Working the Streets
Gloria Lockett's Story

 
Siobhan Brooks: What led you into the sex industry?
Gloria Lockett: Money. I was young, 21 when I first got into the sex industry. I had two jobs, one as a clerk at a Lucky's store and the other as a clerk at City Hall. I was also waitressing at the Hyatt House Restaurant and various hotels in Oakland, trying to support myself and my two kids, and it was very, very hard.

SB: How did you begin working in the sex industry? Did you have any connections with people who were already working in it?
GL: During that time women in San Francisco worked in their fur coats. They were nicely dressed, and their hair would look good. I said to this guy I was seeing, one day, jokingly, "I could do that." Next thing I know he was bringing me a black dress and telling me to put it on. Basically, he and I were going out to work. That was in 1967, and it just went on from there.

SB: How long were you in the sex industry?
GL: I consider myself still to be in the sex industry, but as far as dating and working for myself, I was in it for 18 years. I worked on the streets for about 10 years, and then I worked in clubs in Burlingame and different hotels. In the latter years I went to working ads in newspapers.

SB: How were issues around safety and clients dealt with?
GL: I was working in a stable with lots of other women for about 18 years straight. For 10 of the 18 years, there was an average of 10 of us, me being the eldest. We were always around each other and worked in pairs on the streets and in hotels. We had procedures where if you got out of a car and no one was around, you took down the guy's license plate number, or someone driving behind you took down his license number. As soon as you got into a hotel room you would pick up the phone and tell someone where you were and what time you were expected back. For the most part, I felt pretty safe; the streets are a little more dangerous than being inside, but a lot funnier. When you worked inside you had to play girlfriend and boyfriend, but on the streets the guys knew what you where down there for. They knew why they were picking you up—there were very few games that were played.

SB: How was race an issue in terms of how much money you made?
GL: The money varied. It went up and down depending upon what city and what town. Over the 18 years I worked in a lot of different states. In order to be Black and work the sex industry you had to move around a lot. In each state the money was different, anywhere from $10 to $600. I've worked Vegas, Hawaii, Alaska, Oakland, San Jose, San Francisco, and other small cities, so money depended on where you worked and what kind of date you were going to turn. If you were in Vegas in those days, the average date was $100. Most of the time the guys would offer you as little as possible. If you were on the streets they would offer you $10 or $20, but the art is to talk the men out of how ever much you could get instead of taking what they offered you.

No matter how big, ugly, or old she looked—it didn't matter: The white girl went first, then the black girls.

There was a time when I was on the streets that I could turn as many as 10 or 11 tricks a night. But if you were in a hotel it was more like three or four, and if you worked out of ads in papers then it was five or six. If you worked in Alaska prices were up in those days because of the pipeline, so men had lots of money, plus it was very cold. Guys would work three months at a time before they would be ready to spend their money.

Race played a very big part in how much money you made. Fortunately or unfortunately, I hung around a bunch of sisters who were white. We all helped each other out. If one of the girls would catch a date, we had an apartment or checked out the pad that we were working out of. The two or three Black women would wait until they got to the apartment and we would double date. So, if you were standing out on the corner, they would definitely pick up the white girl first. No matter how big, ugly, or old she looked—it didn't matter: The white girl went first, then the black girls.

When I worked the hotel scene there were very few Blacks, so you had to be very careful. You had the chance to rip guys off, not that I did, though it was tempting at times. But you couldn't rip guys off because there were only two of you, and people in the hotel would know who you were, even if the guy didn't.

You couldn't hang around with other Black girls. You had to hang by yourself or with other white girls, because if you were hanging in the Fairmont or the Hyatt, the people working there were more apt to bother you if you were with another Black girl. I might have hung with one Black girl from time to time, but for the most part I hung with white girls or by myself. It's a very racist thing, for different reasons. Some people have never seen a Black woman; they're raised in areas where they don't see Black women until they're grown. Actually, I remember one time I was standing on the corner of MacArthur in San Pablo and this guy kept passing by looking at me. Finally, a stable sister of mine came out—a big white girl—and he picked her up. I waited until he got to the house; waited until she got her money. Then I went in and said to the guy, "You've got to tell me why you picked her up because I know that you were more interested in me than her. What is it?" He was shaking and he said, "Well, I didn't see a Black person until I was 20. I was too scared." [laughs] Racism plays a part in anything that you do.

