The Long Beach ‘social vagrant’ investigations, 1914

The ar­rests of 31 men in con­nec­tion to two private Long Beach clubs where men were said to cross dress and have sex was the talk of the town in 1914. The Los Angeles Times and oth­er sen­sa­tion­al­ist news­pa­pers at the time prin­ted the names of the ar­res­ted men, with dev­ast­at­ing res­ults.

John Lamb, a prom­in­ent Long Beach banker and Epis­copal Church of­ficer, killed him­self soon after he was ar­res­ted in an un­der­cov­er sting op­er­a­tion in 1914 that tar­geted gay men in the city. Lamb was among 31 men, al­leged mem­bers of two private clubs in Long Beach, who were ar­res­ted and ac­cused of “so­cial vag­rancy.” Lamb said in a let­ter to his sis­ter that he was mor­ti­fied to read his name ...

The Los Angeles Times covered the sen­sa­tion­al 1914 tri­al of Her­bert N. Lowe, who was among 31 so-called “so­cial vag­rants” ar­res­ted and ac­cused of lewd con­duct and hav­ing gay sex. Au­thor­it­ies ac­cused the men of be­long­ing to two private clubs, the 606 Club and the 96 Club, where, of­ficers said, they cross dressed and had sex. B.C. Brown, one of two vice of­ficers who helped pi­on­eer the use of un­der­cov­er ...

The Los Angeles Times ap­peared to take great glee from re­port­ing on the 1914 ar­rests of 31 men in an un­der­cov­er sting op­er­a­tion tar­get­ing gay men in Long Beach. The Times re­por­ted sneer­ingly from the so-called “Holy City of Long Beach.” The men, in­clud­ing loc­al flor­ist Her­bert N. Lowe, were al­leged mem­bers of two private clubs for gay men in Long Beach. While oth­ers, called “so­cial vag­rants” by the Times, ...

An at­tor­ney rep­res­ent­ing one of 31 men ar­res­ted on sus­pi­cion of “so­cial vag­rancy” in Long Beach a cen­tury ago ques­tioned the tac­tics of un­der­cov­er po­lice of­ficers who ren­ted an apart­ment from his cli­ent and spied on him as he flir­ted with a de­coy of­ficer. Her­bert N. Lowe, a loc­al flor­ist, was ul­ti­mately ac­quit­ted.

The Los Angeles Times de­tailed the ar­rests of 31 men ac­cused of “so­cial vag­rancy” and gay sex in the neigh­bor­ing city of Long Beach. The news­pa­per, which pub­lished the names of the men, ap­peared to take great de­light in cov­er­ing the “mor­al clean-up” in the city and the em­bar­rass­ment caused by “the scan­dal.” One man, flor­ist Her­bert N. Lowe, fought the charges at tri­al. The art­icle quotes a judge speak­ing ...

An un­der­cov­er vice of­ficer who pi­on­eered the use of stings tar­get­ing gay men killed him­self after fatally shoot­ing a wo­man with whom he was in­fatu­ated, ac­cord­ing to a Los Angeles Times story pub­lished on Ju­ly 21, 1915. W.H.“Billy” War­ren — known for the “now cel­eb­rated ‘so­cial vag­rant’ in­vest­ig­a­tions” in Long Beach a year earli­er — shot Creta Carter and then turned the gun on him­self, the news­pa­per re­por­ted.

Her­bert N. Lowe, a flor­ist charged fol­low­ing an un­der­cov­er op­er­a­tion tar­get­ing gay men in Long Beach, was ac­quit­ted after a tri­al that drew large crowds. Lowe was among 31 al­leged mem­bers of two private Long Beach clubs, the 606 Club and the 96 Club, who were ar­res­ted and ac­cused of “so­cial vag­rancy” and gay sex. Lowe’s at­tor­ney told the jury that the hands of un­der­cov­er Long Beach vice of­ficers W.H. ...

Long Beach po­lice ar­res­ted 31 men, all al­leged mem­bers of two private clubs, on sus­pi­cion of “so­cial vag­rancy” dur­ing stings con­duc­ted by vice spe­cial­ists W.H. War­ren and B.C. Brown. The ar­res­ted men, the art­icle said, had “un­nat­ur­al tend­en­cies [which] caused them to make ad­vances to oth­er men.” Most paid fines of agreed to serve jail time, but one, flor­ist Her­bert N. Lowe, fought the charges. The of­ficers said he told ...