Queer Ancestor Spotlight - Gladys Bentley
Gladys Alberta Bentley was an American blues singer, pianist, and entertainer during the Harlem Renaissance. She rocketed to fame in the 1920’s as a black, lesbian, cross-dressing performer. Her signature look incorporated a tail coat and top hat, and she was notorious for flirting with women in the audience.
Gladys Bentley c. 1930
Gladys Bentley was born on August 12, 1907 in Philadelphia. She had a strained relationship with her mother, who Bentley claimed rejected her because she was not a boy, which shaped her behavior growing up. In an Ebony article, which has drawn a lot of criticism with accusations of Bentley attempting to “whitewash” her lesbianism, she spoke about preferring to wear her brother’s suits instead of dresses. This and other “unladylike” behavior resulted in her family sending her to doctors in an attempt to “fix” her. Psychiatrists would coin her non-heteronormative behavior as “extreme social maladjustment”. Ultimately, at 16 she ran away to New York City.
She settled in Harlem and began working at Harry Hansberry’s Clam House, a gay speakeasy, as a male-impersonating pianist. She adopted the stage name "Barbara “Bobbie” Minton”, and her she became so popular the club was eventually renamed Barbara’s Exclusive Club. As her fame increased she began playing at the Ubangi Club on Park Avenue and toured the country. She sang about “sissies” and “bulldaggers”, about her female lovers, and about sexual relationships. She attempted to take her art to Broadway but faced both a lawsuit from the club owner’s of the Exclusive Club and police barricading of her performances, which included a backing chorus of eight effeminate male dancers, resulting in her return to Harlem.
In 1931 Bentley had a civil ceremony in New Jersey, entering into a public union with an unknown white woman. This marriage would eventually lead to her being a subject of investigation by the House Un-American Activities Committee during the McCarthy era. The repeal of Prohibition marked the decline of Harlem speakeasies so Bentley relocated to southern California. As American culture began to shift and become more conservative her ability to perform was negatively impacted, at one point requiring special permits in order to perform in male clothing.
In 1952 Bentley married a Los Angeles cook named Charles Roberts, although later in his life he denied they had ever legally married. She also claimed a brief prior marriage to journalist J. Y. Gipson, a columnist for the California Eagle, but he also denied this marriage. She claimed she had been “cured” of her same-sex desires by taking female hormones and became more involved in church life, becoming an ordained minister shortly before her death. In what critics see as an effort to rehabilitate her image for a more conservative era, she wrote an article for Ebony magazine the same year she was married that included photos of her leaning heavily into the image of the domestic wife.
Gladys Bentley died unexpectedly of pneumonia at her home in Los Angeles on January 18, 1960 at the age of 52. She is buried beside her mother at Lincoln Memorial Park in Carson, California. She is remembered as an inspiring figure in the LGBTQ+ and African-American communities, and as someone who exemplified a powerful “black female masculinity” that blurred the boundaries between black and white, and masculine and feminine.
Learn more about Gladys Bentley here:
Gladys Bentley - Queer Music Heritage
“I’m A Woman Again” by Gladys Bentley, Ebony article - Queer Music Heritage
The Great Blues Singer Gladys Bentley Broke All the Rules - Smithsonian Magazine
A Spectacle in Color: The Lesbian and Gay Subculture of Jazz Age Harlem - University of Virginia
Blues Singer Gladys Bentley Broke Ground With Marriage to a Woman in 1931 - The Root
Gladys Bentley: A gender-bending blues performer, who became 1920s Harlem royalty - Jazz Blues News
