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Porn Row: An Inside Look at the Sex for Sale District of a Major American City
- GenresNonfiction
248 pages, Hardcover
First published August 1, 1986
95 people want to read
About the author
Jack Weatherford
20Ìýbooks674ÌýfollowersJack McIver Weatherford is the DeWitt Wallace Professor of anthropology at Macalester College in Minnesota. He is best known for his 2004 book, Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World. In 2006, he was awarded the Order of the Polar Star, and the Order of Genghis Khan in 2022, Mongolia’s two highest national honors. Moreover, he was honoured with the Order of the Gran Mariscal de Ayacucho by the Government of Bolivia in 2014.
His books in the late 20th century on the influence of Native American cultures have been translated into numerous languages. In addition to publishing chapters and reviews in academic books and journals, Weatherford has published numerous articles in national newspapers to popularize his historic and anthropological coverage of Native American cultures, as well as the American political culture in Congress in the 20th century. In recent years, he has concentrated on the Mongols by looking at their impact since the time that Genghis Khan united the Mongol tribes in 1206.
His books in the late 20th century on the influence of Native American cultures have been translated into numerous languages. In addition to publishing chapters and reviews in academic books and journals, Weatherford has published numerous articles in national newspapers to popularize his historic and anthropological coverage of Native American cultures, as well as the American political culture in Congress in the 20th century. In recent years, he has concentrated on the Mongols by looking at their impact since the time that Genghis Khan united the Mongol tribes in 1206.
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
August 27, 2013
Jack Weatherford was a sociologist interested in what was once called the "dark underbelly of America" -- pornography, prostitution, and the like.
In the 1960s, many sociologists were asking honest questions about how they could examine culture without changing it. A white researcher going into a black community in the 1960s to study jazz, for example, immediately upsets that community, causes problems, and interferes with its normal operation. Other sociologists argued that the simple act of asking questions (e.g., "how do you know that God really exists?") raises questions that people might not have considered on their own, and changes the very culture one seeks to study.
A new approach to sociology was emerging in the 1960s, one which argued that the researcher had to be an actual participant in a culture in order to study it. Only by participating can these "observational effects" be overcome.
In Washington, D.C., 14th Street NW had long been the avenue for the wealthy and fun-loving. It began just two blocks north of the White House, and for 10 blocks there were theaters, nightclubs, song halls, and dance clubs patronized by the rich and famous. Singers like Frank Sinatra and Ella Fitzgerald often performed on 14th Street. Interspersed among the nightclubs were large, Victorian mansions owned by some of the wealthiest and oldest families in the city.
During the 1950s, however, 14th Street began to wane. And by the mid 1960s, it had become a notorious red-light district -- home to more than 3,000 female prostitutes, another 50 to 60 adult book stores, more than 20 strip clubs, and more than a few brothels and sex clubs. D.C. police arrested more than 300 hookers a night there, but admitted that it was only a fraction of those plying their trade. Tourists from around the nation came to D.C. to dine at some of the nearby steakhouses, and then frolic in the strip clubs and buy smut in the adult bookstores.
Weatherford became a clerk in one of the more famous bookstores on "Porn Row". A true participant-observer, he hid his education and profession, made up a sleazy background, and immersed himself in the world of pornography, prostitution, and sex in order to study "Porn Row". He wondered how prostitutes functioned, what the role of pimps and drugs was, whether prostitutes had to belong to a brothel or whether they used hotels (and if hotels, how did they come to an agreement with the hotelier). He wanted to know about the links between sex clubs, strip joints, steak houses, burlesque shows, prostitution, and the bookstores. How did these institutions support one another? Did they hinder or compete with one another? How did change come about on "Porn Row"? Why did the city come to tolerate a red-light district two blocks from the White House, and how did this "live and let live" policy come to be sustained?
Porn Row is not a great academic study, and Weatherford is not much of an academic. The book is titillating, either, and has little narrative or real insight. Yet, flawed as it is, Porn Row provides one of the few narratives about what Washington, D.C., was really liked in the late 1960s and early 1970s. It documents an otherwise ignored part of the city's history, and is one of the few honest appraisals of prostitution and pornography in America before crack cocaine turned "sex for fun" into "sex for drugs" and violence overran "Porn Row".
Porn Row also catches 14th Street just as it was to disappear. The few remaining "legitimate" businesses along the street began a surreptitious campaign to buy up abanonded or decrepit property and tear it down. They also openly waged war on strip clubs and other enterprises by documenting how they broke the city's liquor laws -- forcing the city to take action to close them down. By 1985, most of "Porn Row" was long gone, and by 1990 it had ceased to exist completely. Weatherford's book, therefore, documents this aspect of the city just before the "legitimate businessman's campaign" began.
In the 1960s, many sociologists were asking honest questions about how they could examine culture without changing it. A white researcher going into a black community in the 1960s to study jazz, for example, immediately upsets that community, causes problems, and interferes with its normal operation. Other sociologists argued that the simple act of asking questions (e.g., "how do you know that God really exists?") raises questions that people might not have considered on their own, and changes the very culture one seeks to study.
