On Saturday, June 27, 1970, Chicago Gay Liberation organized a march from Washington Square Park ("Bughouse Square") to the Water Tower at the intersection of Michigan and Chicago avenues, which was the route originally planned.
Then many of the participants extemporaneously marched on to the Civic Center (now Richard J. Daley) Plaza.
The date was chosen because the #Stonewall events began on the last Saturday of June and because organizers wanted to reach the maximum number of Michigan Avenue shoppers.
The date was chosen because the #Stonewall events began on the last Saturday of June and because organizers wanted to reach the maximum number of Michigan Avenue shoppers.
Subsequent Chicago parades have been held on the last Sunday of June, coinciding with the date of many similar parades elsewhere.
Subsequently, during the same weekend, gay activist groups on the West Coast of the United States held a march in Los Angeles and a march and "Gay-in" in San Francisco.
The next year, Gay Pride marches took place in Boston, Dallas, Milwaukee, London, Paris, West Berlin, and Stockholm.
By 1972 the participating cities included Atlanta, Brighton, Buffalo, Detroit, Washington D.C., Miami, and Philadelphia, as well as San Francisco.
By 1972 the participating cities included Atlanta, Brighton, Buffalo, Detroit, Washington D.C., Miami, and Philadelphia, as well as San Francisco.
Frank Kameny soon realized the pivotal change brought by the Stonewall riots.
An organizer of gay #activism in the 1950s, he was used to persuasion, trying to convince heterosexuals that gay people were no different from themselves.
An organizer of gay #activism in the 1950s, he was used to persuasion, trying to convince heterosexuals that gay people were no different from themselves.
When he and other people marched in front of the White House, the State Department and Independence Hall only five years earlier, their objective was to look as if they could work for the U.S. government.
Ten people marched with Kameny then, and they alerted no press to their intentions. Although he was stunned by the upheaval by participants in the Annual Reminder in 1969, he later observed, "By the time of Stonewall, we had fifty to sixty gay groups in the country.
A year later there were at least fifteen hundred. By two years later, to the extent that a count could be made, it was twenty-five hundred."
Similar to Kameny's regret at his own reaction to the shift in attitudes after the riots, Randy Wicker came to describe his embarrassment as "one of the greatest mistakes of his life".
The image of gays retaliating against police, after so many years of allowing such treatment to go unchallenged, "stirred an unexpected spirit among many homosexuals".
Kay Lahusen, who photographed the marches in 1965, stated, "Up to 1969, this movement was generally called the homosexual or homophile movement... Many new activists consider the Stonewall uprising the birth of the gay liberation movement.
Certainly it was the birth of #pride on a massive scale
[End of Thread] 🐈
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
