Everything about what it means to be a police officer in Provincetown, MA changed as a result of events on the night of Labor Day, 1989. Former police chief Bobby Anthony and current hate crimes officer Sergeant Carrie Lopes remember the clash between police and the gay community that night as a riot, while artist Jay Critchley remembers it as a good show, but everyone agrees pizza and ice cream were flying and tensions were high. The problem? Hate crimes. Though Provincetown has always been famous for it's diversity and tolerance, gay bashings had become more prevalent and the police didn't seem to be doing anything about it. This frustrated the gay community and, after the pizza riot, the police department knew it had to do something to repair it's relationship with some constituents. The solution? A model of policing that brings everybody to the table to solve problems and treats the town like a customer. It's called community policing and it's still the way Provincetown does business. In this piece, Jay Critchley offers the perspective of a longtime resident and member of the gay community. Sergeant Carrie Lopes and Former Police Chief Bobby Anthony speak for the police department and Barbara Curry, a conference organizer and transwoman, weighs in with the impact of community policing on Fantasia Fair, the oldest gathering of transgender people in the US. 

This is a profile of Bobby Miller, a photographer in Provincetown, MA.

When the summer ends, Provincetown goes from being a tourist spot of 50,000 people to a quiet, small town. But, production of a new local TV series-titled OFFSEASON-rescues the town's theater community from cold isolation.

INTRO: Seattle, Juneau, and Gloucester (GLAW-ster) all have fisherman’s memorials. But Provincetown doesn’t—even though it was one of the first fishing ports in the United States. Local sculptor Romolo Del Deo (ROH-moh-loh del DEE-oh) has a design ready, but not everyone wants to see it built. 

-----

This story was produced at the Transom Story Workshop for WCAI's series "Creative Life."

Watch a video of Romolo describing the process of making monumental sculptures, and the Fishermen’s memorial in particular: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dPDox8dJCQE

Romolo has also built this website describing the project: http://provincetownfishermensmemorial.org/.

Ebooks are changing the way people read, publish and distribute books. Public libraries are among the institutions that are coping with the expansion of digital publishing. In Provincetown, Massachusetts, a small resort community at the tip of Cape Cod, the public library is embracing those changes and taking on a new role -- as publisher. The library has just two full time staff members but they have become the first in the country to start their own digital publishing imprint, the Provincetown Public Press. This piece was produced during the Spring 2014 Transom Story Workshop.
 

Those who serve Cape Cod's poor are the first to point out that behind the veil of the affluent summer paradise we all recognize, hides a community that continually struggles to make ends meet. This duPont-Columbia Award-winning series examines the unique factors that contribute to persistent and hidden poverty throughout the Cape and Islands region. Each story is set in one of the fifteen towns on Cape Cod and the islands of Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket.

Handmade leather sandals have been a staple in Provincetown's vibrant craft scene since they were introduced to the area in the 1940s. At the height of the sandalmaking boom, more than 20 leather shops operated in the seaside town. Today, there is only one. Victor Powell is the last of the last. Though he is still making more than 300 pairs of sandals a year and isn't about to stop any time soon. This piece was produced at the Transom Story Workshop.  

A historic lesbian bar on Cape Cod is up for sale. It opened in 1955, serving women who made the pilgrimage to Provincetown. Reporter Monique LaBorde went on a journey of her own to get the story of the Cape Cod's last lesbian bar.

Peter Donnelly has been a working musician in Provincetown, the famous gay resort destination, for the past 24 years. He's made his name as a singer/songwriter and has become a local celebrity. But until he was 30 years old, he didn't even know he could sing. 

Peter's story of struggle and triumph is his own, but it's also emblematic of LGBTQ progress over the last three decades. He found his voice in the 80s when he began to write songs, sitting alone in his bedroom, trying to reckon with the isolation and frustration that was so much a part of gay life then. His artistic endeavors brought him to Provincetown, where he could finally express himself freely. There he found friends, love, and a loyal audience. Then the AIDS epidemic hit and Peter turned to writing and performing to help him survive the loss of his partner and many of his friends. 

These days Peter isn't writing anymore. It just might be because he's too happy. Instead, he plays in a party band. They perform cover songs and aim to have as much fun as possible. Peter also just got married. He needed songwriting to help him through desperate times, but now he's ready to celebrate.

In his twenties, Stef Adkins was in drag a lot. So much so that in the small town of Provincetown, MA his friends and neighbors always called him by his drag name, Crystal Queer, even when he was his male self. Stef got frustrated and quit doing drag. A few years later, he decided to do drag again as Barbie Que but has been carefully avoiding too much time and attention dressed as Barbie, afraid that becoming more public in his drag persona might cause Stef to be forgotten again.

But the rare lip sync act at benefit dinners wasn't satisfying his need to be glamorous. Last April, at 38, Stef decided he was ready to become more public with Barbie Que and he entered the Miss Gay Massachusetts Drag Pageant for the first time, risking losing himself again.

Norman Mailer--successor to H. L. Mencken as the literary lion of American political conventions--jumps the gun on the Republicans at Madison Square Garden. But then Mailer's prophetic novelist's eye has always run ahead of events, most especially since the classic Esquire piece ("Superman Comes to the Supermarket") of 44 years ago that foresaw, in dread and ecstasy, the triumph of John F. Kennedy.

With interviewer Christopher Lydon, Mailer foresees a "very successful, by their lights" convention next week, and a ruthless fall campaign to shore up a Republican claim to a crusading mission in the world. Mailer's focus is on President Bush in a personal contest with his father's history: "The son's a study in--if you've got a father who's more powerful than yourself, you've got to beat him on the weak link. And the weak link is that the father didn't get reelected as president. There is nothing George Bush will stop at" to get reelected, Mailer observes. John Kerry's mastery as an ocean windsurfer--his expertise at reacting to the faintest puff of wind--is Mailer's key to Kerry's skillful but uninspiring politics.

But Kerry, too, has another fight with history on his hands: "You can always count on the Democrats to do something anemic," that is, to defeat themselves, Mailer says. There are questions here that only Chris Lydon would ask and only Norman Mailer would answer--about the eclipse of hip, existentialist American heroes, about the elusive grace of democracy and the uneasy conscience of a literary revolutionary. With producer Mary McGrath, Christopher Lydon interviewed Norman Mailer at his home in Provincetown, Massachusetts.