Paul Bosche The most infamous of those institutions was Atascadero, in California. Dick Leitsch:And so the cops came with these buses, like five buses, and they all were full of tactical police force. There was no going back now, there was no going back, there was no, we had discovered a power that we weren't even aware that we had. And it's interesting to note how many youngsters we've been seeing in these films. Lucian Truscott, IV, Reporter,The Village Voice:All of straight America, in terms of the middle class, was recoiling in horror from what was happening all around them at that time, in that summer and the summer before. John O'Brien:And deep down I believed because I was gay and couldn't speak out for my rights, was probably one of the reasons that I was so active in the Civil Rights Movement. Howard Smith, Reporter,The Village Voice:I had been in some gay bars either for a story or gay friends would say, "Oh we're going to go in for a drink there, come on in, are you too uptight to go in?" There was all these drags queens and these crazy people and everybody was carrying on. There was the Hippie movement, there was the Summer of Love, Martin Luther King, and all of these affected me terribly. It was a down at a heels kind of place, it was a lot of street kids and things like that. Over a short period of time, he will be unable to get sexually aroused to the pictures, and hopefully, he will be unable to get sexually aroused inside, in other settings as well. Dick Leitsch:You read about Truman Capote and Tennessee Williams and Gore Vidal and all these actors and stuff, Liberace and all these people running around doing all these things and then you came to New York and you found out, well maybe they're doing them but, you know, us middle-class homosexuals, we're getting busted all the time, every time we have a place to go, it gets raided. Lucian Truscott, IV, Reporter,The Village Voice:And then the next night. Ellinor Mitchell Few photographs of the raid and the riots that followed exist. People that were involved in it like me referred to it as "The First Run." Andrea Weiss is a documentary filmmaker and author with a Ph.D. in American History. Slate:The Homosexuals(1967), CBS Reports. Raymond Castro:Society expected you to, you know, grow up, get married, have kids, which is what a lot of people did to satisfy their parents. The Mafia owned the jukeboxes, they owned the cigarette machines and most of the liquor was off a truck hijacking. Synopsis. Tommy Lanigan-Schmidt:The police would zero in on us because sometimes they would be in plain clothes, and sometimes they would even entrap. Activists had been working for change long before Stonewall. We'd say, "Here comes Lillian.". Seymour Pine, Deputy Inspector, Morals Division, NYPD:We told this to our men. Jerry Hoose:Gay people who had good jobs, who had everything in life to lose, were starting to join in. Stonewall Forever is a documentary from NYC's LGBT Community Center directed by Ro Haber. But the . Participants of the 1969 Greenwich Village uprising describe the effect that Stonewall had on their lives. William Eskridge, Professor of Law:Ed Koch who was a democratic party leader in the Greenwich Village area, was a specific leader of the local forces seeking to clean up the streets. And the harder she fought, the more the cops were beating her up and the madder the crowd got. The Stonewall riots inspired gay Americans to fight for their rights. And these were meat trucks that in daytime were used by the meat industry for moving dead produce, and they really reeked, but at nighttime, that's where people went to have sex, you know, and there would be hundreds and hundreds of men having sex together in these trucks. The Chicago riots, the Human Be-in, the dope smoking, the hippies. And that, that was a very haunting issue for me. Nobody. In addition to interviews with activists and scholars, the film includes the reflections of renowned writer Allen Ginsberg. This time they said, "We're not going." Martin Boyce:And then more police came, and it didn't stop. In a spontaneous show of support and frustration, the citys gay community rioted for three nights in the streets, an event that is considered the birth of the modern Gay Rights Movement. Dr. Socarides (Archival):Homosexuality is in fact a mental illness which has reached epidemiological proportions. Dick Leitsch:It was an invasion, I mean you felt outraged and stuff like you know what, God, this is America, what's this country come to? Barney Karpfinger The windows were always cloaked. Quentin Heilbroner Martha Shelley:Before Stonewall, the homophile movement was essentially the Mattachine Society and Daughters of Bilitis and all of these other little gay organizations, some of which were just two people and a mimeograph machine. Danny Garvin:Everybody would just freeze or clam up. First you gotta get past the door. Former U.S. President Barack Obama shakes hands with gay rights activist Frank Kameny after signing a memorandum on federal benefits and non-discrimination in the Oval Office on June 17, 2009. All kinds of designers, boxers, big museum people. The term like "authority