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W
E SET UP HOME
in a dilapidated little boarding house in Hollywood. And we were happy. I managed to pick up odd jobs here and there: tree trimming, cleaning stoves, driving a cab, and delivering furniture for a store diagonally across the street from a busy gas station on Hollywood Boulevard. The money I earned just about paid the rent and bought us groceries. What more did we need? Well, it turned out that I actually needed quite a bit more. Betty didn’t entirely fulfill my sexual needs so I still played around a lot. She either didn’t cotton on to that fact, or she simply didn’t mind. I’m not sure which. If I stayed out late at night she never once questioned it. That was the kind of woman she was. She just hung back and let me be. You don’t often find women like that, I can tell you, and because of it I cared deeply for her. She just wasn’t able to provide the sexual excitement and variety that I craved. What else can I say?

In February 1946 I was walking past the gas station near the furniture store where I worked in Hollywood and noticed a
HELP WANTED
sign outside. I don’t know why but I stopped, stared at the sign, and thought to myself,
Why not?
So I walked into the office behind the driveway where the pumps were located. The owner was a rather stout middle-aged man in his early fifties. He was seated at his desk and looked up as I entered, then sized me up and grinned. I told him I was there to talk about the job.

I liked him right away. His name was Bill Booth and he said he was looking for someone to take care of the station and pump gas from about five o’clock in the afternoon until around midnight. He had to head back home to San Pedro, somewhere down the coast in the Long Beach area, at five in order to get home for dinner with his family. Even in those days it took forever to get anywhere in L.A., especially because there weren’t any freeways yet. He said that because of the gas station’s proximity to downtown Hollywood and its buzzing nightlife—which encompassed theaters, clubs, restaurants, bars, and dance halls, plus all the thriving movie studios in the surrounding area—there was enough business to keep the station open until at least eleven at night, or later. He needed someone willing and reliable enough to take care of things at least until after the theaters and clubs closed. He told me that he had one other employee, a mechanic by the name of Wilbur McGee, who worked in the service and repair bay during the day. But it was the evening hours that worried him. He was losing business. Was I interested? Was I!

We agreed that I would start work just as soon as I got back from a planned visit to Illinois. I had managed to save up a few bucks for a down payment on a secondhand 1939 Plymouth, and Betty and I took off in it on a road trip across the country via New Orleans, to Chicago and Ottawa. We spent time with Momma, Phyllis, and my stepdad. I also visited Don’s grave and then slipped away to have some fun on my own with my old friends—both male and female—in Chicago. Then I went back for Betty and we drove all the way back to California. When we returned I started my new job as a pump jockey at the Hollywood Richfield gas station at 5777 Hollywood Boulevard, at the corner of Van Ness Boulevard. It was March 1946. I wasn’t quite twenty-three years old but I was raring to go. The hours were from five in the afternoon to midnight or later, depending on business and on whether I felt like staying open longer, seven days a week. I was kitted out with smart new blue trousers and a nice blue shirt that had “Scotty” stitched on it in yellow letters, as well as an eagle, the logo of the Richfield Gas Company. I looked and felt pretty dapper in that outfit, I have to admit.

I
t always amazed me that Bill Booth, the proprietor of the gas station, never cottoned on to what I was doing. Even though tricks only got underway at night long after he and Mac had left the premises, he had no inkling about what was taking place in the trailer. Or in the washroom, for that matter. He was oblivious to everything. Not once did he think that all those young good-looking guys and pretty girls might be lounging around for reasons other than having nothing else to do. During the daytime when he and Mac manned the station he would receive dozens of telephone calls for me. He never asked why there were so many callers, or what any of them wanted. He simply wrote down their numbers on a notepad for me to call them back. Both Bill and Mac would go about their normal business routine until I arrived at five o’clock and would never question whether any of my buddies and their girlfriends had an ulterior motive for being there. As far as they were concerned I was just a very popular guy with lots of friends, and that was that. If they had suspected anything, I would not have been able to build up my wide circle of contacts and run things the way I did.