SB: Was the money more equal when you were with other Black women?
GL:Well, it's hard to say because the skill was not how much a person would offer you, but how much money you could talk them out of. I think it was probably about equal, of course they would give a white girl more money than they would give you. So Black girls knew that they had to talk. I always figured if you had the money on you, then you should be prepared to spend it. Unfortunately, this was before ATM cards. [laughs]

SB: How many times have you been arrested and what were the circumstances of your arrests?
GL: I've been arrested about 40 times. The first time I got arrested it was horrible; I was in San Francisco and a sweep happened. They arrested me and about 30 other prostitutes. I had never been to jail. I was 21. I didn't know anything about jail and I didn't know anyone who had ever been to jail. I remember I was in jail crying and one of the girls whispered to me, "You can't cry because if you cry the other girls are going to talk about you."

I was like, "I don't care! I'm never going to do this again." The girl said, "Aw, baby. You'll be back out there tomorrow." She was right. [laughs]

They had you sleep on cement floors with wool blankets, which I'm allergic to. The toilets were in front of the bed, so there was no privacy. In the first year I plead guilty, so I was on probation for a year—it was horrible. After that, I fought all my cases and I have to say that I'm a little bit different from the average person because I refused to think I was a criminal. I got up every morning and went to court, and used a public defender, sometimes private lawyers. I spent a lot of time in court and—knock on wood—I never served more than three days. But it was very difficult because if you're on the streets you get arrested, you're an easy pick-up.

Police always want easy marks, and prostitutes are a lot less dangerous than a domestic violence call. If you're not on the streets, for the most part, you won't get arrested. Police constantly harass prostitutes; police have arrested me and said things like, "What if we put sand in this Vaseline? That would really be something." They used to take our condoms and punch holes in them. So, the police were really bad, and that's another reason why you had to move around. I really hated it that we had to move around so much. Trying to raise kids and moving from one city to another city was hard. But my kids' lives were a little more stable. Either my mother kept them or the housekeeper did, so they weren't jumping all over the place like I was. I moved around a lot to keep from going to jail. Jail back then is the same as now, most people in jail are Black. White people that go to jail don't stay and they don't get the same amount of time.

SB: Were murders of prostitutes a big concern for you when you were working the streets?
GL: It's always a concern but my situation was a little bit different because I hung around so many people. Misery does not like company, so most of the time the women that were getting murdered hung by themselves. There was a time when pimps, if you will, would not let their women work with other women for fear that their women would become more educated and organized and leave them.

I can remember a particular woman who used to work the streets, and she and her old man were IV drug users. She had six kids and she was always by herself. One day a guy picked her up and killed her. It was really bad because she was a white girl and she was with a Black man. From what I heard nobody claimed her body because her parents disowned her after she got involved with a Black man—prostitution was just another factor for her parents disowning her, but racism was really the issue. Her body stayed in the morgue for 30 days. So, that was the most fear of working the streets by yourself. I think women shouldn't be by themselves; people try to take advantage of women anyway, but when women are by themselves, they're more of a victim.

SB: Did you ever have a pimp?
GL: Yes. I was with the guy for 25 years. He was the same guy that got me into prostitution. I left him a couple of times, but he was the only pimp I had.

SB: Was the relationship good?
GL: Yes, but it was hard. Anytime that you have a man that has anywhere between 10 and 12 other women, it's difficult. He was a very good man, which is why he had so many women. He was very likable and very family-oriented, not the type that would beat you and make you stay out all night, and he didn't make you fulfill a quota. We all just thought of him as our old man rather than our pimp, because he wasn't the stereotype of a pimp. You know, wearing the hat tossed to the side, jeans, a three-quarter leather coat, and big shades.

SB: How did your kids react to you being a prostitute?
GL: It's hard to say because my kids were three and four when I got with the guy. So, he was the only father that they knew. My kids starting asking me about it when they reached 10 and 12 years of age, but before then it was never brought up. None of the prostitution took place around them... but they knew. Having housekeepers, living in fine houses, driving Rolls Royces and Cadillacs, and having a whole bunch of white women around the house: They knew.

After a while they asked. I used to just tell them I was going to work when I would leave them, then they asked me what kind of work was I doing. They were so used to having designer clothes, I don't think it affected them much when they were younger. However, I do think now that they're older it [prostitution] had an effect on them which I'm not happy with. Both of them are not as stable as I would like them to be, especially my daughter. And who knows? I don't know if it's the prostitution or me not being around them when they were growing up. We love each other. None of my kids have said anything like, "Oh, Mom! We hate you because you was a ho'."

