A Gay Revolution the Suburban Way

The Nutbush, a gay bar in Forest Park, Ill., outside Chicago, celebrated its 30th anniversary last month. The bar is as revolutionary for its unremarkable anonymity as other urban gay bars, like Manhattan's Stonewall, once were for their scenes of intolerant violence. Even as the Nutbush has become accepted, with its own dart team in the local bar league, it continues to serve as an oasis for newly "out" men and women as well as, in the words of one patron, much more: "This is where I get a mortgage. This is where we buy a house or a car. Somebody wants to take a trip to Honduras or Cancun, we've got guys who are travel agents. This is family. We keep it in the family."