Call Number:

Coll.133

Repository:

John J. Wilcox, Jr. LGBT Archives, William Way LGBT Community Center

Extent:

1 folders

Preferred Citation:

John Brown memoir, circa 1960s-1970s, Ms. Coll. 133. John J. Wilcox, Jr. LGBT Archives, William Way LGBT Community Center, Philadelphia, PA.

Date:

circa 1960s-1970s

Creator:

Brown, John Samuel (Sammy)

Form:

Memoirs

Abstract:

This collection consists of a single item: an 8-page handwritten memoir by John Brown, who also went by Sammy as well as by the drag name Marilyn. It tells the story of how Brown was introduced to gay life in Philadelphia, how he and friend Jack Van Alstyne met queens in Rittenhouse Square in 1953, and how he took on the drag name Marilyn. It also has details about Brown serving time in juvenile detention in 1954.

John Samuel "Sammy" Brown, known also as the drag persona Marilyn, was born November 26, 1938, in Camden, New Jersey. He and his siblings were raised by mother Betty; his father died while John was young. He attended Hatch Junior High School and Camden High School with classmate and best friend Jack Van Alstyne, until dropping out of school after one year of high school. In 1953, at the ages of 14 and 15, Brown and Van Alstyne were introduced to the young "queens" who frequented Rittenhouse Square in Philadelphia, and they made frequent trips on the bus from Camden. There among his fellow queens Brown received his drag name, Marilyn, due to his pale complexion and blonde hair. Because of a long period of truancy from school, John Brown was incarcerated for nearly a year at the Camden Detention Center in Camden, New Jersey; the Jamesburg Correctional Facility [New Jersey Training School] in Monroe Township, New Jersey; and the New Jersey State Diagnostic Center at Rahway State Prison [East Jersey State Prison] in Avenel, Woodbridge Township, New Jersey, where he received electroshock therapy as an attempt to "cure [him]." He was released shortly before his 16th birthday. As an adult, Brown had an apartment in Philadelphia and ran an antique store in the same city. He participated in drag and female impersonation contests and performed in drag shows throughout his life and was well-known in Philadelphia and New Jersey gay circles. He died at the age of 73 on June 21, 2012 in New Jersey.

This collection consists of a single item: an 8-page handwritten memoir by John Brown, who also went by Sammy as well as by the drag name Marilyn. The memoir was given to friend Hugh Hagius in the early 2000s, but had been written by Brown "about 35 years ago." It is written in pencil in a printed block-letter hand on lined yellow and cream colored paper. It tells the story of how Brown was introduced to gay life in Philadelphia, how he and friend Jack Van Alstyne met queens in Rittenhouse Square in 1953, and how he took on the drag name Marilyn. It also has details about Brown serving time in juvenile detention in 1954.