Washington, d. C. , to learn about the 1969 stonewall riots and how they served as a catalyst for the moderate lbgtq rights movement. Welcome to the museum. Im patty rhule here. We are here at the prologue of rise up, stonewall and the lbgtq rights movement. Stonewall was an event in the summer of 1969 of an uprising of a gay bar that propelled forward the lbgtq rights movement. This is where we tell the story of how ordinary americans used the First Amendment freedoms, press, speech, assembly, religion to advocate for change and change society. Were going to walk around the corner in this area and look at some artifacts from two of the earliest lbgtq rights organizations that rose up in the 1950s and 60s. Gay americans lived in fear and secrecy for the 20th century. Gay people could be arrested for showing affection in public, police prowled parks for to arrest gay people who were seeking there. It was a difficult time to be a gay american. This is when you see the rise of a few early lbgtq groups social groups, such as the society and the daughters of the when people are meeting in secret to talk about what its like to be a gay man, a lesbian woman, to socialize, dance, to have fun and have fun. Instead of simply seeking tolerance by the public they decided they want more than that and they wanted actual acceptance. Here you see some artifacts from the society, a matchbook which would be passed on to people in public places, people they thought were likeminded people. Again, a secret way to say are you gay, i am too, lets talk about it. Here is a legal book that was published for gay people who were arrested by police who gave them advice about what their rights were when dealing with the police. You see some early pioneering lbgtq publications, put out by the daughters and one, one won a famous First Amendment case in the Supreme Court when the post office was refusing to distribute it. Ultimately the Supreme Court decided they did have the right to publish that magazine. Next were going to go down to the main gallery of this exhibit. Right now were in an area before the main gallery of rise up, stonewall and the lbgtq rights movement. Popular culture was a go ahegoo to start for many people. Such an Important Role in shaping attitudes. 1961 the first images that you see of homosexuals because thats what gay people were called back then, is in a pbs documentary that aired in San Francisco called the rejected and talked about homosexuality as an issue and problem. Suddenly, you see gradually more lbgtq people being represented in sports, on television n movies and you hear heres martinas tennis racket. She is an incredible athlete, multiple tennis champion who comes out as being gay. Rock hudson, famous hollywood celebrity, who reveals that he is dying of aids, a huge earthquake in ploorp culture and in the lbgtq rights movement. Then you saw in philadelphia, tom hank portrays a man with aids in an academyaward winning movie and we have the script signed by all the cast members of that. Of course Ellen Dgeneres who comes out on the cover of Time Magazine and the repercussions that resulted from that. Her show was canceled soon after that, she received Death Threats because of it, but nonetheless that moment in time is seen as a powerful movement for the lbgtq rights community. You have shows like will and grace and even Vice President biden spoke about the tv show will grace as doing more to get more americans used to the idea of samesex marriage. Than anything else. In that event they had invited gay people into their living rooms in cases when they felt that people might not know gay people in their lives. From will and grace we have movies like brokeback mountain, modern family, hugely popular sitcom and Caitlyn Jenner coming out on have the vanity fair as a transgender woman. These are moments in time that moved attitudes and brought popular understand to the issues that the lbgtq community was facing. Next were going to walk into the main gallery and were going to see what happened at the Stonewall Inn 50 years ago in the summer of 1969. Now were going to go back to a hot summer night to Greenwich Village in new york city, stonewall in. Stonewall inn wasnt a particularly nice ball. The drinks were watered down and run by the mafia, but it was a place gay people could come and dance together and socialize. Remember back then its illegal for gay people to socialize together, seen showing affection in public. The Stonewall Inn preyed on the gay wall street workers who socialized there. There was sort of a blackmailing ring going on. Not the nicest place but at least it was a place gay people could call their own. Theres a Police Crackdown on such illegal establishments going on. When police came in and started raiding the bar and tossing people out of it, they were a little bit rough with a lesbian and threw her out onto the streets, and the crowd went wild. This was kind of a pent up feeling by the people there at the stonewall. Police had been harassing gay people for a long time, arresting them for showing affection in public. At this point in time in 1969, weve got the youth movement, counterculture, sexual revolution is happening, and people arent going to take it. Theyre done with not being who they are, not being accepted as gay and theyre fed up. So this starts six nights of onandoff uprising, rioting, glass throwing, brick throwing, interactions with police. Out of this moment springs forth what we call the modern lbgtq rights movement. You see here, here is a headline in the Mainstream Media and how dismissive the mainstream publications are. Homo nest raided queen bees are stinging mad. Derogatory terminology. The Mainstream Media didnt cover this for a couple of days. Several days of fights and rioting going on in Greenwich Village until theyre paying attention to whats going on there. In this case, we have some historic publications from the museum of how the Gay Rights Movement was covered by others. You have the advocate, wisconsin an early lbgtq publication based in l. A. You have the ladder, which is a lesbian publication that reported on uprising at a bar in the california region. And then you have mainstream publications starting to Pay Attention and say, what is going on . Time magazine a few months after stonewall has a cover, the homosexual in america, in which theyre saying never before have homosexuals been in the forefront of the conversation of whats going on in the United States today. Out of this moment springs forth what we call the modern lgbtq rights movement. We organized this exhibit not chronologically