Portal:Prostitution

Portsmouth Square, looking north to Telegraph Hill, 1851.

The Barbary Coast was a red-light district during the second half of the 19th and early 20th centuries in San Francisco which featured dance halls, concert saloons, bars, jazz clubs, variety shows, and brothels. Its nine block area was centered on a three block stretch of Pacific Street, now Pacific Avenue, between Montgomery and Stockton Streets. Pacific Street was the first street to cut through the hills of San Francisco, starting near Portsmouth Square and continuing east to the first shipping docks at Buena Vista Cove.

The Barbary Coast was born during the California Gold Rush of 1849, when the population of San Francisco was growing at an exponential rate due to the rapid influx of tens of thousands of miners trying to find gold. (read more...)

Elizabeth Needham (right foreground) as portrayed in William Hogarth's A Harlot's Progress.

Elizabeth Needham (died 3 May 1731), also known as Mother Needham, was an English procuress and brothel-keeper of 18th-century London, who has been identified as the bawd greeting Moll Hackabout in the first plate of William Hogarth's series of satirical etchings, A Harlot's Progress. Although Needham was notorious in London at the time, little is recorded of her life, and no genuine portraits of her survive. Her house was the most exclusive in London and her customers came from the highest strata of fashionable society, but she eventually ran afoul of the moral reformers of the day and died as a result of the severe treatment she received after being sentenced to stand in the pillory. (read more ...)

Wikipedia Featured Article

• ...that the Chatham Garden Theatre in New York City (pictured) went from haven for prostitution to Presbyterian chapel in the span of one year?
• ... that Chains of Love was described as "televised prostitution"?
• ... that in March 1998, the Ontario Court of Justice ruled that being topless while one engages in a commercial purpose such as prostitution is illegal?
• ... that the first mass protests against prostitution of children were led by ECPAT in the 1990s?

• 3rd
  • 1877: Death of Jurjentje Aukes Rauwerda, a Dutch prostitute and procurer. She was famous among members of her profession in the contemporary Netherlands, and ran the largest brothel in Amsterdam, the Maison Weinthal.
• 7th
  • 1958: Birth of Robyn Few, an American sex workers' rights activist, founder of the Sex Workers Outreach Project USA (SWOP-USA), and co-organiser the annual International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers.
• 9th
  • 1669: Death of Damaris Page, a London brothel keeper, entrepreneur and property developer, one of the most successful and famous prostitutes of her time.
• 16th
  • 2018: Death of Dennis Hof, an American brothel owner, politician, and star of the HBO series Cathouse. He was best known as the owner of seven legal brothels in Nevada.
• 29th
  • 1957: Murder of Rosemarie Nitribitt, a German luxury call girl whose violent death caused a scandal in the Germany of the Wirtschaftswunder years. The case gave rise to a novel, three movies and a musical.
• 31st
  • 1959: Murder of Blonde Dolly (Sybille Alida Johanna Niemans), a Dutch prostitute and businesswoman.

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