Smut Share: Getting Personal

An 18+ Valentine’s romp with QHB & Gerber/Hart exploring queer desire, personal ads, and the intimate, raunchy corners of LGBTQ+ history.

Join Queer History Boston and Chicago’s own Gerber/Hart for a Valentine’s-tinted dive into queer desire, personal ads, erotic ephemera, and the messy, intimate, hilarious ways LGBTQ+ people have sought connection across time.

This edition of Smut Share celebrates the art of getting personal... from newspapers and classified ads to zines, photos, letters, and other NSFW snapshots that refused to keep queer yearning politely offstage. Balancing the horny with the heartfelt, our archivists will explore materials that are explicit, tender, ridiculous, and deeply human.

Expect historical smut, unexpected romance, and plenty of conversation about how queer/trans people have found each other in eras that weren’t always eager to help.

✨ About Gerber/Hart

Gerber/Hart is an LGBTQ+ library and archives located in the Rogers Park neighborhood in Chicago. Founded in 1981, Gerber/Hart is one of the largest repositories of LGBTQ+ content in the world. Gerber/Hart focuses on collecting, preserving, and making accessible the LGBTQ history and culture of Chicago and the Midwest. Learn more by following @gerberhart on Instagram and Facebook, or by exploring their 2022 podcast Unboxing Queer History.

🌈 About QHB

Queer History Boston is a community archives that documents, preserves, and shares LGBTQ+ histories of Boston and New England. What started in 1980 as a small group of volunteers has grown into one of the largest LGBTQ+ community archives in the U.S. For 45 years we operated as The History Project, in 2025 we came out as Queer History Boston, and we couldn’t be prouder!