 1-3.

[6] William Beahen, Stan Horrall, Red Coats on the Prairies: The Northwest Mounted Police 1886-1900 (Regina: Centax Books, 1998), 255, 256; Gray, Red Lights on the Prairies, 97.

[7] Beahan and Horrall, Red Coats on the Prairies, 255-256; York, "We Have Never Allowed Such A Thing Here...," 1-3.

[8] Beahan and Horrall, Red Coats on the Prairies, 255-256.

[9] “Another Oscar Wilde: Terrible Case of Unnatural Vices at Regina,” Calgary Herald, May 22 1895, pg. 1.

[10] Lyle Dick, “Same-sex Intersections of the Prairie Settlement Era: The 1895 Case of Regina's "Oscar Wilde."” Histoire Sociale/Social History 42, 83 (May 2009): 107-145.

[11] “Masquerades as Man,” Saskatoon Daily Star, February 27 1924, pg. 7.

[12] Pathologized refers to viewing and analyzing women’s behaviour as having a psychological and psychiatric component, with a direct cause and effect. Women were seen as patients, rather than criminals.

[13] “Personal Problems,” Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, October 20 1936, pg. 16.

[14] “Personal Problems,” Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, October 20 1936, pg. 16.

[15] Richard Smith, interview with the author, Jan 24 2020.

[16] Richard Smith, interview with the author, Jan 24 2020.

[17] Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, April 19 19179, pg. 21; Elizabeth Smith, interview with the author, Dec 21 2019.

[18] Richard Smith, interview with the author, Jan 24 2020.

[19] Richard Smith, interview with the author, Jan 24 2020.

[20] “Saskatonians respond to licensed disco,” Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, 13 August 1979, pg. 9.

[21] Bryn Levy, “The Love Seat: Saskatoon restaurant sees hundreds of proposals over 43 years,” CKOM 650 AM, accessed March 16 2020, https://www.ckom.com/2017/02/14/the-love-seat-saskatoon-restaurant-sees-hundreds-of-proposals-over-43-years/

[22] Bryn Levy, “The Love Seat: Saskatoon restaurant sees hundreds of proposals over 43 years,” CKOM 650 AM, accessed March 16 2020, https://www.ckom.com/2017/02/14/the-love-seat-saskatoon-restaurant-sees-hundreds-of-proposals-over-43-years/

[23]  Elizabeth Smith, interview with the author, Dec 21 2019; Richard Smith, interview with the author, Jan 24 2020.

[24] Richard Smith, interview with the author, Jan 24 2020.

[25] Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, Jan 20 1984, pg. 15.

[26] Jessica Brown, “U of S students turning to ‘sugar daddies’ to pay for tuition,” Global News, January 28 2014, https://globalnews.ca/news/1113424/more-u-of-s-students-seek-sugar-daddies-to-pay-for-tuition/ ; “Facts,” Seekingarrangement.com. Accessed March 16, 2020. 

[27] Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, July 31 1976, pg. 30.

[28] Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, August 19 1976, pg. 33.

[29] Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, July 31 1976, pg. 30.

[30] John Lou, interview with the author, March 2 2020.