so much but themes. Next we come to the fight of the right to work and serve. We come to the story of frank kameny, a harvardeducated man, a government employee, who is fired from his job because of an arrest for solicitation. Now solicitation was a charge that was commonly used against gay people, oftentimes they wouldnt fight back because of repercussions for fighting back for such a crime. You could lose your job for being gay. Your neighbors would probably distance themselves from you. Your family, your parents could lose your children. It was a life of fear and secrecy in the 1950s and 60s. Frank decided he was going to fight back against government rules against gay people. President eisenhower signed a law into effect that homosexuals could not be hired by the federal government. Frank decided there should be no reason for such a law, that homosexuals deserved rights to work in the federal government and anywhere else just as much as anyone did. He organized a series of protests as early as 1965 where people who were gay would picket in front of the white house and Civil Service commission, going public with signs such as this, america, the land of opportunity for homosexuals too. Quarter million homosexual federal employees protest Civil Service commission policy. The Civil Service commission is the organization who gets hired by the federal government. He is a figure who is considered the father of the lbgtq rights movement. His story pops up throughout this exhibit. Were going to go around the corner and talk about a woman named barbara gittings. She took it upon herself to fight back against the American Psychiatric association which at this point has deemed homosexuality a mental illness. Barbara was a College Student in 1942 when she was diagnosed as being homosexual. She did a Little Research about what that meant and found out homo sexual people were frequently institutionalized, had electroshock treatment, and various other horrible things that could happen to people like herself. She thought there was something very wrong about that. She took on the American Psychiatric association. In 1972 she appeared at their convention in dallas, texas, and she spoke on a panel with a gay psychiatrist who was so fearful of the repercussions of coming out and speaking publicly as a gay person that he wore this mask. Barra had an information booth. You see the sign up there for the information booth. It gave positive images of what gay people were all about. A year later the association took away the designation of homosexuality as being a mental illness. Frank, who we heard from before, sent a letter to his friends saying, its a miracle. Weve been cured. Next well talk about harvey milk, one of the pioneering lgbtq people to be elected to office in the United States. Harvey milk was elected to the San Francisco board of survivors in 1967. Milk proceeded to get various laws passed increasing rights for lbgtq citizens and served for about a year before he was brutally cut down. He was assassinated by a former policeman and commissioner himself. In this case you can see an envelope found in milks jacket and the bullet holes left in the card he had written to somebody. The light sentence that the person who shot milk and mayor george musscone resulted in the white knight riots when people were coming forth with fury and frustration at the lack of attention toward the death of this pioneering figure in lbgtq history. This case we have artifacts from Tammy Baldwin and barney frank pioneering lbgtq congress persons. Tammy baldwin in 1998 was the first openly gay woman elected to congress. This is the red suit she wore when elected to the Wisconsin Legislature and we have a Newsweek Magazine featuring barney frank. He served in massachusetts before being a gay person. The citizens of massachusetts elected him several more time and he married his long time partner jim ready. Were going to walk around the corner and explore the story of lbgtq activists fighting for the right to serve in the military. In 1974 leonard was a sergeant in the air force. He was a deck car rated vietnam war veteran, served three tours of duty and had the bronze star. He decided to challenge the militarys ban on gay people serving. Working with frank, the father of the lbgtq rights movement, he decides to push back against the air force. The air force discharged him and offered him a settlement instead of deciding to change its policy, but you see this persons brave stance going on the cover of Time Magazine in 1975 saying i am a homosexual the first gay person to appear on the cover of Time Magazine. They start to chip away at attitudes that prevented gay people from serving in the military. You can see some News Coverage of the repeal of dont ask, dont tell. Thats a policy that the Clinton Administration that allowed gay people to serve in the military as long as they were quiet about who they were and what their Sexual Orientation was. You see the gavel that nancy pelosi used to announce the repeal of dont ask, dont tell in 2010. Out of stonewall comes a new era of militancy and clout for the Gay Rights Movement. You sea protests called zaps. They were socalled because they were provocative designed to get press coverage and a lot of attention to what the activists were fighting for. Groups like the gay raiders out of philadelphia who got themselves into the cbs evening news with walter cronkite, got on the stage and had a protest as americans watched their evening newscast. The protesters said cronkite took time after the newscast about what their issues were and he actually changed the way cbs covered them. Various groups and nationalities feel their stories arent being told by the Mainstream Press, they frooekly start their own newspapers and magazines and here you see gay activist, the lesbian tide and many other publications rose up out of the stonewall era. You see this incredible flag the symbol of the lbgtq movement. Gilbert baker called himself the gay betsy ross when he was encouraged to come up with a flag to symbolize the movement. Notice it has two more stripes than the flag does now. Two colors were too hard to reproduce and got rid of the hot pink and tortoise. That was made by gilbert. This is the sewing machine. This flag isnt the original but one of the first of that flag of that template. Flex were going to go in and talk about the aids crisis and how that activated and mobilized lbgtq activists. In every movement you see signs of progress and then pushback. After this incredible spirit of openness, gay people being public about their