The Jaguar Bookstore – San Francisco (1960s–1980s) Tucked into Polk Street, The Jaguar was one of San Francisco’s earliest openly gay bookstores, opening its doors in the 1960s. Part shop, part community hub, it carried everything from pulp novels and physique mags to serious works of queer literature—at a time when access to such materials was rare and often risky. For two decades, it gave San Francisco’s LGBTQ community a place to see themselves reflected in print and to connect with others who shared their world.