figures" wasn't used back then, there was just "Lily Law," "Patty Pig," "Betty Badge." Noah Goldman The last time I saw him, he was a walking vegetable. And the cops got that. They were supposed to be weak men, limp-wristed. We were all there. It was a horror story. We went, "Oh my God. Raymond Castro:So finally when they started taking me out, arm in arm up to the paddy wagon, I jumped up and I put one foot on one side, one foot on the other and I sprung back, knocking the two arresting officers, knocking them to the ground. [1] To commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall riots in 2019, the film was restored and re-released by First Run Features in June 2019. Seymour Pine, Deputy Inspector, Morals Division, NYPD:Well, we did use the small hoses on the fire extinguishers. Danny Garvin:Something snapped. They are taught that no man is born homosexual and many psychiatrists now believe that homosexuality begins to form in the first three years of life. Raymond Castro:You could hear screaming outside, a lot of noise from the protesters and it was a good sound. [7] In 1989, it won the Festival's Plate at the Torino International Gay & Lesbian Film Festival. I mean they were making some headway. It premiered at the 1984 Toronto International Film Festival and was released in the United States on June 27, 1985. And so Howard said, "We've got police press passes upstairs." Chris Mara Raymond Castro:If that light goes on, you know to stop whatever you're doing, and separate. So if any one of you, have let yourself become involved with an adult homosexual, or with another boy, and you're doing this on a regular basis, you better stop quick. And then there were all these priests ranting in church about certain places not to go, so you kind of knew where you could go by what you were told not to do. Jimmy knew he shouldn't be interested but, well, he was curious. Martha Shelley:When I was growing up in the '50s, I was supposed to get married to some guy, produce, you know, the usual 2.3 children, and I could look at a guy and say, "Well, objectively he's good looking," but I didn't feel anything, just didn't make any sense to me. New York City's Stonewall Inn is regarded by many as the site of gay and lesbian liberation since it was at this bar that drag queens fought back against police June 27-28, 1969. More than a half-century after its release, " The Queen " serves as a powerful time capsule of queer life as it existed before the 1969 Stonewall uprising. Hugh Bush I just thought you had to get through this, and I thought I could get through it, but you really had to be smart about it. The only faces you will see are those of the arresting officers. Ed Koch, Councilman, New York City:The Stonewall, they didn't have a liquor license and they were raided by the cops regularly and there were pay-offs to the cops, it was awful. John O'Brien:Our goal was to hurt those police. Do you want them to lose all chance of a normal, happy, married life? The documentary "Before Stonewall" was very educational and interesting because it shows a retail group that fought for the right to integrate into the society and was where the homosexual revolution occurred. I learned, very early, that those horrible words were about me, that I was one of those people. And I said to myself, "Oh my God, this will not last.". And it just seemed like, fantastic because the background was this industrial, becoming an industrial ruin, it was a masculine setting, it was a whole world. And Vito and I walked the rest of the whole thing with tears running down our face. Danny Garvin:There was more anger and more fight the second night. Long before marriage equality, non-binary gender identity, and the flood of new documentaries commemorating this month's 50th anniversary of the Greenwich Village uprising that begat the gay rights movement, there was Greta Schiller's Before Stonewall.Originally released in 1984as AIDS was slowly killing off many of those bar patrons-turned-revolutionariesthe film, through the use of . Stonewall Uprising Program Transcript Slate: In 1969, homosexual acts were illegal in every state except Illinois. And we had no right to such. Naturally, you get careless, you fall for it, and the next thing you know, you have silver bracelets on both arms. Gay people were told we didn't have any of that. Martin Boyce:It was another great step forward in the story of human rights, that's what it was. To commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Stonewall riots in New York City, activists rode their motorcycles during the city's 1989 gay-pride parade. They'd go into the bathroom or any place that was private, that they could either feel them, or check them visually. hide caption. As kids, we played King Kong. It was as bad as any situation that I had met in during the army, had just as much to worry about. The medical experimentation in Atascadero included administering, to gay people, a drug that simulated the experience of drowning; in other words, a pharmacological example of waterboarding. And I think it's both the alienation, also the oppression that people suffered. This is every year in New