O
NE NIGHT AROUND MIDNIGHT
after I had locked up the gas station I drove a couple of my friends out to Westwood for a night of sexual fun and games at a private home. We all partook of the shenanigans and I collapsed into bed at home at around six the following morning. When I woke up at about noon I had lunch with Betty and Donna and then, at two or three in the afternoon, I decided to drive out to the station. Along the way I became aware of the fact that I had not had enough sleep. I was still exhausted. I looked at myself in the rearview mirror and thought I needed to stop and rest somewhere. The trailer at the gas station would have been perfect but I didn’t want Bill Booth or Mac to know that I was using it. There was only one thing to do. Ferndale Park was a quiet, shaded oasis of lawns and trees out where Los Feliz Boulevard met Western Avenue. I decided to stop off there and take a nap in the grass. I parked the car at the side of the park, strode across the lawns, and found a quiet and secluded spot in the shade. I lay down and instantly fell fast asleep. It wasn’t long before I was having a highly erotic dream. In it, a long line of beautiful women were coming up to me and, one by one, they each performed exquisite oral sex on me. It felt so believable that I only slowly emerged from my slumber and opened my eyes. Squinting against beams of sunlight splaying through the branches of the tree above me I saw something. No, not something, but
someone.
This was no dream.

A figure was sitting beside me. The person was in silhouette and I couldn’t see who it was. As I traversed that magical realm from the dream world to full consciousness my vision cleared and I could see that the person was a guy. He was sitting on the grass next to me reading a novel. Without even looking at me as he continued to read, holding the book in one hand, he had slipped his other hand through the fly of my Levi denims and was playing with my cock. Though shocked at my discovery, the sensations were so good that I dared not move. As soon as he realized that my eyes were open he lowered the book, turned to me, and smiled.

“Good afternoon,” he said very politely, pretending that absolutely nothing was amiss or irregular.

“Hello,” I gurgled, not quite believing but thoroughly enjoying what was happening.

I wanted to ask him his name but before I could say anything he gently tightened his grip around my throbbing member and made me come. I lay there as he wiped his hand on a hankie and smiled again. I sat up, took the hankie from him, and, without saying a word, mopped myself up and buttoned my fly. I could still not fully comprehend what had just happened when he thrust out his hand and we shook.

“Name’s Alex Tiers,” he said.

“Bowers,” I replied groggily. “Scotty Bowers.”

“Good to meet you, Scotty,” he said. “Care to wash up? I don’t live too far away.”

And so began another friendship that would last for years.

Alex was a naughty devil. An aspiring actor, he lived in a very nice apartment on the corner of Tamarind and Franklin Avenues in Hollywood. He was very wealthy, having inherited a lot of “old money” from his father and family on the East Coast. As I dried off from the shower I had just taken in his bathroom he started telling me about himself and I was surprised to learn that we had a friend in common: George Cukor. It turned out that for a while Alex and George had shared a house in Malibu when George had first come out to California from his native New York. I realized then that even though this was Hollywood, life really revolved around small societal nodes.

One night I got a call from George Cukor inviting me to lunch the following Saturday. As I had seen quite a lot of him by now and was really very fond of him I gladly accepted. In fact, we spoke frequently because whenever I wasn’t able to see George for a quick trick myself I had sent other guys over to him.

When I arrived at his mansion at around noon on Saturday he was in a foul mood. I hadn’t seen him like that before. When I entered the living room I saw Katharine Hepburn and hairstylist Sydney Guilaroff. I had been tricking Syd regularly and he had become very fond of me. Once again Hepburn looked every bit a man, dressed in slacks with her hair fairly short though not parted. I seem to remember that George had given the maid the day off, because he busied himself with lunch preparations in the kitchen while Hepburn, Syd, and I chatted.

I can’t remember exactly what we talked about but I distinctly remember the conversation eventually shifting to the topic of Hepburn’s hairstyle on a new picture she was working on with Syd. It was called
Adam’s Rib
and was being shot on the MGM lot. George was the director. The movie was about two lawyers who were married to one another but on the opposing sides of the courtroom during the trial of a woman accused of trying to murder her philandering husband. It was being promoted in the trades with the catch line, “It’s the hilarious answer to who wears the pants.” It was an ironically appropriate proclamation because Hepburn was playing the lead opposite MGM superstar Spencer Tracy. According to the rumor mills Hepburn was said to be having an affair with Tracy. However, as I saw things, nothing could possibly be further from the truth. For one thing, Hepburn was a lesbian and I could not imagine this incontrovertibly butch lady having an affair with a man,
any
man.

