1960s terms and Polari
1962
Trevor talks about the names gay people were called in the 1960s.
“I don’t think we used the word ‘gay’ till the sixties, you were queer or a puff, shirtlifter, which was not very nice really. I think during the sixties that came out being ‘gay’, I’m not sure how that started.”
“'Polari' was a London thing and Merchant Navy. They used to say ‘boner lalleys’, they brought it out on a radio programme and that’s what became popular, because it was Kenneth Williams, and Hugh Paddock – Round the Horn, but it didn’t come popular in Birmingham.”
Contributed by: Trevor Hall, 76