Drag King timeline| 1, 2, 3 , 4 , 5

Murray HillDella Disgrace is now Del La Grace Volcano and comes to the states to shoot Kings for The Drag King Book.

SAN FRANCISCO Fudgie Frottage and Toone as Remy Martin launch Club Throne (where kings cum).

NEW YORK Murray Hill (left) runs against Rudolph Guiliani for mayor of New York.

1998 - The Drag King book with photos by Del and text by Judith Halberstam is released on Serpents Tail. Kings from New York, San Francisco, London, Paris and Milan, including nearly all the aformentioned kings are represented. Jack also namechecks H.I.S. Kings in Columbus and the emerging troupe phenomena.The Drag King Book 1998

 

NEW YORK Dred, Mo, Del, Flare, Lance and many others begin appearing on the Maury Povich show's special Drag King episodes.

The Men of Club Casanova take their show on the road for their 1st national tour - 23 shows in 18 cities including a bowling alley in Minneapolis and a sushi bar in Charlottesville, Va. starring Mo B. Dick, Antonio Caputo, Lucky 7 and BoB.

Mo B. Dick plays a featured role in John Waters' Pecker.

BERLIN Hans Scheirl releases the film Dandy Dust about a split-personality cyborg of fluid gender.

SAN FRANCISCO Arty Fischal a.k.a. Leslie Einhorn wins the 3rd San Francisco Drag King Contest at the DNA Lounge. Elvis MC's. Cooper a.k.a. Duke's band Whiskey Dick perform. Possum & Squirrel (alias Vinnie & Mario) do Deliverance. Deena Davenport, Laurie Naslund, Texas Tomboy and Denise Laws are Celebrity Judges.

1999 - NEW YORK Tristan Taormino reviews The Drag King book for the Village Voice in "Of Butches, Kings, and Masculinity". In San Francisco John Karr does the same for The Bay Area Reporter (left Harry Dodge and Toone).

WASHINGTON DC's Club Chaos founded by Drag King Ken.

SAN FRANCISCO Fresh White wins the 4th San Francisco Drag King contest. at the DNA. Elvis and Joan Jett Black MC. Smoov Dawg and Electro are the runners up, Todd and Erik (a.k.a. Vinnie & Mario/Possum & Squirrel), Rex Rox and more compete. Michelle Tea, SFDK97 Cooper, Dyke Daddy Skeeter and Crush Velvet are The Celebrity Judges.

SEATTLE WA May sees the first performance of the Seattle Kings including Mick E. Lix, Thirstin, Hellery Homosex and Lance. Read all about it in The Seattle Gay News.peggy

COLUMBUS 1st International Drag King Conference & Extravaganza is held October 15-17 in Columbus, Ohio produced by H.I.S. Kings.

NATIONALLY Peggy Shaw (right) performs Menopausal Gentleman. She's called "an East Village icon of lesbian butchness" by the New York Times and "The King of Drag" by Willamette Week.

2000 - SAN FRANCISCO Electro (below left) a.k.a. Cassie Holman wins the 5th Annual San Francisco Drag King Contest at The King Street Garage. Vlad Sucker, who is already Mr. Trannyshack 2000 is runner up. The SF Weekly and Dellazine are there.

Harry Dodge is a gender fluid member of the ensemble cast in John Waters' Cecil B. Demented.

ElectroNEW YORK Several of Del's photographs from The Drag King book are commissioned by HBO for a Sex in the City episode in which a straight male photographer has an exhibit of Drag Kings. Dred, Mo and other New York Kings are cast in the episode but end up on the cutting room floor.

LOUISVILLE, KY The UnderGrounD KingZ are founded.

CHICAGO, IL Chicago Kings are founded by Mr. Izzie Big, Harley Poker, Maxx Hollywood and Pussy Galore. They now comprise a troupe of 30 Kings and are doing weekly shows!Seattle Kings

SEATTLE, WA In January Seattle holds its first contest. In June The Seattle Weekly does a piece on the Seattle Kings (right).

LOS ANGELES Backstreet Noize are founded by Max, Justin & Carlos.

SANTA BARBARA, CA The Disposable Boy Toys founded (below).

BLOOMI1NGTON, IN B-Town Kings founded by Caleb.Disposable Boy Toys 2001

2nd IDKE held in Columbus. Kings and their supporters from 20 states & 2 Canadian provinces attend including Dred, Pat Riarch, Carlos Las Vegas, The Disposable Boy Toys, The Toronto Drag Kings, Billy T. Holly, Johnny Kingpin, H.I.S. Kings, Toone and Alix Olson. Drag King Ken and Johnny Kat from DC perform as well as produce King - the first ever Drag King zine as a documentation of the event.

DENVER CO In October Elvis Herselvis flies in from San Francisco to be a celebrity performer and judge at the Duke of Denver competition. Valentino wins.

AUSTRALIA Mo B. Dick goes down under to Australia to host & perform at Melbourne's King Victoria contest. Mo also performs in Sydney.

2001 - SAN FRANCISCO Paul Wanka wins The 2nd Mr. Trannyshack contest. Members of The Go-Gos are judges.

