a gay leather bar opened in las vegas in 1988 and outlasted the apps, the internet and a gaming fine. it closes wednesday.

via the Las Vegas Review-Journal, Instinct and Hoodline.

The Las Vegas Eagle opened in 1988 as a Levi's and leather bar on East Tropicana Avenue, back when, as the Review-Journal puts it, gay bars were where people went to find each other and to organize the fight against AIDS. It outlasted that era, changes in ownership, temporary closures and every dating app ever built. It will not outlast September.

The bar announced on Instagram last weekend that its last day of service is Sept. 30. That is a Wednesday, so in practice this is the final weekend. The post thanked everyone on both sides of the bar and told regulars to come in and raise a glass, which, frankly, you were going to do anyway.

Its history has the full range. In 2013, the Review-Journal notes, gaming officials fined the owner at the time $27,000 for violating rules against inappropriate behavior in licensed gaming establishments. The bar shut, renovated and came back having swapped underwear night for DJs, drag shows and karaoke, which is the most Las Vegas redemption arc available.

The Review-Journal's report gives no reason for the closure. The comments under the announcement, as Instinct describes them, read like a wake, with people calling it a staple of the city's queer history. If you are in town this weekend and you own anything leather, you know what to do.