Melbourne in the 1920s and ’30s had a reputation as a staid and provincial city, a respectable, Sabbath-observing town, a metropolis of quiet suburban lives. There were, however, those who did not conform to society’s rules; among them homosexual men. The members of this hidden and persecuted group formed a subculture of friendship groups, meeting places, secret signs and words which allowed them to live their lives against a backdrop of legal, social, and moral restrictions. This book is an investigation of this subculture and those men who lived within it.