A new approach to sociology was emerging in the 1960s, one which argued that the researcher had to be an actual participant in a culture in order to study it. Only by participating can these "observational effects" be overcome.
In Washington, D.C., 14th Street NW had long been the avenue for the wealthy and fun-loving. It began just two blocks north of the White House, and for 10 blocks there were theaters, nightclubs, song halls, and dance clubs patronized by the rich and famous. Singers like Frank Sinatra and Ella Fitzgerald often performed on 14th Street. Interspersed among the nightclubs were large, Victorian mansions owned by some of the wealthiest and oldest families in the city.
During the 1950s, however, 14th Street began to wane. And by the mid 1960s, it had become a notorious red-light district -- home to more than 3,000 female prostitutes, another 50 to 60 adult book stores, more than 20 strip clubs, and more than a few brothels and sex clubs. D.C. police arrested more than 300 hookers a night there, but admitted that it was only a fraction of those plying their trade. Tourists from around the nation came to D.C. to dine at some of the nearby steakhouses, and then frolic in the strip clubs and buy smut in the adult bookstores.
Weatherford became a clerk in one of the more famous bookstores on "Porn Row". A true participant-observer, he hid his education and profession, made up a sleazy background, and immersed himself in the world of pornography, prostitution, and sex in order to study "Porn Row". He wondered how prostitutes functioned, what the role of pimps and drugs was, whether prostitutes had to belong to a brothel or whether they used hotels (and if hotels, how did they come to an agreement with the hotelier). He wanted to know about the links between sex clubs, strip joints, steak houses, burlesque shows, prostitution, and the bookstores. How did these institutions support one another? Did they hinder or compete with one another? How did change come about on "Porn Row"? Why did the city come to tolerate a red-light district two blocks from the White House, and how did this "live and let live" policy come to be sustained?
Porn Row is not a great academic study, and Weatherford is not much of an academic. The book is titillating, either, and has little narrative or real insight. Yet, flawed as it is, Porn Row provides one of the few narratives about what Washington, D.C., was really liked in the late 1960s and early 1970s. It documents an otherwise ignored part of the city's history, and is one of the few honest appraisals of prostitution and pornography in America before crack cocaine turned "sex for fun" into "sex for drugs" and violence overran "Porn Row".
Porn Row also catches 14th Street just as it was to disappear. The few remaining "legitimate" businesses along the street began a surreptitious campaign to buy up abanonded or decrepit property and tear it down. They also openly waged war on strip clubs and other enterprises by documenting how they broke the city's liquor laws -- forcing the city to take action to close them down. By 1985, most of "Porn Row" was long gone, and by 1990 it had ceased to exist completely. Weatherford's book, therefore, documents this aspect of the city just before the "legitimate businessman's campaign" began.
January 11, 2012
Fascinating. Out of print but worth finding. I let someone borrow my first copy, never got it back. Obtained another copy... made the same mistake. Damn. Going to have to buy a third copy.
March 23, 2021
More like 3.5, this was an early project by Jack Weatherford, so I could see him flushing out his writing style. I’m a fan of everything else that he has done and is responsible for in-depth, truer look at how things unfolded throughout history.
As for it being a purely anthropological read, i can say that he tended to let his personal experiences play out for a good half of the book. Interesting as it was, it was different than I had anticipated. Regardless, I’m glad I was able to get an out of print copy and hence checked off any gaps I may have had in porn, sexual customs and the 80’s underground Sex scene.
As for it being a purely anthropological read, i can say that he tended to let his personal experiences play out for a good half of the book. Interesting as it was, it was different than I had anticipated. Regardless, I’m glad I was able to get an out of print copy and hence checked off any gaps I may have had in porn, sexual customs and the 80’s underground Sex scene.
January 13, 2025
"And the poolhalls, the hustlers, and the losers
Used to watch 'em through the glass
Well I'd stand outside at closin' time
Just to watch her walk on past
Unlike all the other ladies
She looked so young and sweet
As she made her way alone down that empty street
Down on mainstreet."
"Mainstreet", Bob Seger, 1976
Porn Row In Washington, D.C.
Jack Weatherford (b. 1946) has had a long, distinguished career as an anthropologist and is best-known for his book "Genghis Kahn and the Making of the Modern World" (2005) Much earlier in his career, while living in Washington, D.C., Weatherford decided to study the capital city's notorious red-light district centered on 14th street, just blocks from the White House. He landed a job in an adult bookstore which included "peeps", a back-room consisting of booths were patrons could watch pornographic films by dropping quarters, as well as books. He worked long 54 hour weeks in the bookstore for about six months. His employer was known only as "The Company" and Weatherford says The Company owned about one-half of the adult establishments on Porn Row. His book "Porn Row: An Inside Look at the Sex for Sale District of a Major American City" tells of his experiences.