I recall Hepburn being adamant about the way she wanted her hair to be styled in the movie, but Syd insisted that it be done differently. They got into an almighty row that only subsided when George himself joined in the fray. Eventually George announced lunch and we all took our places at the dining room table.

Hepburn was still smoldering. She looked at George, dropped her head coyly, and imploringly whined, “Please don’t be angry with me, George. I’ve got to fight for my independence in this town. You know that.”

“My dearest Kate,” George hissed back condescendingly, “the only thing you have to do in this town is to listen to the good advice of those who know what they’re talking about.”

“Oh, George, come on,” Hepburn retorted. “Be nice to me.”

“Why?” he replied.

“Aww,” Hepburn responded in a melancholic kind of way. “You know, I’ve been in this town all these years and other than you and Syd here I really don’t have many friends at all.”

George took little time in answering. He looked at her and said, “Yeah, that’s right, Kate, and you know why? Because you’re a real spoiled
bitch.
”

And with that the afternoon drew to an uncomfortable and premature close. Later on, after we had all said our good-byes, I walked Hepburn to her car. On the way she turned to me and asked whether I thought she seemed like a spoiled bitch. I remember laughing aloud when she asked that and said that, no, I really didn’t think she was anything like that at all. That seemed to make her feel a little more comfortable. She warmed to me and began to chat. I no longer recall what we talked about but just before we parted she insisted that I call her Kate. And then she asked me to do her a favor.

“I know about your reputation, Scotty. When you get a chance, do you think you can find a nice young dark-haired girl for me? Someone that’s not too heavily madeup.”

I said of course I would. I liked Kate. I couldn’t care less what people said about her. Admittedly, she did have notoriously bad skin, especially when seen up close. Fortunately, makeup and clever lighting took care of that in the movies. But in real life without makeup her complexion was really awful. Nevertheless, I found her captivating. She had an irresistible magnetism. Behind that blemished face lurked a great intelligence.

There were scenes in Martin Scorsese’s 2004 movie
The Aviator
that hinted at a love affair between Katharine Hepburn and movie producer, aviation pioneer, and one-time owner of RKO Radio Pictures studios Howard Hughes, but they are entirely implausible. It would have been out of the question, not only because dear old Kate was a lesbian but also because of her poor skin.

I arranged many ladies for Hughes. Any arrangement I made for him had to be treated with the utmost confidentiality. A date for a trick had to be executed in a clandestine, cloak-and-dagger manner, with no one ever knowing anything about it. Howard was as straight as an arrow and really liked women but, ironically, he hardly ever had sex with them. He was so fanatically fussy about his own health as well as the cleanliness and pristine beauty of the young lady that if she ever wore even the slightest hint of makeup that he did not like he would make her take a shower immediately and wash everything off. And if, heaven forbid, she had even the tiniest blemish or a pimple he simply would not touch her.

Over the next fifty years Katharine Hepburn and I would become the very best of friends. In the course of time I would fix her up with over 150 different women. Most of them she would only see once or twice, and then tire of them. But there was one exception. There was a very cute little seventeen-year-old trick that I set Kate up with early in our friendship. The girl’s name was Barbara. Kate became infatuated with her, not as a lover or a partner but purely as an occasional trick. Shortly after they started seeing one another Kate bought her a brand-new two-toned Ford Fairlane as a gift. Kate saw Barbara off and on for just over forty-nine years. Kate lived out East most of the time but Barbara remained here in California. Three months before dear Kate passed away in June 2003 Barbara—who had married no less than three times during that period—received a letter from Kate’s attorneys. With the letter was a check for $100,000. It was a birthday gift for her from Kate. Kate knew she was dying so it was probably also a parting or farewell present. Barbara and I had kept in touch with one another and when she received the check she told me that she really had me to thank for it. After all, she said, I was the one who introduced her to Kate. But, she added, she really didn’t have any need for the check at all. Her third husband had passed away and left her his fortune. Lucky girl.