Stoumen took them to court a number of times, to the California Supreme Court, and he actually eventually won. The ABC - Alcohol Beverage Control board - had lots of control over how all these laws went, and then they were all tied together with Catholic, or Christian, politics and morality of the era, moving from the early 20th century into the mid 20th century. Even at Maud’s, the longest running lesbian bar up in Cole Valley, they had male bartenders, because that was the law. Women could not serve alcohol, (or even, in some places, legally enter a bar) so there was always a man working the bar. First of all, you could not be an out gay person as an owner of the bar, because if you’d ever been convicted of a crime against morality - which many people were, for soliciting or performing a lewd (homosexual) act - you were prohibited from running a bar. There was so much police harassment going on, all about serving gay people. He was a Holocaust survivor, and a straight man, but his bar catered to all types of people - the Beats gathered there, older locals from the neighborhood, and of course, the gay crowd. Sol Stoumen, the proprietor, was a kind of incredible guy, I’m really fascinated by him. I think it’s really interesting that that marked the transition in a way, because that year was really significant, in that the Black Cat closed after their long legal battle.