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Scotty Bowers
George Albert "Scotty" Bowers (July 1, 1923 – October 13, 2019), active from 1945 to 1980, was best known for procuring prostitutes for Hollywood industry insiders, many closeted about bisexual or homosexual liaisons. Bowers was described as having "a savant-like quality: a result of his refusal to be embarrassed by sex."
Unconfirmed tales of his exploits circulated for years; Bowers eventually revealed his story after the studio-era Hollywood celebrities had died, claiming "the truth can't hurt them anymore." The 2012 publication of his memoir Full Service drew broad media attention. The subsequent documentary film Scotty and the Secret History of Hollywood reunited Bowers with some of his hustlers shortly after the book's release.
Bowers was born in 1923 in Ottawa, Illinois, the son of Edna (Ostrander) and Glen Bowers. As a child during the Depression in Chicago, Bowers said that he began engaging in sexual acts with Catholic priests for small amounts of money, later justifying the behavior as himself providing a useful service rather than the Catholic Church sexually molesting a minor.
In 1942, Bowers joined the United States Marine Corps and fought as a paramarine in the Pacific War, including at the Battle of Iwo Jima, during World War II, losing his brother and two close friends. In 1946, he started working as an attendant at the Richfield Oil gas station located at 5777 Hollywood Boulevard, at the corner of Van Ness Avenue. Bowers claimed that one customer was actor Walter Pidgeon who drove Bowers to his home where the two had a brief sexual encounter, for which Pidgeon paid Bowers $20. After this, Bowers began providing gas station customers with sexual favors for money, and arranging similar favors for others without taking a percentage of the transaction payment. His customers were primarily men seeking sexual activity with other men, but he also arranged for women to have other women as sexual partners.
In 1950 Bowers stopped working at the service station and began working as a party bartender, while continuing his sexual services. He also claimed to have provided women, mostly prostitutes, to Alfred Kinsey as interview subjects for his study on human sexuality. Bowers was never prosecuted by the authorities for his activities; he kept all his contact information in his head. The actor Beach Dickerson willed three houses to Bowers. In his autobiography, Bowers claimed that cinematographer Néstor Almendros bequeathed him his Oscar.
On July 8, 1984, he married cabaret singer Lois J. Broad, ten years his junior. She died in 2018. Bowers died at his home in Los Angeles on October 13, 2019, at the age of 96. The cause of death was kidney failure.
According to film critic Peter Debruge, writing for Variety in 2006: "Everyone knows Scotty. After all, he’s been serving drinks to the Beverly Hills crowd for almost 60 years, working a different party almost every night of the week, sometimes two a day." Gore Vidal, maintaining Bowers's account was accurate, spoke at the official launch of the memoir; it was Vidal's last public appearance. Robert Benevides, the partner of actor Raymond Burr, said to the LA Weekly: "Scotty just liked to make people happy." Film director John Schlesinger and investigative reporter and novelist Dominick Dunne also backed Bowers’s claims.
Joan Allemand, a former arts director of the Beverly Hills Unified School District, who knew Bowers for more than 20 years and introduced him to his subsequent co-writer, Lionel Friedberg, said: "Scotty doesn't lie about anything. He's a poor kid from a farm in Illinois, and when he got here, his two assets were his big penis and charming personality. That's what he used to feed his family." Cecil Beaton wrote of his sexual encounters with Bowers in his published diary of the 1960s, while in her memoirs Debbie Reynolds wrote of Milton Berle employing him for a party prank. Bowers appears as the character 'Smitty' in John Rechy's 1963 roman-à-clef City of Night. A profile in the New York Social Diary stated: "Clients all agreed that he was 'very good' at what he did, and very agreeable ... And very discreet. He did not discriminate. He even had one regular longtime client ... who had no arms and no legs ... The Scotty I knew was a guy who always seemed to be enjoying his life working morning, noon and night, with never a gripe; always with a smile to greet you, and never with an axe to grind. After a lifetime in Hollywood, that's a remarkable feat and its own kind of Zen."
