(swoosh)
(slow music)
- [Narrator] Capitol Hill is a neighborhood in flux.
As familiar signs of gentrification take over
the spaces that once housed Seattle's gay community.
- [Jeff] In the 60s, 70s
the bars were down in Pioneer Square.
Then they moved up to uptown, to Haller Gulch,
and the Regrade, and then they started moving up the hill.
Real estate on the hill was cheap.
The Boeing bust.
- [Narrator] In the 1970s and the 80s,
working class families moved off Capitol Hill in droves.
Gay bars moved in.
And with gays becoming more accepted in public life,
an enclave formed on Capitol Hill.
- [Jeff] Brass Connection was a dance bar.
And then Neighbors opened up in 83,
so you had a center right there.
You'd go dancing from one bar to another.
- And there was a lot of gay businesses
- I mean, even, there were more bathhouses and things
then so it was very, very queer then.
- [Shelley] It was.
- [Jeff] Our house and the house next to us
were always both queer houses.
You knew people down the block,
people in the apartment building across the street.
- [Martha] People that worked here lived here.
- [Shelley] A lot of people that worked here lived here.
- [Martha] So it was neighborhoody.
- [Shelley] And it made a very tight community
I think at that point.
- [Narrator] The gay enclave remained strong
in the 80s and 90s but around the early 2000s
is when residents started to feel the shift.
(crowd in bar talking)
In today's Capitol Hill, a new generation
is embracing the term "queer" instead of sticking
with the more rigidly defined "gay".
It's at once a more radical identity,
and also a more inclusive one.
- Queer/Bar is a safe space first and foremost
for any and all people who fall under the LGBTQIA umbrella.
We've not even been open two months.
Queer, the "Q" in the LGBTQIA umbrella
is the only one that's all-encompassing
and we wanted it to be a very obvious place
so the community really does understand,
like, this is a gay bar.
This is a lesbian bar.
This is a trans, this is everybody.
- [Narrator] But inviting in a wider community
is not without its challenges.
- [Robbie] The tech industry has like exploded
which is wonderful, but it also means
we get a flood of people that don't know
and don't remember what Seattle,
or Capitol Hill specifically, used to be like.
- [Narrator] Another big issue is housing,
as prices climb and mom and pop landlords
give way to corporate real estate firms.
- It creates this sort of sense that this place
is not really community focused.
It loses sort of that sense of person to person familiarity.
And so I feel like it maintains
this sort of historic tie, but people
are not living and being as much in community
on the Hill as they used to be.
- [Jeff] I lived in a house for 18 years
that is now, there's townhouses there.
Here's my corner.
The garden was over here in the front
and then the chickens were over here at the edge.
The landlord's partner was diagnosed
with early stages of Parkinson's.
So Steve and Joe decided to sell the properties
and I understand the reasoning.
I miss having a house.
People have been moving off the Hill.
We used to joke that if you found someone
and became a couple, you'd move to Queen Anne.
Wallingford was lesbians.
Well, Wallingford and West Seattle.
Nowadays, everywhere.
We truly are everywhere.
We can't afford to live on the Hill anymore.
- [Narrator] Nathan Adams and his husband
moved to White Center in 2012
and shortly thereafter decided to pursue their dream
of opening a gay bar.
- We looked in SoDo, we did look on the Hill,
and finally we did settle on White Center
and the whole reason why was because
so much of the community has moved South
that there's not a place for everybody to gather
and just be themselves.
The roller rink right back here, they do gay skate
the first Wednesday of every month.
And it's huge.
They're always packed, they always sell out.
It's a truly diverse population.
I think that's what makes Rat City, White Center
the next sort of, I don't wanna say gayborhood,
but it's developing its own identity.
(light music)
- [Danni] The queer neighborhood that we have
has some serious problems.
Mostly economic problems, who it's accessible for,
who can afford to live here.
But I think the idea of having queer geographies
is still really vital and important
and for all of the reasons that,
to build political power we need
to be able to interact and see each other
and be in places and spaces where
we have a sense of solidarity,
we have a sense of community.
When there's like more of a diaspora
in that like people are moving out
into more suburban spaces, I think it diminishes
the sense of political power and the sense of safety.
(light music)
- [Narrator] Despite all the changes,
Capitol Hill is still the center of gay life
in Seattle and still serves an important role
for gay people in the region.
- [Martha] So many people both of us know,
most of our friends, that this is a special place
for them, the Hill, and this area.
- It's the fun of being able to go into Pony,
have a couple drinks, see all your friends,
then walk down to Diesel, and see some other friends
you haven't seen in a while.
It's seeing the community live as a community.
And I think that's really hard to explain
to someone who's not gay because you take it for granted
when you see your neighbors going jogging
in the mornings or walking their dogs.
You take all that for, oh that's just,
that's the neighborhood, that's just the way life is.
When you're gay, that's not the way life is,
so the gayborhood becomes that.
That's what Capitol Hill was for me
when I came out so it's important.
(light music)
- [Announcer] In Close on KCTS9 is made possible
in part by BECU.
(light music)
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