Queering the Redneck Riviera: Sexuality and the Rise of Florida Tourism

Queering the Redneck Riviera recovers the forgotten and erased history of gay men and lesbians in North Florida, a region often overlooked in the story of the LGBTQ experience in the United States. Jerry Watkins reveals both the challenges these men and women faced in the years following World War II and the essential role they played in making the Emerald Coast a major tourist destination.

In a state dedicated to selling an image of itself as a “family-friendly” tropical paradise and in an...