“And then my deepest joy,
when the hot weekends came, sometimes as early as May but surely by June. I would leave East Ninth street early on Saturday morning, wearing my bathing suit under my shorts, and head for the BMT, the start of a two-hour subway and bus trip that would take me to Riis Park—my Riviera, my Fire Island, my gay beach—where I could spread my blanket and watch strong butches challenge each other by weightlifting filled garbage cans, where I could see tattoos bulge with womanly effort and hear the shouts of the softball game come floating over the fence.”
— Joan Nestle, Lesbian Memories 1: Riis Park, 1960 (from A Restricted Country)
