After Lights Out at the Y · Members Collection No. 1

25 true stories of the men who found each other in the YMCAs, bathhouses, gyms and quiet corners of a world that told them to hide.

Your purchase keeps Gay Timeline going. The channel is independent and runs on its listeners. Every collection you get helps the channel keep going and makes the next true story possible. You are not just buying stories. You are helping keep these men’s names spoken.

Our most-watched story ever is Inside the Gay YMCA. You asked for more, so here it is: a whole collection built around the Y and the world around it, from its Christian founders in 1844 to the closing of the old residence floors. Every one of these 25 stories is members-only. You won't hear them on YouTube or anywhere else.

Inside this collection

• Inside the Sloane House YMCA: New York's biggest gay address, 1930–1960
• The West Side Y: rooms, pools and quiet friendships in Manhattan
• When men swam naked: the secret ease of the YMCA pool
• The Harlem YMCA: poets, dreamers and brothers on 135th Street
• The Chicago YMCA Hotel: 2,000 rooms on South Wabash
• The Embarcadero YMCA: San Francisco's waterfront rooms
• The Railroad YMCAs, the YMCA lobby and the night schools for young men alone in the city
• Bathhouse Row in Hot Springs, the downtown athletic clubs and Muscle Beach
• Grand Central's waiting room, the reading rooms and the movie palaces of Times Square
• How the Y became a song, and the last nights of the old Y
• …and more, 25 stories in all

In every story

• About an hour, read slowly and calmly by Julian, perfect for falling asleep
• One ad-free MP3 with cover art, from the first word to the last
• A one-page PDF of the real men, historians and books behind it
• No app and no account: the files are yours to keep, playable anywhere, even offline

Every story is built from real, documented history and the work of the historians who uncovered it.

$37 for all 25 stories, about 25 hours of listening. Paid once, yours to keep. Your download link arrives by email straight after checkout. Pay with PayPal or a card.

Every purchase pays for the research, the narration and the next collection. Thank you for keeping these names spoken.