Weatherford writes that he had already traveled to many places around the world doing anthropological research but that he had never before been in any adult industry establishment. But, he states, "once I had started this new venture, I found the natives more inscrutable than Washington, politicians, more savage than Ecuadorian head-hunters and, in the end, more tragic than any other people I had ever encountered."
The book gives a view of the lurid streets of 14th street. Work at the bookstore had its times of violence but also its moments of routine and boredom. Weatherford met other workers on porn row, including male and female prostitutes, pimps, masseuses, and exotic dancers. Some he met at the bookstore while others he met on the street, as his job required him to coordinate with other enterprises in Porn Row owned by The Company.
The book is at its best when it is most immediate -- in describing the author's encounters with sex workers and its depictions of the environs on the street. These encounters and depictions have a gritty, realistic and often poignant feel. He also describes the patrons of the bookstore but more at a distance. He doesn't really interact with them more than necessary as part of his job as a clerk. Many of the patrons would be professionals or blue collar workers in the city out for their lunch break, on their way home, or coming out at night.
Unfortunately Weatherford combines his discussion of his experiences with long, wordy digressions of varying relevance and interest. He discusses what he sees as the role of sexuality in the United States and how it fosters areas such as Porn Row. He also includes long wandering sections on the sexual mores and habits of people in other parts of the world and at other times far removed from the United States or Europe. This anthropological material adds little to the discussion or to the understanding of Porn Row.
At the time Weatherford's book was published, Washington D.C.'s 14th street Porn Row was well on its way to demise. Many factors contributed to the demolition of the seedy bookstores, massage parlors, nude bars, and prostitution. By the 1990s Porn Row in Washington, D.C. had disappeared. Weatherford's book is valuable as a study of its place and time especially because there had been little other study of it. I wish there had been more. With its limitations, "Porn Row" captures something of the red-light district in Washington D.C. during the 1960s through the mid 1980s.
Robin Friedman
Used to watch 'em through the glass
Well I'd stand outside at closin' time
Just to watch her walk on past
Unlike all the other ladies
She looked so young and sweet
As she made her way alone down that empty street
Down on mainstreet."
"Mainstreet", Bob Seger, 1976
Porn Row In Washington, D.C.
Jack Weatherford (b. 1946) has had a long, distinguished career as an anthropologist and is best-known for his book "Genghis Kahn and the Making of the Modern World" (2005) Much earlier in his career, while living in Washington, D.C., Weatherford decided to study the capital city's notorious red-light district centered on 14th street, just blocks from the White House. He landed a job in an adult bookstore which included "peeps", a back-room consisting of booths were patrons could watch pornographic films by dropping quarters, as well as books. He worked long 54 hour weeks in the bookstore for about six months. His employer was known only as "The Company" and Weatherford says The Company owned about one-half of the adult establishments on Porn Row. His book "Porn Row: An Inside Look at the Sex for Sale District of a Major American City" tells of his experiences.
Weatherford writes that he had already traveled to many places around the world doing anthropological research but that he had never before been in any adult industry establishment. But, he states, "once I had started this new venture, I found the natives more inscrutable than Washington, politicians, more savage than Ecuadorian head-hunters and, in the end, more tragic than any other people I had ever encountered."
The book gives a view of the lurid streets of 14th street. Work at the bookstore had its times of violence but also its moments of routine and boredom. Weatherford met other workers on porn row, including male and female prostitutes, pimps, masseuses, and exotic dancers. Some he met at the bookstore while others he met on the street, as his job required him to coordinate with other enterprises in Porn Row owned by The Company.
The book is at its best when it is most immediate -- in describing the author's encounters with sex workers and its depictions of the environs on the street. These encounters and depictions have a gritty, realistic and often poignant feel. He also describes the patrons of the bookstore but more at a distance. He doesn't really interact with them more than necessary as part of his job as a clerk. Many of the patrons would be professionals or blue collar workers in the city out for their lunch break, on their way home, or coming out at night.
Unfortunately Weatherford combines his discussion of his experiences with long, wordy digressions of varying relevance and interest. He discusses what he sees as the role of sexuality in the United States and how it fosters areas such as Porn Row. He also includes long wandering sections on the sexual mores and habits of people in other parts of the world and at other times far removed from the United States or Europe. This anthropological material adds little to the discussion or to the understanding of Porn Row.
At the time Weatherford's book was published, Washington D.C.'s 14th street Porn Row was well on its way to demise. Many factors contributed to the demolition of the seedy bookstores, massage parlors, nude bars, and prostitution. By the 1990s Porn Row in Washington, D.C. had disappeared. Weatherford's book is valuable as a study of its place and time especially because there had been little other study of it. I wish there had been more. With its limitations, "Porn Row" captures something of the red-light district in Washington D.C. during the 1960s through the mid 1980s.
Robin Friedman
December 13, 2014
This is one of the craziest, most interesting books I have ever read. Including fiction. This was better than fiction.
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