In early 1977, I got a part time waiter job at the newly-opened Bell Pepper gay restaurant on Lemmon at McKinney. It was a Denny’s-looking building that had previously been an Indian restaurant – The Raja, I believe. The Bell Pepper was owned by a couple named Dennis and Suzanne.
All spring and summer the juke box played Liza Minelli’s New York, New York. One night a week I waited on the group that was in the process of founding the Dallas Gay Political Caucus (“DGPC”), the first Dallas gay political organization. I remember them in the circular booth: Dick Peeples, Don Baker, Loise Young, Steve Wilkins, and Jerry Ward. I continued working there a few months longer when it moved two blocks away to McKinney Avenue. In October ’78, my new boss, Ted Eidson, suggested that I watch a documentary film in theaters entitled Word is Out.
