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Carols gay bar chicago suburbs2/9/2024 One night a month for several years, Sidetrack’s staff and management donated salaries and tips to Open Hand. For example, Sidetrack helped to sustain Open Hand Chicago’s meals-on-wheels program for people with AIDS when it started operations in 1988. During those years Sidetrack has hosted countless activist events and made untold donations of goods, services, and money. Meanwhile, the growth of LGBT activism paralleled the bar’s own growth, and Sidetrack, its owners, and its staff became indispensable parts of that activism.Īt the time of its induction, Sidetrack was in its 25th year. Crowds grew, longer lines stretched up the block, and the bar’s quarters themselves expanded. As the video bar phenomenon took hold nationally, Sidetrack’s custom, in-house video editing became increasingly sophisticated. The street already had a number of gay-owned businesses -including Jim Gates’ pioneering bar, Little Jim’s-but Sidetrack brought something hitherto unseen there: a musicvideo bar. In April 1982, Sidetrack opened its doors on a stretch of North Halsted IStreet that was still being “discovered” by gay Chicagoans.
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