York City. The award winning film Before Stonewall pries open the closet door, setting free the dramatic story of the sometimes horrifying public and private existences experienced by gay and lesbian Americans since the 1920s. You needed a license even to be a beautician and that could be either denied or taken away from you. The history of the Gay and Lesbian community before the Stonewall riots began the major gay rights movement. They would not always just arrest, they would many times use clubs and beat. Eric Marcus has spent years interviewing people who were there that night, as well as those who were pushing for gay rights before Stonewall. Before Stonewall: The Making of a Gay and Lesbian Community is a 1984 American documentary film about the LGBT community prior to the 1969 Stonewall riots. In 1969 the police raided the Stonewall Inn, a gay bar in New York City's Greenwich Village, leading to three nights of rioting by the city's gay community. Frank Kameny I never saw so many gay people dancing in my life. And if enough people broke through they would be killed and I would be killed. Dick Leitsch:So it was mostly goofing really, basically goofing on them. Interviewer (Archival):What type of laws are you after? Where did you buy it? Martha Shelley:The riot could have been buried, it could have been a few days in the local newspaper and that was that. It was like a reward. These homosexuals glorify unnatural sex acts. I mean I'm talking like sardines. W hen police raided a Greenwich Village gay bar, the Stonewall Inn, on June 28, 1969 50 years ago this month the harassment was routine for the time. Also, through this fight, the "LGBT" was born. The Laramie Project Cast at The Calhoun School Louis Mandelbaum So gay people were being strangled, shot, thrown in the river, blackmailed, fired from jobs. It won the Best Film Award at the Houston International Film Festival, Best Documentary Feature at Filmex, First Place at the National Educational Film Festival, and Honorable Mention at the Global Village Documentary Festival. Howard Smith, Reporter,The Village Voice:But there were little, tiny pin holes in the plywood windows, I'll call them the windows but they were plywood, and we could look out from there and every time I went over and looked out through one of those pin holes where he did, we were shocked at how big the crowd had become. It was as if they were identifying a thing. That summer, New York City police raided the Stonewall Inn, a popular gay bar in Greenwich Village. Gay people were not powerful enough politically to prevent the clampdown and so you had a series of escalating skirmishes in 1969. It was narrated by author Rita Mae Brown, directed by Greta Schiller, co-directed by Robert Rosenberg, and co-produced by John Scagliotti and Rosenberg, and Schiller. John O'Brien Fred Sargeant:Things started off small, but there was an energy that began to flow through the crowd. I didn't think I could have been any prettier than that night. A New York Police officer grabs a man by the hair as another officer clubs a. In 1924, the first gay rights organization is founded by Henry Gerber in Chicago. Tommy Lanigan-Schmidt:Those of us that were the street kids we didn't think much about the past or the future. Seymour Pine, Deputy Inspector, Morals Division, NYPD:If someone was dressed as a woman, you had to have a female police officer go in with her. I was in the Navy when I was 17 and it was there that I discovered that I was gay. And they were lucky that door was closed, they were very lucky. This documentary uses extensive archival film, movie clips . Martin Boyce Danny Garvin:We were talking about the revolution happening and we were walking up 7th Avenue and I was thinking it was either Black Panthers or the Young Lords were going to start it and we turned the corner from 7th Avenue onto Christopher Street and we saw the paddy wagon pull up there. Tommy Lanigan-Schmidt:I never bought a drink at the Stonewall. They were just holding us almost like in a hostage situation where you don't know what's going to happen next. The award-winning documentary film, Before Stonewall, which was released theatrically and broadcast on PBS television in 1984, explored the history of the lesbian and gay rights movement in the United States prior to 1969. Jerry Hoose:Who was gonna complain about a crackdown against gay people? William Eskridge, Professor of Law:In states like New York, there were a whole basket of crimes that gay people could be charged with. Katrina Heilbroner As you read, keep in mind that LGBTQ+ is a relatively new term and, while queer people have always existed, the terminology has changed frequently over the years. Narrator (Archival):This is one of the county's principal weekend gathering places for homosexuals, both male and female. Doric Wilson:And we were about 100, 120 people and there were people lining the sidewalks ahead of us to watch us go by, gay people, mainly. Hunted, hunted, sometimes we were hunted. I would wait until there was nobody left to be the girl and then I would be the girl. They can be anywhere. The cops were barricaded inside. How do you think that would