Ye Olde Arguments for a War on Ye Olde Boston.

Boston Beauties

Even though I was in the heart of the American Revolution and the symbolic home of Independence all I could wonder about was, "Where did they keep the strippers?" I had heard of The Combat Zone from those who had visited many years ago. It was supposed to be the Boston equivalent to The Block, with a much cooler name. In the very brief research I had done to find this place I found that it had been destroyed during urban renewal projects in Boston and turned into City Hall.

Baltimore Gems: Ready to Move In !!

The complete irony did not get passed me as I stood around what had been the area of The Combat Zone at the edge of beautiful Boston Common and watched couples kissing and homeless rummaging and tourists touristing with no idea that less than 40 years ago the district would have been blanketed by prostitutes, neon lights and peep shows.

Boston chose to solve this issue of sleeze by removing The Combat Zone and building the bright domed building of democracy and law, City Hall... where naked girls had once done splits. Baltimore chooses to simply ignore the sleeze, the tourists and the homeless by surrounding the depressing scenes with City Hall and all of the important government buildings. For Bostonians it wasn't acceptable to have a city center filled with drugs, underage strippers and prostitution. Baltimore likes to think of itself as a rebel, one that can live with real combat zones in full view and be progressive enough to allow them to exist side by side with half-assed urban renewal from 1970.

Boston didn't have the same unique character or characters that Baltimore can boast. We Baltimoreans have the privilege of affordable housing and cheap beer with no suits or high heels required. It seemed Boston had a lot of professional up-tights wandering the streets looking productive and educated. Baltimore doesn't have too much to worry about it that area either; everyone in Baltimore knows that those from Hopkins can't bother to mix with the rest of the population anyway. Baltimore's a lot more friendly and have way better accents. There has never been an instance when either "park" or "car" have ever contained an "h."

I didn't come back after two days in Boston to rip on my favorite city in the world. Instead, I came back like one does after attending the wedding of a really rich friend with impeccable taste. Their uncle is a bank president, their mom a beauty queen and brother Secretary of State. You showed up with a Goodwill dress you thought was funky and interesting, but really just looked like you dumpster dove outside the reception hall when compared to the designer crap the twiggy women wore so elegantly. When you get home from an affair like that your life all of a sudden seems so sloppy and out of control. At your wedding the wedding singer sounded like Neil Diamond, the catering was from the pit beef place down the street paid for with a coupon, and the most educated guest was your brother with an A.A. in General Studies from a tech school. The kid that walked in drunk to his last final and announced, "I feel like Ron Howard!" when he really looked like King Koopa smelling like Natty Light and vomit.

There are many fundamental differences between those scenarios and I would never want to live a life of designer clothes with the Secretary of State's secret service at family dinners. I just want to know that I am good enough to have anything I want and that people realize I choose to live the campy life and love it. As of right now, I take my English guest to Boston after living with me for months in Baltimore and I found myself trying to show her dumpsters behind the historic churches calling them "monuments" or asking the few drunken homeless people I could find for directions to avoid the nicely uniformed "information" people milling about every corner. It was just too upsetting to show her how easy and wonderful it was to navigate around a city that embraced and capitalized on both its hard drinking Irish side and refined Puritan roots. Even after taking her to a soup kitchen for our final night out and telling her it was the best restaurant in town she was starry eyed about the city that had started the war against her nation with tar and feathers!

Baltimore city government wants to start a 4 cent bottle tax to raise money for city improvements. I am totally for the tax and insist that all of the money go to a "Government Exchange Program" so we can import the Boston planners and send our impoverished government lot up to them. Our Baltimore city council will have the extinct Combat Zone moved into City Hall in no time. Tourists will be mugged and possibly shot in front of famous monuments while liquors stores will be instated on every block. At least this "Government Exchange Program" will keep us competitive with Boston instead of our usual lack of recognition for creation of complete unemployment, total violence and most effective littering campaign. Let's spread the love.

Carnival Strippers.

photo by Susan Meiselas

Take a close look at the beautiful photo documentary book by Susan Meiselas, Carnival Strippers. It may not focus on the girls from The Block but does bring the sentiments of the current day Block strippers to life. It is sad and poetic and has blocks of transcribed interviews taken by the author beside images wavering between purity and total resignation.

Her documentation took place between three summers of 1973 through '75 as the carnival strippers performed in town. One girl cites Blaze Starr as an example of how well she wanted to do for herself as a stripper. Another girl candidly stated that all of the dancers were prostitutes veiled as strippers. It did seem this was true there as well as the way it seems to be on The Block. I can confirm that information for the present day and feel very strongly that the atmosphere of explicit sex acts on stage and prostitution were a common historical theme on The Block as well.

It is so unfortunate to me that a similar collection of photographs does not exist to document The Block of this same time period in the 1970's. The women interviewed for this collection spoke very often of their disdain for woman's liberation and their great desire for being homemakers. It makes me think deeper about the role of feminism in society beginning in the late 60's then taking flight in the 1970's and how it was translated to life in a strip club on The Block. I am curious how much of an effect the women's movement had on the souring of the adult entertainment district of Baltimore.

Carnival Strippers will most likely not appear in your local library. It is very explicit and often times highly disturbing. I checked it out from Goucher College Library in Towson, MD. It's worth searching for to help with your understanding of the most basic adult entertainment that was and still can be found all over the country.

photo by Susan Meiselas