Howie Weenis (right) a.k.a. Vinnie Testosteroni a.k.a. Rat Bastard a.k.a. Vlad Sucker a.k.a. Todd a.k.a. Possum - Malia Spanyol wins the 6th Annual San Francisco Drag King Contest! SFDK2K Electro, dressed as a hot dog dances with hand puppets to Dust in the wind and reluctantly relinquishes his crown. Howie Weenus

Shack "The Shack" Shackwell and Bubba Lou (a.k.a. Laurie Bushman and Leigh Crow) MC. Miss Chocolate, Peggy Sue, SFDK99 Fresh White and Jordy Jones are Celebrity Judges. Fabulous contestants including Rusty Hips and Johnny Angel compete. Drag band The Woodyz play live, Boy Wonder wows the crowd and The Village Peeps do Macho Man.

Erin O'Neill shows her Kings of the Road portrait series in Long Beach CA.

SAN FRANCISCO Jordy Jones curates Trans-Art 2001, a series of four events addressing the cultural aspects of the emergence of Trans Communities. Contributions include Drag King portraits from the above series by Erin, self-portraits in drag by Annie Sprinkle, new work by Del, Loren Cameron, Jordy, Texas Tomboy, Chloe Atkins and more.

Sir Real 2001There's a panel with Ben Singer, Jack Halberstam, Terry Tafoya, Dr. Joan Roughgarden as well as Jordy himself. Video, installation and performance work from several other transluminaries. Fudgie Frottage a.k.a. Lu Read produces a concurrent DragStrip event that features SFDK99 Fresh White, Rico Suave and more. Toone creates the trans-art.org website.

NEW YORK Sir Real (left) continues the venerable kinging and genderfuck traditions at the W.O.W. Cafe Theater with a modest, monthly variety shindig, The Reality Show. In January, W.O.W. celebrates 20 years of groundbreaking dyke performance from Split Britches to Dred. Longtime theater writer and Split Britches expert Alisa Solomon covers the event for The Village Voice in "The Wings of Desire".

SAN FRANCISCO Harry Dodge and Silas Flipper debut their gender fluid buddy movie By Hook or by Crook to a sell out crowd and a standing ovation at the 25th Frameline film festival.

Leigh Crow (Elvis Herselvis) as Big Chief, forms the Drag band Flatcracker with fellow King the jim dandy Jen Gandy and bioQueen Deena Davenport. They've got 3 kings, 2 bioQueens and they rawhk!

FLORIDA The House of Ma leaves home for an east coast tour in June including Boston, NYC, Provincetown, Philly, Asheville and Chapel Hill.

Pat Riarch tours with spoken word prophet Alix Olsen. They share many bills with Bitch & Animal, creators of the rousing anthem Drag King Bar.

Luster, Mo, Dred and others appear on the Rikki Lake Show.

SANTA BARBARA, CA Tristan Taormino meets Del & The Disposable Boy Toys and finds them anything but. She reveals all for The Voice in "Porn, Chicken, and Boy Toys".

NEW YORK Murray Hill holds the 1st Drag King Invitational in September. 25 Kings from all over The US and Canada perform despite the tragic events of 9/11. Lesbian Nation was there.

Mo B. Dick goes out on the road for a second national tour with The Men of Casanova: Muthafucka MC, Antonio Caputo and more (bus right). This time they cover 34 shows in 27 cities. Read all about it in the Advocate.

Maxwell from HIS Kings

NEW YORK Murray Hill wins Drag King of the year at The Glammy Awards.

ATLANTA, GA L.Camino from The House of Ma competes and wins the Atlanta Drag King Contest.

OLYMPIA, WA Drag Attack Cabaret release Third Antenna - A documentary about the radical nature of Drag. Directed by Freddie Fagula & Hellery Homosex with interwiews and peformance footage covering three years and including acts from Washington, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Minnesota, New York and beyond like Thirston, H.I.S. Kings, Billy T. Holly, Sir Real, Little Ford Fuckleroy and many many more.

COLUMBUS, OH The 3rd IDKE in November includes three important cultural debuts: the first Drag King Film Festival curated by Toronto King Flare; Erin's Kings of the Road slideshow; and the launch of Kingdom international Drag King magazine edited by Ken & Carlos Las Vegas (left). The original version of this timeline appears in this inaugural issue which also features Flare, Johnny Kat, Tom Erge, Mo B. Dick, Stu, Diane Torr, Pat Riarch, Lance and much much more. Kingdom mahazine 2001Maxwell (above) Jake, Luster and H.I.S. Kings host 2 days and nights of hot acts, royal mindmeld and regal roundtables.

IDKE is a veritable communing of The Kingdom with over 200 Kings, Queens, transmen, boyz and their supporters from all over North America participating. Kings range in age from 16 to 60, in style from hip-hop homebois to broadway hoofers; from The House of Ma's genderfuck to a fetished-out leatherclad Depeche Mode punk. Lots of new troupes including The Chicago Kings, The B-Town Kings and The Underground Kingz. The Bee Gees make an appearance in their white Staying Alive jumpsuits.

Sparky reviews IDKE for the Dyke Diva website.

NEW YORK Tristan Taormino reviews IDKE for the Village Voice in "Drag Kings make me wet!"

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Drag King timeline| 1, 2, 3 , 4, 5