sexuality, who they were, their Sexual Orientation, protesting in the streets, quickly on the heels of that comes the aids crisis. In the early 1980s stories about aids, this Mysterious Illness that is striking gay men in los angeles and new york comes to the forefront in Gay Publications first. Quickly the Mainstream Press catches up, but the early headlines, because no one knows what causes aids, are really more fear mongering than anybody else and leads to the Lgbtq Community being further ostracized. You see two journalists part of the Mainstream Press, in the 1980s it wasnt incredibly welcoming to be gay staff on a major newspaper. Both of these journalists reported about the aids crisis and both of them succumbed to aids as well. It wasnt until 1992 that drugs were found that made aids not a death sentence, but a disease that people could live with. Here you saw again gay activists using the very provocative and flamboyant protests and the diein that took place at st. Patricks cathedral and elsewhere. There were protests outside the fda where activists were advocating for drugs to come to market quicker, more research by the government and more support of people with aids. The Gay Community was providing meals, support, information about drug trials, and organizations like act up and other organizations are advocating for people with aids and the community as a whole. More than 362,000 americans died of aid before treatment for it became widespread in the late 1990s. To illustrate that story, we have a section of the aids quilt. The names project in 1987 laid patches of a quilt across the National Mall here in washington, d. C. This is evidence that while aids is a treatable disease the aids crisis is really not over. This is a piece of a quilt that tells the story of a transgender woman in atlanta who died in 2016. Her name was Cheryl Courtney evans. Next were going to go to a section that talks about the battle for samesex marriage and the role that faith and religion played in that. Some faith communities welcomed members of the Gay Community, but not all. In 1977 dade county, florida, joined about a dozen other communities in passing legislation aimed to prevent discrimination against gay people in housing and other areas. Anita bryant was a christian singer and a spokeswoman for the florida orange juice industry. She thought this law would end up having children corrupted by the Gay Community. So she fought back against it with her save the children campaign. Here again you see the creativity of the lgbtq activists who fought back against anita bryant. In this case you see an album put out by olivia records, a lesbian record label. Its called lesbian concentrate and there are a variety of songs pushing back against anita bryant and orange juice. Bartenders stopped selling screw divers paid with orange juice and vodka. Again you see the rising up. The lbgtq rising up and pushing back against people trying to erode their essential rights. You see faith people like the reverend Jerry Falwell and billy graham, powerful evangelical leaders, who are blaming gay people for the aids crisis. Again, a setback for the community because the powerful spokesmen of faith are pushing back against the community and their essential rights. Next we come to the section about the historic ruling that led to samesex marriage being made legal across the country. The First Amendment gives every american the power to petition the government for change if there are policies or laws or things happening that they do not like. Thats really evidenced throughout this exhibit. Jim had been planning to marry his longtime partner john arthur, but in their home state of ohio it was illegal for two men to marry. They flew to an airport tarmac in maryland. One was dying of a neurological disease at the time. Mr. Arthur died a few months later. But he wanted him to be listed as a living spouse and he joined 14 couples and a few other widowers in the Supreme Court case then in 2015 made samesex marriage legal across the country. In this case you can see the jacket that he wore on his wedding day. The bow tie that he wore on announcement day. And the wedding rings, the fused wedding rings of his and johns. He had them fused together with some of john arthurs ashes after he died. These artifacts were the first we got on loan for this exhibit and its a really powerful statement because at its essence, this whole exhibit is about who do you love and who do you have the right to love. So these are powerful exhibits that tell the story of how Everyday Americans petitioned the government for change, using their First Amendment freedoms. The struggle for samesex marriage was a decadeslong process. Here in this case you see in 1953 the pioneering lgbtq publication one puts on its cover homosexual marriage, question mark. Of course its not until decades later that that Supreme Court ruling in 2015 makes samesex marriage legal across the country and there were many players who played a role in chipping away at attitudes that prevented samesex marriage. Edith windsor was one of those people. She was with her longtime partner for many years. When thea died, edith was stuck with a rather large tax bill. She decided she was going to challenge the irs saying she was being denied the same rights heterosexual couples had. More than a thousand of them. Years later the Supreme Court decided in her favor and this is a couple of the check she got from the irs for back payment of those inheritance taxes she had paid plus, of course, the interest. Thats always a favorite artifact for people to see especially around tax time here. Here you see posters that were used by protesters who were heralding the Supreme Court decision that Edith Windsor took part in and on the wall across here you see some really iconic figures who 50 years ago would never have been open about their Sexual Orientation or sexuality. We call this once rejected and now embraced and you see how attitudes have changed towards lbgtq americans. Theyre influencers and politicians and activists and actors, journalists, these are people who are much adtired for who they are and what they do. Here at the museum, our mission is to promote understanding of the importance of the free press and the First Amendment. We hope more people will come and visit this exhibit because stonewall, the events at stonewall and rise up, stonewall and the lgbtq rights movement, really tells the story of how Everyday Americans used their First Amendment freedoms, freedom of press, religion, freedom of assembly, freedom of petition, freedom of speeh