• Stonewall: Before the 12th Century, a stone wall was simply a fence that enclosed a field and was made of rough stones without mortar. Solid, it blocked easy passage. An Australasian in the 19th Century who wanted to block political legislation "stone-walled it." By the 1930s, slang for a sure-winning racehorse, an animal that was an absolute certainty for coming in first, was a "stonewall bonker." Later, Richard Nixon was to advise friends "to stonewall it; let them plead the Fifth Amendment" and refuse to answer or cooperate.
• "My Mother Told Me I Was Different," a proposed movie documentary
• Charles Kaiser, THE GAY METROPOLIS 1940-1996

• In 1969, "Stonewall" took on an entirely new meaning. On Friday, June 27th, late in the evening, New York City police made a planned raid around on The Stonewall Inn, which was rumored to be a Mafia-owned dance bar at 53 Christopher Street in Greenwich Village (although an individual who knew the two owners say they were only young Italian entrepreneurs, that all young Italians obviously are not connected with the Mafia). What began simply for the police department as a routine "fag-bar" raid quickly escalated into five, inconsecutive nights and early morning hours during which gays, lesbians, and transgenderists decided literally to fight back.
• Employees began being arrested. Some customers were told to leave. Others were detained. But the raid turned ugly around 2 a.m. Saturday morning when angry gay patrons, several transgenderists, and others started yelling "GAY POWER!" and throwing stones, coins, and bottles.
• There are many versions of what happened next. When ultimately the cops barricaded themselves inside on one of the nights, the place was attacked from outside by as many as 300 people, maybe 400. The police, trapped inside, called for reinforcements. Not all onlookers were pleased, and some threw bottles at the gays. When police reinforcements arrived, some of the rioters dispersed for awhile but regrouped. For the next several evenings, and after the media reported the eye-catching, escalating incident, they and hundreds of others returned. The word got around fast. The last week of June 1969 became known as the time of the Stonewall Rebellion, which inspired the start of Gay Pride Week.
• Among the descriptions of the event and time is historian Martin Duberman's Stonewall (1994), which became the basis for a 1996 movie by the same title. Now available on video, it has an opening sequence which features "live" interview excerpts with actual members of the Stonewall Veterans' Association such as Tommy Lanigan-Schmidt and Randy Wicker.
• Over the years and continuing to the present, many instances have occurred during which the rights of gays, lesbians, and transgenders have been abused by police departments, elected officials, and legislabors: not only in New York but throughout the United States and the entire world!
• In 1969 it was illegal for men to dance with men, although women could dance with women. To teenagers, The Stonewall Inn was a favorite place of refuge, a site where they could dance with whomever they wanted and could choose whatever music they wished. At the same time, however, the Mafia-owned and operated bars in the city were places where possible violence was always present. Gay bars were seedy and the drinks were watered . . . but at least they were there.
• For nearly 30 years it has been an uphill struggle. Before The Stonewall, there were other brave gay, lesbian, and transgenderists who courageously fought the system, making in-roads here and there. The Mattachine Society was particularly important. In 1951, the MATTACHINE SOCIETY was founded to help homosexuals realize their collective histories and experiences. The Mattachine Society is often considered the beginning of the contemporary organized gay rights movement in the U.S. The name Mattachine was derived from medieval French history and referred to jesters who always wore masks in public. In 1953, the first issue of the publication, One, appeared. It was hoped that this publication would be a vehicle for carrying information about the gay community to the general public and to a wide gay and lesbian readership. This publication is often considered one of the first major steps in the gay liberation movement more commonly associated with the late 1960's and early 1970's.
• However, it was the Stonewall rebellion that made the public, and more importantly "us," realize that we are a people, that we must demand our rights as American citizens and as human beings. At long last we symbolically had achieved "minority status."

Stonewall parades currently are held in several hundred locations around the world.

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