The film brings together voices from over 50 years of the LGBTQ rights movement to explore queer activism before, during and after the Stonewall Riots. Things were just changing. And this went on for hours. This was ours, here's where the Stonewall was, here's our Mecca. Yvonne Ritter:It's like people who are, you know, black people who are used to being mistreated, and going to the back of the bus and I guess this was sort of our going to the back of the bus. They were supposed to be weak men, limp-wristed. Maureen Jordan Martin Boyce:In the early 60s, if you would go near Port Authority, there were tons of people coming in. With this outpouring of courage and unity the gay liberation movement had begun. And the rest of your life will be a living hell. Alexandra Meryash Nikolchev, On-Line Editors Because he was homosexual. We knew it was a gay bar, we walked past it. Urban Stages But it's serious, don't kid yourselves about it. The lights came on, it's like stop dancing. John Scagliotti In the sexual area, in psychology, psychiatry. Yvonne Ritter:I had just turned 18 on June 27, 1969. Dick Leitsch:So it was mostly goofing really, basically goofing on them. In 1924, the first gay rights organization is founded by Henry Gerber in Chicago. Suzanne Poli You gotta remember, the Stonewall bar was just down the street from there. It's like, this is not right. "Daybreak Express" by D.A. View in iTunes. This was a highly unusual raid, going in there in the middle of the night with a full crowd, the Mafia hasn't been alerted, the Sixth Precinct hasn't been alerted. Just making their lives miserable for once. For those kisses. A CBS news public opinion survey indicates that sentiment is against permitting homosexual relationships between consenting adults without legal punishment. Raymond Castro:If that light goes on, you know to stop whatever you're doing, and separate. Doric Wilson:In those days, the idea of walking in daylight, with a sign saying, "I'm a faggot," was horren--, nobody, nobody was ready to do that. I learned, very early, that those horrible words were about me, that I was one of those people. 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. Few photographs of the raid and the riots that followed exist. The first police officer that came in with our group said, "The place is under arrest. And she was quite crazy. But we had to follow up, we couldn't just let that be a blip that disappeared. But I was just curious, I didn't want to participate because number one it was so packed. They didn't know what they were walking into. "Don't fire. Based on Hunted, hunted, sometimes we were hunted. Eric Marcus has spent years interviewing people who were there that night, as well as those who were pushing for gay rights before Stonewall. Jerry Hoose:I was afraid it was over. Danny Garvin:Something snapped. The severity of the punishment varies from state to state. Martha Shelley:We participated in demonstrations in Philadelphia at Independence Hall. And, it was, I knew I would go through hell, I would go through fire for that experience. 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. Tommy Lanigan-Schmidt:Those of us that were the street kids we didn't think much about the past or the future. Samual Murkofsky 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. And some people came out, being very dramatic, throwing their arms up in a V, you know, the victory sign. The police weren't letting us dance. John O'Brien:Cops got hurt. And I just didn't understand that. One time, a bunch of us ran into somebody's car and locked the door and they smashed the windows in. 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. The cops were barricaded inside. TV Host (Archival):Ladies and gentlemen, the reason for using first names only forthese very, very charming contestants is that right now each one of them is breaking the law. In an effort to avoid being anachronistic . Then the cops come up and make use of what used to be called the bubble-gum machine, back then a cop car only had one light on the top that spun around. ABCNEWS VideoSource In the Life The mob was saying, you know, "Screw you, cops, you think you can come in a bust us up? People could take shots at us. One never knows when the homosexual is about. It was an age of experimentation. Danny Garvin:With Waverly Street coming in there, West Fourth coming in there, Seventh Avenue coming in there, Christopher Street coming in there, there was no way to contain us. The Underground Lounge Before Stonewall (1984) - full transcript 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. All of this stuff was just erupting like a -- as far as they were considered, like a gigantic boil on the butt of America. They were not used to a bunch of drag queens doing a Rockettes kick line and sort of like giving them all the finger in a way. We could lose our memory from the beating, we could be in wheelchairs like some were. Raymond Castro Meanwhile, there was crowds forming outside the Stonewall, wanting to know what was going on. Vanessa Ezersky Because as the police moved back, we were conscious, all of us, of the area we were controlling and now we were in control of the area because we were surrounded the bar, we were moving in, they were moving back. He may appear normal, and it may be too late when you discover he is mentally ill. John O'Brien:I was a poor, young gay person. Doug Cramer He said, "Okay, let's go." People started throwing pennies. Revealing and. And we had no right to such. ", Martin Boyce:People in the neighborhood, the most unlikely people were starting to support it. TV Host (Archival):Are those your own eyelashes? ITN Source 'Cause I really realized that I was being trained as a straight person, so I could really fool these people. Heather Gude, Archival Research "We're not going.". Danny Garvin:Everybody would just freeze or clam up. The mayor of New York City, the police commissioner, were under pressure to clean up the streets of any kind of quote unquote "weirdness." Jerry Hoose:I mean the riot squad was used to riots. Queer was very big. Lucian Truscott, IV, Reporter,The Village Voice:They started busting cans of tear gas. Dick Leitsch:Very often, they would put the cops in dresses, with makeup and they usually weren't very convincing. Fred Sargeant:Things started off small, but there was an energy that began to flow through the crowd. Seymour Wishman Ellinor Mitchell Louis Mandelbaum We'd say, "Here comes Lillian.". I mean I'm talking like sardines. It gives back a little of the terror they gave in my life. That was scary, very scary. Howard Smith, Reporter,The Village Voice:And by the time the police would come back towards Stonewall, that crowd had gone all the around Washington Place come all the way back around and were back pushing in on them from the other direction and the police would wonder, "These are the same people or different people?". Martin Boyce:And then more police came, and it didn't stop. That's it. Because if you don't have extremes, you don't get any moderation. All of the rules that I had grown up with, and that I had hated in my guts, other people were fighting against, and saying "No, it doesn't have to be this way.". We had been threatened bomb threats. This produced an enormous amount of anger within the lesbian and gay community in New York City and in other parts of America. Pamela Gaudiano Danny Garvin:It was the perfect time to be in the Village. 