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Scotty Bowers
George Albert "Scotty" Bowers (July 1, 1923 – October 13, 2019), active from 1945 to 1980, was best known for procuring prostitutes for Hollywood industry insiders, many closeted about bisexual or homosexual liaisons. Bowers was described as having "a savant-like quality: a result of his refusal to be embarrassed by sex."
Unconfirmed tales of his exploits circulated for years; Bowers eventually revealed his story after the studio-era Hollywood celebrities had died, claiming "the truth can't hurt them anymore." The 2012 publication of his memoir Full Service drew broad media attention. The subsequent documentary film Scotty and the Secret History of Hollywood reunited Bowers with some of his hustlers shortly after the book's release.
Bowers was born in 1923 in Ottawa, Illinois, the son of Edna (Ostrander) and Glen Bowers. As a child during the Depression in Chicago, Bowers said that he began engaging in sexual acts with Catholic priests for small amounts of money, later justifying the behavior as himself providing a useful service rather than the Catholic Church sexually molesting a minor.
In 1942, Bowers joined the United States Marine Corps and fought as a paramarine in the Pacific War, including at the Battle of Iwo Jima, during World War II, losing his brother and two close friends. In 1946, he started working as an attendant at the Richfield Oil gas station located at 5777 Hollywood Boulevard, at the corner of Van Ness Avenue. Bowers claimed that one customer was actor Walter Pidgeon who drove Bowers to his home where the two had a brief sexual encounter, for which Pidgeon paid Bowers $20. After this, Bowers began providing gas station customers with sexual favors for money, and arranging similar favors for others without taking a percentage of the transaction payment. His customers were primarily men seeking sexual activity with other men, but he also arranged for women to have other women as sexual partners.
In 1950 Bowers stopped working at the service station and began working as a party bartender, while continuing his sexual services. He also claimed to have provided women, mostly prostitutes, to Alfred Kinsey as interview subjects for his study on human sexuality. Bowers was never prosecuted by the authorities for his activities; he kept all his contact information in his head. The actor Beach Dickerson willed three houses to Bowers. In his autobiography, Bowers claimed that cinematographer Néstor Almendros bequeathed him his Oscar.
On July 8, 1984, he married cabaret singer Lois J. Broad, ten years his junior. She died in 2018. Bowers died at his home in Los Angeles on October 13, 2019, at the age of 96. The cause of death was kidney failure.
According to film critic Peter Debruge, writing for Variety in 2006: "Everyone knows Scotty. After all, he’s been serving drinks to the Beverly Hills crowd for almost 60 years, working a different party almost every night of the week, sometimes two a day." Gore Vidal, maintaining Bowers's account was accurate, spoke at the official launch of the memoir; it was Vidal's last public appearance. Robert Benevides, the partner of actor Raymond Burr, said to the LA Weekly: "Scotty just liked to make people happy." Film director John Schlesinger and investigative reporter and novelist Dominick Dunne also backed Bowers’s claims.
Joan Allemand, a former arts director of the Beverly Hills Unified School District, who knew Bowers for more than 20 years and introduced him to his subsequent co-writer, Lionel Friedberg, said: "Scotty doesn't lie about anything. He's a poor kid from a farm in Illinois, and when he got here, his two assets were his big penis and charming personality. That's what he used to feed his family." Cecil Beaton wrote of his sexual encounters with Bowers in his published diary of the 1960s, while in her memoirs Debbie Reynolds wrote of Milton Berle employing him for a party prank. Bowers appears as the character 'Smitty' in John Rechy's 1963 roman-à-clef City of Night. A profile in the New York Social Diary stated: "Clients all agreed that he was 'very good' at what he did, and very agreeable ... And very discreet. He did not discriminate. He even had one regular longtime client ... who had no arms and no legs ... The Scotty I knew was a guy who always seemed to be enjoying his life working morning, noon and night, with never a gripe; always with a smile to greet you, and never with an axe to grind. After a lifetime in Hollywood, that's a remarkable feat and its own kind of Zen."