Our True Colors : The History and Evolution of Backpatch Insignias

By Rob Ridinger

            One of the most distinctive aspects of the leather community’s public face as seen by both the mainstream gay population and society in general are the brilliantly colored heraldric designs displayed at many type of functions. Appearing on everything from associate patches and friendship pins to elaborate formal banners carried in an event that bears their name, the Parade of  Colors, their use is so widespread that it seems as though they have always existed in their present form. But the origins and growth of this element of leather culture and art have not been widely researched.

            As with many other aspects of leather culture, the beginnings of the backpatch lie in southern California during the early 1950s. Given the explosion of popular interest in mainstream American culture in buying and riding motorcycles at this time, it was inevitable that each local organization or riding club would attempt to make itself prominently distinct from its neighbors. The initial backpatches of the gay male motorcycle clubs were worn on riding vests made of denim, with the event pins for their runs modeled on the designs of the club logos and worn on individual biker caps with which were first of cloth and later became the leather biker caps in widespread use today. One of the informants in Gayle Rubin’s landmark study of the San Francisco leather community, Valley of the Kings, noted that if someone walked into a bar wearing a vest with colors on it during the 1960s, it was a sure sign that they were from California.

The idea of colors worn on a denim vest was a practice which eventually extended as least as far as the Midwest and New York City, as vests from Chicago’s Lakeriders and Second City and a photograph of the members of Wheels MC taken in 1969 preserved in the Leather Archives’ collection attest. The idea of a backpatch was both as a statement of identity and an advertisement to the general public of the name of a group of riders who might only be seen as passing visitors. The beginnings of the shift from denim vests to the more familiar leather vest can be seen in the practice of wearing leather sashes with run pins on them to formal events, begun in 1971 by Oedipus M.C. of Los Angeles.

The evolution of backpatch designs over the past half century is more difficult to trace. Some were abstract symbols unaccompanied by any text as part of the design , an approach which presupposed that the viewer was acquainted with the group already and would thus be able to translate the symbol and identify the wearer’s affiliation. Examples of this type of design are the red arrowhead containing a circle of the second oldest leather club in Canada, Spearhead, the black and red three-pronged symbol of the chapters of the Trident International, the blue and gold triskelion (a structures of three usually bent, rather flexible legs radiating from a center )  worn by members of Tribe MC of Detroit, and the red shield and steel chain of the Knights d’ Orleans. A more widespread approach was the utilization of the formal symbol of a leather and levi club or organization with a few letters included as design elements, examples being the colors of Pittsburgh MC, where the letters PMC are set into the three arms of the blue and gray keystone shape inspired by the nickname of the state of Pennsylvania and the complex logo of the Atlantic Motorcycle Coordinating Council ( AMCC ), where the letters are interwoven with the overall loop pattern of the design. A third pattern is one where a detailed design is accompanied by the full name of the organization, such as the logos of Centaur MC of Washington, D.C., the Atons of Minneapolis,  Gateway MC and Blue Max of St. Louis. A fourth is the use of monochrome designs with the name of the organization alone, such as the black and silver oval sign of Onyx, the silver and black sword and shield of  Icon Detroit, and the bar vest from FeBe’s in San Francisco. A fifth variety of colors are those created and worn by a single individual, which can either follow the standard dimensions of a club backpatch or be an expressions of a particular business or craft pursued by the wearer or an honor held by them. This is probably the most baroque type of colors that can ornament a vest, and can be made of anything from fabric to metal. While the titleholder vests made for local participants in the contests leading up to American Brotherhood, IML and IMsL are the most familiar example of this type ( mainly through the frequent illustration of their wearers in publications such as International Leatherman and The Leather Journal), owners of leather businesses often create one-of-a-kind colors for themselves. A widely-seen example of this is the vest created by Lee Willis, owner of the Stud Works, shown by the late Tony De Blasé in the first promotional video produced by the Leather Archives in 1996. Its owner had been a noted leather craftsman and artist of Seattle, and had adorned the back of his vest with a shimmering portrait of the Space Needle outlined in steel studs. DeBlase himself often wore a vest with the black, blue and red leather flag emblem on the back as his colors, an entirely suitable honor given that he created what has become the worldwide emblem of the leather community. First shown to the public at IML on May 28, 1989,  the most famous display of this set of colors occurred onstage at IML in 2000, when the original prototype was displayed to a cheering theater before its presentation to the Leather Archives. This occurred while DeBlase was ill, and he passed on July 21, 2000. A more distinctive if specialized application of  colors is the orange vest worn in rotation by the appointed Dungeonmaster at events sponsored by the Chicago Hellfire Club.

As the idea of creating and wearing colors began to take hold across the United States and southern Canada,  distinctive cultural patterns associated with them began to appear in the leather community, including protocols for the proper wearing of a patch ( with no symbol to be placed above the logo on a formal dress vest ), the steps necessary to be deemed worthy to be granted colors through a period of pledge service and education ( a practice which continues and reflects in part the Old Guard ethic of making novices earn their leathers ), and, consequently,  sanctions for the removal of colors should an individual violate agreed-upon norms of conduct. Colors had thus moved beyond performing simply an identifying function to being invested with a public formal authority- when being worn, the individual was acting as a representative of their organization rather than as a private person, and was expected to behave in a manner that would bring honor to the group and ratify their place as a knowledgeable leather person. The concept of colors as embodying the collective honor and pride of a group parallels the military practice of the  “ Trooping of the Colors “ on public ceremonial occasions, and was utilized as a way of formally recognizing the bonds which had evolved over time between leather organizations through the presentation of framed sets of colors, usually between clubs but often to local home bars as well. What had begun as a simple distinguishing mark for individual local groups had evolved into a formal and valued structural element of the networked leather community and.

            With the foundation of the Leather Archives and Museum in 1991, one of the first priorities in the creation of special collections was the gathering and preservation of the colors of clubs which had disbanded or for whom only a small number of surviving members remained, in addition to those of the active contemporary organizations.  The Colors Project was initaitedatied by george Xameron of Vancouver and expanded, until by 2004 some five hundred organizations were represented in the collection.