Old Reliable

[+ robear]

Word comes of the death on 4/12 of David Hurles aka "Old Reliable," who pioneered real world gay porn in the 70s and 80s, featuring rough LA street trade showing and jacking, rather than the sleek, well-groomed models then in vogue in commercial porn.  He was in the vanguard of home video producers, selling his homemade VHS tapes very early on in the home vid revolution by mail and eventually through distributors.

As a young gayling I was obsessed and tantalized by some of his models.

Vintage Old Reliable: Mike B

VINTAGEOLDRELIABLE.BLOGSPOT.COM

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<meta name="msvalidate.01" content="13B0BFC20B7ACA2FB62F6CA9024821B2" /> vintage old reliable, david hurles, trade, prisoner, hustler...

 

David Hurles - Wikipedia

EN.WIKIPEDIA.ORG

 

[Luv2play]

Never heard of him but his style of porno doesn't appeal me. Getting straight rough trade to jerk off or be sucked of in some cases is boring to watch. Imo.

Also his later years were sad after his career ended.

[pubic_assistance]

Never heard of him either. A bit before my time, I think.

Googled him with xxx and got some interesting images of his work.

I found it intriguing. Not always beautiful men, but the images all capture a sort of raw / real masculine sexuality that I found appealing.

[+ Charlie]

Old Reliable used to have photos of the kind of guys I found hot enough to jerk off to, but whom I would never have wanted to actually have interaction with. As I remember, all the photos were black and white, and often seemed to have the same sofa in the room.

[jeezifonly]

I grew up in the 60-70’s Midwest where guys with bodies worth looking at were not a product of the gym, but lucky with some DNA and a solid construction (or similar) job that kept them fit.

In the 70’s the same type of guys that were between jobs in LA could be lured with beers and weed to be filmed jerking. The old Reliable ads were in the first gay mags I saw. Finally rented one in VHS in the 80’s and it was total gonzo home movie style. Were it not for the spectacular appendage in the frame I’d have hit eject and moved onto something Falcon…😄

[+ FreshFluff]

Was the rough trade in porn trend driven by Stonewall? If making gay porn was effectively decriminalized after that, maybe more straight men were willing to try it.

[+ robear]

5 hours ago, FreshFluff said:

Was the rough trade in porn trend driven by Stonewall? If making gay porn was effectively decriminalized after that, maybe more straight men were willing to try it.

I think it was the other way around, Old Reliable was "old school" in his selection of models.

Hurles was a friend and protege of Bob Mizer, whose long-running Athletic Model Guild (founded 1945!) was the largest and most durable of "physique photographer" studios post-WWII. AMG recruited young men "on the move" in LA, in need of cash and with little to lose.  A series of court challenges in the 60s and 70s decriminalized "obscenity," opening the way to more mainstream commercial porn production and marketing, away from the realm of peepshows and mob control and plain brown wrappers. Thus came Target, Falcon, Colt, etc., in the 70s and 80s, following the lead, of course, of the much larger straight porn industry in Southern Cali.

Old Reliable was something of a throwback to those earlier days (Hurles and Mizer shared a number of models), with the notable innovation of home video and audio recordings into the mix. I doubt Stonewall, which only became a "thing" over the course of the 70s through the efforts of gay rights activists, would have even been on the radars of any of the men involved in gay porn production, either in front of or behind the camera.

Bob Mizer - Wikipedia

EN.WIKIPEDIA.ORG

 

[+ Charlie]

10 hours ago, FreshFluff said:

Was the rough trade in porn trend driven by Stonewall? If making gay porn was effectively decriminalized after that, maybe more straight men were willing to try it.

The actors in gay porn of the pre-Stonewall era were not the ones who had to worry about criminalization: it was the distributors who were prosecuted. The actors/models were rarely identified except with pseudonyms. Even the photographers were usually safe unless they took an active role in the distribution of their work, as Mizer did. The little "physique" magazines of the 1950s often used photos that were submitted to them by amateur photographers. I bought one of those magazines in 1960, and saw that the names of the photographers were listed in the back, and by using a phone book, I discovered that one of them lived near me. A friend and I went to his home, rang his doorbell, and told him where we had found his name, and said that we were trying to find out where to buy posing straps. He was a middle-aged accountant whose hobby was "physique photography."🙄 He invited us in, and said he would give us straps if we would take our clothes off and try them on, which we did. That led to something other than photographs. He became a friend, and we often stopped by his house to socialize with him and his gay acquaintances, including some of his models. He only did photos that could safely appear in the beefcake magazines, regardless of whatever else went on during (but mostly after) the photo shoot.

 

[Lookin]

58 minutes ago, Charlie said:

I bought one of those magazines in 1960, and saw that the names of the photographers were listed in the back, and by using a phone book, I discovered that one of them lived near me. A friend and I went to his home, rang his doorbell, and told him where we had found his name, and said that we were trying to find out where to buy posing straps. He was a middle-aged accountant whose hobby was "physique photography."🙄 He invited us in, and said he would give us straps if we would take our clothes off and try them on, which we did. That led to something other than photographs.

Good gosh, @Charlie, I sure hope you've got a book deal in the works!  I'm clearing my coffee table as we speak.  

[+ Charlie]

35 minutes ago, Lookin said:

Good gosh, @Charlie, I sure hope you've got a book deal in the works!  I'm clearing my coffee table as we speak.  

Alas! The only photo he took of me that I saved was in a coat and tie.

[+ azdr0710]

2 hours ago, Charlie said:

He invited us in, and said he would give us straps if we would take our clothes off and try them on, which we did.

man, your great stories.....one of these days, you need to publish all those personal journals you mention.......or at least pass them around at the next pool party.....

[+ Charlie]

I could tell a number of stories about our visits to Grover, the photographer, but I'll limit it to one. He had a boarder named Oakley, a hot-looking wild young redneck from Louisiana who would fuck anything that moved. Oakley was obviously an attraction for some of Grover's gay friends to visit--Old Reliable would definitely have appreciated him. One evening my friend and I were on our way somewhere with his 15 year old sister, and for some reason we stopped at Grover's house. Oakley immediately wanted to put a make on the sister, and tried to persuade her to come up to his room to "show her something interesting." She was no fool, and after some banter, the three of us left as soon as we could. She knew her brother and I were gay, but she found it hilarious that we would know someone like Oakley. (I know someone is going to be curious, so I will save you the trouble of asking: yes, I was something that moved.)