Divine: People magazine called Divine the “Drag Queen of the Century.” His style is best known in the form of Babs Johnson, “The Filthiest Person Alive” in John Waters’ Pink Flamingos. Divine remains an icon of the freedom to choose one’s sexual identity, and, as Waters recently told CP: “You can still drive down the street in Baltimore and you’ll see people who look like Divine.”

F. Scott Fitzgerald: Both Hemingway and Fitzgerald’s friend and editor Edmund Wilson claimed that when Fitz got drunk, he’d always complain to them that Zelda said his dick was too small to ever satisfy a lady. Good friend that Hemingway was, he took Fitz into the bathroom and told him to “look at it from the side”—and put a pillow under her butt. He really was a genius.

Billie Holiday: Sure, they say she ran errands for a Pennsylvania Avenue brothel, but Billie Holiday is on the list because nobody from nowhere has ever had a sexier voice.

Robin Quivers: Quivers (her real name) was born in Pikesville to a dad who worked at Bethlehem Steel, got a nursing degree at University of Maryland, and worked at Shock Trauma before she became co-host of The Howard Stern Show, where she has endlessly discussed lesbians, strippers, and masturbation, as well as her own relationship with Mr. X and her fondness for enemas.

Babe Ruth: The Babe liked the babes: A former roommate claimed he saw him sleep with at least seven in one night. And he missed a third of a season due to syphilis, so he might appreciate the fact that Urban Dictionary lists a sexual move that shares his name, in which a man points to the spot he intends to ejaculate—and pulls it off.

Sisqo: The former member of Dru Hill achieved fame and fortune via 2000’s hit “Thong Song” and became the voice of a generation, desperately imploring, “Le’ me see that thong!”

Blaze Starr: The most famous dancer on the Block and the owner of the 2 O’Clock Club, the buxom Starr claimed to have slept with President Kennedy, whose lovemaking style she described as “fast and great.” Her long-term affair with Earl Long—governor of Louisiana and brother to the more famous Huey—got Earl locked in the looney bin by his wife, and it ultimately became the subject of 1989’s Blaze, starring Paul Newman.

Gertrude Stein: The literary genius, proto-feminist, and Hopkins med school drop-out declared Hemingway and crew a “lost generation.” She was also in a long-term and committed lesbian relationship with Alice B. Toklas, whom Stein reportedly called “Pussy” (and for whom Stein wrote a famous faux-autobiography, about Toklas’ life with Stein).

John Waters: The Pope of Trash needs no introduction to this list. A connoisseur of kink, Waters is the master of Baltimore sexy. In his most recent book, Role Models, he includes a gay porn auteur and a lesbian stripper from the Block named Zorro as his heroes. He is one of ours.

Frank Zappa: Rock ’n’ roll is always about sex, but it’s rarely as explicit or as funny as these lyrics to Zappa’s “Sex”: “What’s poppin’ up the most from coast to coast/ Sex/ At yer bongo party an’ yer weenie roast/ Sex/ Even them Christians who are born again/ Sex/ Go out ’n’ get pooched every now ‘n’ then/ Sex.”

The Sex Issue

Intro: The Sex Issue
G Marks the Spot | Baltimore's Sex All-Stars | “It used to be a skill, now it’s a pill”
Waxing Poetic or Otherwise | Real-Life Embarassing Sex Stories | Porn in the USA
Free Love: Reader Valentines | “French Tickler” | Ask First