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The Sixties: LGBTQ Rights

This guide covers the decade 1960 - 1970

Overview

The LGBTQ community was tired of the lack of job opportunities, the loss of employment if they were "outted,"  and the continual police harassment. Bars in most states would lose their liquor license if they served homosexuals. The very act of homosexual love would land a man or a woman in jail. With Stonewall, the LGBTQ community organized to demand their rights. But it had taken a lot of preparation for the struggle that continues today.

For further information on the LGBTQ history, follow this link.

LGBTQ Events 1

  • 1930. One of first sexual-reassignment surgeries performed: Einar Wegener became Lili Elbe.
  • 1950. The Mattachine Society is founded in Los Angeles.
  • 1951. In Stoumen v. Reilly, the California Supreme Court ruled a bar's license could not be suspended for serving liquor to gays.
  • 1952. Christine Jorgensen becomes America's most famous transgender person.
  • 1955. The Daughters of Bilitis is founded in San Francisco.
  • 1956. Howl and Other Poems by Allen Ginsburg published
  • 1958. US Supreme Court ruled that the LGBTQ magazine, ONE, not obscene.
  • 1959. First documented LGBT riot over police harassment at Cooper's Donuts in LA.
  • 1961. Film of Lillian Hellman's The Children's Hour released.
  • 1962. Early gay rights demonstration pickets New York City draft board offices
  • 1962. Illinois first state to decriminalize homosexuality.
  • 1963. John Rechy's novel  City of Night published.
  • 1964. Council on Religion and the Homosexual founded in San Francisco.
  • 1965. Police raid San Francisco's New Year's Day Mardi Gras Ball, fundraiser for charity. Case kicked out of court.
  • 1965. Sit-ins at Dewey's Deli in Philadelphia.
  • 1965. First Annual Reminder: LGBT activists picket White House.
  • 1965. Jose' Sarria founds the charity organization, The Imperial Court System, in San Francisco.
  • 1966. San Francisco Police Dept. establishes its first community liaison officer to work with transgender community.
  • 1967. PRIDE (Personal Rights in Defense and Education) founded in LA to confront police harassment.
  • 1967. Craig Rodwell opened America's first LGBT bookstore in Greenwich Village.
  • 1968. Troy Perry founds the Metropolitan Community Church.
    1968. Frank Kameny created the catchphrase, "Gay is good."
    1968. Frank Marcus' Killing of Sister George stereotypes lesbians.

LGBTQ Pioneers

  • Marlene Dietrich
  • Henry Gerber
  • Radclyffe Hall
  • Bayard Rustin
  • Sappho
  • Gertrude Stein
  • Alan Turing
  • Walt Whitman

LGBTQ Activitists

  • Rose Bamberger
  • Rita Mae Brown
  • Arthur Evans
  • Barbara Gittings
  • Miss Major Griffin-Gracy
  • Lorraine Hansberry
  • Harry Hay
  • Karla Jay
  • Marsha P. Johnson
  • Christine Jorgensen
  • Phyllis Lyon
  • Jeanne and Jules Manford
  • Morty Manford
  • Del Martin
  • Harvey Milk
  • Jack Nichols
  • Jim Owles
  • Troy Perry
  • Clark Polak
  • Renee Richards
  • Sylvia Rivera
  • Craig Rodwell
  • Marty Robinson
  • Jose Sarria
  • Mark Allan Segal
  • Peter Tatchell
  • Bill Thom
  • Randy Wicker
  • Edie Windsor

LGBTQ Anthems

Over the Rainbow, Judy Garland (1939)
How Long Has This Been Going On?, Carmen McRae (1959)
Lush Life, Billy Strayhorn (1964)
You Don't Own Me, Dusty Springfield (1964)
To Try For The Sun, Donovan (1965)
You've Got to Hide Your Love Away, The Beatles (1965)
Emmie, Laura Nyro (1968)
Ballad of the Sad Young Man, Roberta Flack (1969)
Make Your Own Kind of Music, Mama Cass (1969)
Lola, The Kinks (1970)
Starman, David Bowie (1972)

Source:allmusic.com, GayCultureLand, crazyonclassicrock.com, The Guardian, jazz.fm, and LA Weekly,
Songs found on Spotify

LGBTQ artists

  • Reinaldo Arenas, Cuban writer
  • Josephine Baker, entertainer
  • James Baldwin, writer
  • Leonard Bernstein, conductor and composer
  • Rita Mae Brown, writer
  • Truman Capote, writing
  • Wendy Carlos, musioteian
  • "Rudi" Gernreich, fashion designer
  • Allen Ginsberg, poet
  • Tommy Kirk, actor
  • Liberace, musician
  • Sal Mineo, actor
  • Cole Porter, composer
  • John Rechy, writer
  • Maurice Sendak, writer-illustrator
  • Gore Vidal, writer
  • Andy Warhol, artist
  • John Waters, director

LGBTQ Rights Organizations

  • ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union
  • Committee of Concerned Psychiatrists
  • Daughters of Bilitis
  • ECHO (East Coast Homiphile Organizations)
  • GAA (Gay Activist Alliance)
  • Gay Liberation Front
  • Janus Society of Philadelphia
  • Lambda Legal
  • Mattachine Society
  • Metropolitan Community Church
  • National Gay Task Force
  • PFLAG (Parents, Family and Friends of Lesbians and Gays)
  • Society for Individual Rights
  • STAR (Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries )

LGBTQ Events 2

  • 1969. Stonewall Uprising erupts.
  • 1969. Gay Liberation Front is founded.
  • 1969. Gay Activists Alliance is founded.
  • 1969. Gay Liberation Front hosts "Coming Out Dances" to raise money for charity.
  • 1970. First Pride Parade in New York City.
  • 1970. Lavender Menace and Radicalesbians are founded.
  • 1970. Troy Perry officiates at the first same-sex marriage in the United States.
  • 1970. At a Metropolitan Museum of Art celebration, GAA begins its ZAP! strategy, disrupting public events to protest by hijacking the event.
  • 1970. Sylvia Rivera and Mary P. Johnson found STAR.
  • 1972. ACLU challenges the ban on same-sex marriages.
  • 1972. East Lansing, Michigan enacted an antidiscrimination ordinance, protecting gays and lesbians from being fired from their jobs.
  • 1973. Jeanne and Jules Manford establish PFLAG.
  • 1973. Homosexuality is removed as a menace from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.
  • 1973. Mark Allan Segal zaps Walter Cronkite's CBS News broadcast.
  • 1973. Harvey Milk gets involved in San Francisco politics.
  • 1973. Lambda Legal launched.
  • 1974. U.S. Representatives Bella Abjug and Ed Koch introduced the Equality Act of 1974. It died in committee.
  • 1974. Armistead Maupin's Tales of the City serial appears as a serial in The Pacific Sun.
  • 1975. Leonard Matlovich outs himself to his Air Force commanding officer.
  • 1977. Anita Bryant's anti-gay campaign.
  • 1977. Renee Richards became the first transgender woman to play in a professional tennis tournament.
  • 1978. Harvey Milk assassinated.

Additional References

Bronski, M. (2011). A queer history of the United States. Boston: Beacon Press.