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Wednesday, August 24, 2022

Lyle Frisby 1929-1958


There are only a few stories in the annals of physique photography sadder than that of Lyle Frisby.  
The business partner (and possibly life partner) of Pat Milo was jailed for a year in 1957 for obscenity.  While incarcerated, his health failed due to harsh treatment and lack of adequate medical care.  Prior to Lyle's imprisonment, he did the photography, and Pat did the bookkeeping and daily business grind.  Pat took photography courses at UCLA while Lyle was away and became the great photographer we all know.  Lyle Frisby died within months of his release from jail, leaving the business to Pat.  The high school yearbook photo above is the only known photo of Lyle Frisby.  May he rest in peace.
Our freedom of expression came at a high price.  Please don't forget that.

 

17 comments:

  1. What I find so utterly sickening about the behaviour of police, prosecutors and all purpose superintendants of public morality is that the vast and overwhelming majority of them were of an age to have been brought up at a time when male nudity in gymnasia and municipal swimming baths was not merely promoted vigorously but thought to be a healthy and good thing. They would also have been surrounded as youths by images of nude and semi-nude men because photography, rather as the internet at its inception, was entirely unregulated. Magazines, papers and school books, certainly in parts of America, regularly published pictures of nude male swimmers, nudist magazines proliferated because they were tolerated, and bodybuilders on the bona fide competition circuit got a free pass. But just as soon as there was a soupçon of the merest hint of a possibility that an image could be construed as homoerotic, they all started sucking their teeth and tutt-tutting and swooped while the museums and galleries contained images far in excess of their hypocritical, trumped-up objections.

    The same is now happening on the internet. The New Puritans are circling like crows over carrion. The 1950s could easily return - this time all the more total because of technology. We must stand our ground and not be moved.

    Nothing makes me angrier than stories such as Lyle Frisby's. May he rest in peace.

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  2. Jerry VMM - You've done it again ! Thanks to your intrepid/detective nature.
    Finally, an image of Lyle Frisby ! I though i'd never the day.
    When I looked up physique photos, I found myself wondering about the photographers and what they must of went through.
    What happened to Mr. Frisby at that time, well you talk about INJUSTICE !
    Calorman- I enjoy your input and insight on Jerry's site. You're one of several
    whose opinions/statements I look forward to reading.
    Yes, I fear our country is going backwards. History is terrible at repeating itself.
    Vigilance is needed now more than ever for the "busy-bodies" are at it again.
    When see/read on the internet people going on about the "god-old days"
    and giving history an "all was rosy look" (racism, slavery, sexism, homophobia) and making excuses for Hitler/Stalin/Putin
    or any other despot (Pinochet, Somoza, Duvalier, Trujillo, Amin, the Kims)
    It makes me sick. Too bad the "busy-bodies" can't get a "taste" of tyranny.
    But, sadly it is the innocent that suffer the greatest and you wonder if there's a
    God or whatever supreme being is out there.
    I'll get off my soapbox - Bless you both and everyone who comes to this site.
    -Rj in the IE

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    Replies
    1. It's amazing how there are so few photographs of some of the men who made their living photographing others.

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    2. I found a Los Angeles Mirror article dated May 21, 1954 by muckracker Paul Coates talking about the arrest of Bob Mizer and Lyle Frisby just 2 days before the article on obscenity charges. I am going to send to you. The Los Angeles Police sent undercover Officers to buy naked photos from Mizer and Frisby. BusyBody Coates talks about it as he Moralizes about the nudity and dangers to children and society. It really is awful. I really want to get the date of Frisby's arrsst settled once and for all.

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  3. The past is prologue to the present. The price of freedom is eternal vigilance of those who will usurpe it to their own ends.

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    Replies
    1. People think of the Shirley principle. Surely this law won't affect me. It will; if nothing else you'll be the target of a moral panic so the authorities have an excuse to silence dissidents.

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  4. RIP, he died of young age and the story just sad
    He's 29 if im not mistaken, same age like mine

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  5. Thanks for posting this. Too many people don't know our past and the millions of heroes who walked before us to clear the trail. This story was repeated too many times in too many towns and cities.

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  6. Thank you very much for this excellent information about Lyle Frisby. I seem to have another photo of Lyle Frisby, and will send it to you.

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    Replies
    1. Got it, thank you! I will post it in a future series.

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  7. Wow, he's a distant relative (by marriage, so far, I haven't found a common ancestor)!

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  8. Links: https://www.familysearch.org/tree/person/details/9N46-GQ6
    https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/149899996/lyle-g-frisby
    https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Frisby-624
    Wait about a day for the database to refresh, then if you are on the main WikiTree, you will be able to see your relation by blood, or connection by marriage, to Lyle.

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    Replies
    1. Since I now know he was Mormon, it's no surprise someone had worked out all the genealogy.

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    2. WikiTree has already refreshed, so you can now see how you are related or connected, if you are already on the main WikiTree.

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    3. I'm not on WikiTree, but I wrote a 276 page book about my genealogy, and I doubt there's any significant connection. Thanks, though.

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