Ferris Alexander and his “empire of smut”

Between 1970 and 1990, local businessman Ferris Alexander confounded city leaders, enraged neighborhood activists and infuriated feminist anti-pornography activists in Minneapolis. Alexander built a chain of movie houses and bookstores that specialized in pornographic materials, profiting from a burgeoning desire for semi-public sexual explorations. For two decades he monopolized the sale of pornography in Minnesota, seizing the opportunity created by the loosening of obscenity regulations. In this hour-long podcast, Historyapolis blogger Kevin Ehrman-Solberg narrates the story of the man who ruled an “empire of smut” in Minnesota until the rise of home video recorders made these venues obsolete. It’s a rags to riches story with surprising twists and turns, unexpected alliances and lessons that policymakers and activists are still absorbing.