affect him mentally, for the rest of their lives if they saw an act like that being? And it's that hairpin trigger thing that makes the riot happen. Martin Boyce:And I remember moving into the open space and grabbing onto two of my friends and we started singing and doing a kick line. Here are my ID cards, you knew they were phonies. Martin Boyce:All of a sudden, Miss New Orleans and all people around us started marching step by step and the police started moving back. Martha Shelley:We participated in demonstrations in Philadelphia at Independence Hall. They could be judges, lawyers. Richard Enman (Archival):Well, let me say, first of all, what type of laws we are not after, because there has been much to-do that the Society was in favor of the legalization of marriage between homosexuals, and the adoption of children, and such as that, and that is not at all factual at all. Mary Queen of the Scotch, Congo Woman, Captain Faggot, Miss Twiggy. This 1955 educational film warns of homosexuality, calling it "a sickness of the mind.". Jimmy hadn't enjoyed himself so much in a long time. And it would take maybe a half hour to clear the place out. John O'Brien:It was definitely dark, it was definitely smelly and raunchy and dirty and that's the only places that we had to meet each other, was in the very dirty, despicable places. I was a homosexual. I'm losing everything that I have. ", Howard Smith, Reporter,The Village Voice:And he went to each man and said it by name. I went in there and they took bats and just busted that place up. Seymour Pine, Deputy Inspector, Morals Division, NYPD:We had maybe six people and by this time there were several thousand outside. Gay bars were always on side streets out of the way in neighborhoods that nobody would go into. David Carter, Author ofStonewall:There was also vigilantism, people were using walkie-talkies to coordinate attacks on gay men. And Howard said, "Boy there's like a riot gonna happen here," and I said, "yeah." Martin Boyce:I wasn't labeled gay, just "different." Marc Aubin I was a man. Howard Smith, Reporter,The Village Voice:All of a sudden, in the background I heard some police cars. So I run down there. On June 27, 1969, police raided The Stonewall Inn, a gay bar in New York. Susana Fernandes Milestones in the American Gay Rights Movement. Seymour Pine, Deputy Inspector, Morals Division, NYPD:Our radio was cut off every time we got on the police radio. Trevor, Post Production You know. The ones that came close you could see their faces in rage. A sickness of the mind. Ed Koch, Councilman, New York City:Gay rights, like the rights of blacks, were constantly under attack and while blacks were protected by constitutional amendments coming out of the Civil War, gays were not protected by law and certainly not the Constitution. Martin Boyce:It was thrilling. A person marching in a gay rights parade along New York's Fifth Avenue on July 7th, 1979. The shop had been threatened, we would get hang-up calls, calls where people would curse at us on the phone, we'd had vandalism, windows broken, streams of profanity. Tires were slashed on police cars and it just went on all night long. And I just didn't understand that. Martin Boyce:I heard about the trucks, which to me was fascinated me, you know, it had an imagination thing that was like Marseilles, how can it only be a few blocks away? People talk about being in and out now, there was no out, there was just in. Howard Smith, Reporter,The Village Voice:That night I'm in my office, I looked down the street, and I could see the Stonewall sign and I started to see some activity in front. Martin Boyce:There were these two black, like, banjee guys, and they were saying, "What's goin' on man?" Alexis Charizopolis Alan Lechner There were gay bars in Midtown, there were gay bars uptown, there were certain kinds of gay bars on the Upper East Side, you know really, really, really buttoned-up straight gay bars. And then as you turned into the other room with the jukebox, those were the drag queens around the jukebox. But we went down to the trucks and there, people would have sex. You know, it's just, everybody was there. Jerry Hoose:The bar itself was a toilet. Well, little did he know that what was gonna to happen later on was to make history. Remember everything. The film combined personal interviews, snapshots and home movies, together with historical footage. It must have been terrifying for them. It was first released in 1984 with its American premiere at the Sundance Film Festival and its European premiere at the Berlinale, followed by a successful theatrical release in many countries and a national broadcast on PBS. kui We had no speakers planned for the rally in Central Park, where we had hoped to get to. And they started smashing their heads with clubs. And the rest of your life will be a living hell. Martin Boyce:Oh, Miss New Orleans, she wouldn't be stopped. Howard Smith, Reporter,The Village Voice:At a certain point, it felt pretty dangerous to me but I noticed that the cop that seemed in charge, he said you know what, we have to go inside for safety.
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