SB: How old are your kids now?
GL: I'm 50. My son is 33, and my daughter is 32.

SB: How did you become involved with COYOTE?
GL: I got involved with COYOTE because as I mentioned earlier there were a group of us working the streets of Berkeley, Oakland, and San Jose. When working the streets of Berkeley, the police started to figure out that we were prostitutes all working for the same person. This happened around the same time as the Jonestown Massacre. The police would say that the guy we worked for was another Jim Jones, brainwashing us, and that they would catch him like they caught Al Capone. So, the police got really heavy on us.
 
When we started working San Jose back in 1977, there was lots of money, until 1983. What happened was they [the police] started watching us, and they set us up. One night the police called the house that we were working out of. I was the one answering the phones, setting the girls up on different dates. Then they came in and busted me; I was the only Black woman. Six women got busted, but two of them weren't there, so they didn't get busted. They charged me with pimping and pandering, conspiracy, 647b [which is prostitution], being in a house of prostitution, being around a house of prostitution. They charged the other [white] women with 647b. The six customers got tickets, they were never arrested, and they were made to testify against us. We spent a year in court, and according to the police, it cost the taxpayers a million dollars for a prostitution case. I refused to plead guilty for conspiracy, I told the police that I would plead guilty to being in a house of prostitution—which is six months' probation, which I could deal with.

In the next bust, the police only went for me and my lover [who was Black], and one other woman [who was Black]. They tried to get all of the white women and the Mexicans to testify against us! It was a huge case, and they charged us with every felony there was. They charged my man with having a gun in the house. My bail was $500,000. My old man's was $1,000,000. When I got the first case, I had tried to call Margo St. James, but I didn't really follow up. But when I got the second case, we really needed some kind of help and support.

The police also asked the white girls to testify against the Black girls; some of them wouldn't and stayed in jail the whole time of the trail. Margo St. James went to court with us every day. I won my case; the other woman pleaded guilty and did a year and a half. My old man got 20 years. He did two-and-a-half years and then won on appeal.

After the trail I became more involved with COYOTE. I knew that, for the most part, the people working the streets were Black and other women of color. So I had a real problem with the fact that COYOTE was so white. The people were real nice, it was just too white. But I wanted to be involved with COYOTE to let my people know that prostitution was not an all-white issue.

I turned out to be quite an activist, but mainly because I knew that there had to be a voice for people who were working the streets and getting arrested—which meant mostly Black people. Those were people to me who were doing prostitution big time. It was horrendous to me, the white women who would turn two tricks a month and call that prostitution, when Black women were working the streets turning five and six dates a night. They were working six days a week in rain, cold, and snow. I felt it was important for me to be a part of COYOTE to let people know that Black women's issues were different from white women's issues.

For the most part, white prostitutes work inside, and many of them get into prostitution because of power issues. Some were once in the professional world and felt like they were being treated like whores. Many of them have gone to college. Black women mainly do prostitution to economically survive. Most of them never had the opportunity for higher education.

I think Black prostitutes think COYOTE is a waste of time. They feel that prostitution is never going to be legalized or decriminalized. Many of them feel that they don't have the time for meetings because they're too busy making money, and that the meetings aren't going to benefit them in any way. I do understand all those reasons, and if I hadn't been in the situation I was in, I probably would not have attended them, either. However, I definitely think that my being at these meetings made a difference. Though COYOTE is still mostly white, they understand many issues relating to women of color that otherwise would have not been addressed. I served for two years on Hallinan's task force to decriminalize prostitution in San Francisco, and I'm sure I made a difference by being on the task force. I've been to the International Conference on Prostitution in Amsterdam, which I also think was valuable. Black women do need to be heard.
 

SB: Do you feel like a sex workers' movement is happening, and are what are your thoughts about the feminist movement of the '70s?
GL: I've always felt that I was a feminist, but what a feminist is to me is not what a feminist is to some people. I love being a woman and I think it's my right to do whatever I want with my body and mind. Many people think that if you're a prostitute you couldn't be a feminist because you're letting people use you. I always felt that I was certainly using them [the customers] as much as they were using me. So who's using whom? That's the art of the game. It has always irritated me when people asked me, "How could you be a feminist and do this?" How could I not be? Women are breadwinners for the most part, and very strong and powerful. Women basically call the shots, and sometimes we let men think that they're calling them.

Hopefully, women in the sex industry will come together more; I see this with the white women, I'm hoping that the Black women and women of color will start coming together, as well.