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. Mike Wallace (Archival):Dr. Charles Socarides is a New York psychoanalyst at the Albert Einstein School of Medicine. I wanted to kill those cops for the anger I had in me. Stacker put together a timeline of LGBTQ+ history leading up to Stonewall, beginning with prehistoric events and ending in the late 1960s. Prisoner (Archival):I realize that, but the thing is that for life I'll be wrecked by this record, see? All kinds of designers, boxers, big museum people. Marjorie Duffield Producers Library Stonewall Forever is a documentary from NYC's LGBT Community Center directed by Ro Haber. Mayor John Lindsay, like most mayors, wanted to get re-elected. Lucian Truscott, IV, Reporter,The Village Voice:A rather tough lesbian was busted in the bar and when she came out of the bar she was fighting the cops and trying to get away. People cheer while standing in front of The Stonewall Inn as the annual Gay Pride parade passes, Sunday, June 26, 2011 in New York. I was in the Navy when I was 17 and it was there that I discovered that I was gay. On June 27, 1969, police raided The Stonewall Inn, a gay bar in New York. I mean I'm only 19 and this'll ruin me. (Enter your ZIP code for information on American Experience events and screening in your area.). [2][3] Later in 2019, the film was selected by the Library of Congress for preservation in the United States National Film Registry for being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".[4][5][6]. Howard Smith, Reporter,The Village Voice:And I keep listening and listening and listening, hoping I'm gonna hear sirens any minute and I was very freaked. It's not my cup of tea. And when you got a word, the word was homosexuality and you looked it up. They pushed everybody like to the back room and slowly asking for IDs. We went, "Oh my God. They could be judges, lawyers. So I attempted suicide by cutting my wrists. Virginia Apuzzo:It was free but not quite free enough for us. Susan Liberti John O'Brien:If a gay man is caught by the police and is identified as being involved in what they called lewd, immoral behavior, they would have their person's name, their age and many times their home address listed in the major newspapers. Howard Smith, Reporter,The Village Voice:I had a column inThe Village Voicethat ran from '66 all the way through '84. Raymond Castro:I'd go in there and I would look and I would just cringe because, you know, people would start touching me, and "Hello, what are you doing there if you don't want to be touched?" Lucian Truscott, IV, Reporter,The Village Voice:What they did in the Stonewall that night. Dana Kirchoff It said the most dreadful things, it said nothing about being a person. Tweet at us @throughlineNPR, send us an email, or leave us a voicemail at (872) 588-8805. Eric Marcus, Recreation Still Photography And it's interesting to note how many youngsters we've been seeing in these films. Jerry Hoose It was a leaflet that attacked the relationship of the police and the Mafia and the bars that we needed to see ended. Well, it was a nightmare for the lesbian or gay man who was arrested and caught up in this juggernaut, but it was also a nightmare for the lesbians or gay men who lived in the closet. Slate:The Homosexual(1967), CBS Reports. Many of those activists have since died, but Marcus preserved their voices for his book, titled Making Gay History. Martha Shelley:They wanted to fit into American society the way it was. Andrea Weiss is a documentary filmmaker and author with a Ph.D. in American History. We heard one, then more and more. I actually thought, as all of them did, that we were going to be killed. I told the person at the door, I said "I'm 18 tonight" and he said to me, "you little SOB," he said. Now, 50 years later, the film is back. Except for the few mob-owned bars that allowed some socializing, it was basically for verboten. We were going to propose something that all groups could participate in and what we ended up producing was what's now known as the gay pride march. Tommy Lanigan-Schmidt Before Stonewall pries open the closet door, setting free dramatic stories from the early 1900's onwards of public and private existence as experienced by LGBT Americans. Before Stonewall. Absolutely, and many people who were not lucky, felt the cops. John O'Brien:All of a sudden, the police faced something they had never seen before. The last time I saw him, he was a walking vegetable. Available on Prime Video, Tubi TV, iTunes. 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. Amber Hall Homo, homo was big. First Run Features Martha Shelley:The riot could have been buried, it could have been a few days in the local newspaper and that was that. Charles Harris, Transcriptions You see these cops, like six or eight cops in drag. We didn't want to come on, you know, wearing fuzzy sweaters and lipstick, you know, and being freaks. Doric Wilson Seymour Pine, Deputy Inspector, Morals Division, NYPD:Well, I had to act like I wasn't nervous. And gay people were standing around outside and the mood on the street was, "They think that they could disperse us last night and keep us from doing what we want to do, being on the street saying I'm gay and I'm proud? Jay Fialkov I never saw so many gay people dancing in my life. We didn't necessarily know where we were going yet, you know, what organizations we were going to be or how things would go, but we became something I, as a person, could all of a sudden grab onto, that I couldn't grab onto when I'd go to a subway T-room as a kid, or a 42nd street movie theater, you know, or being picked up by some dirty old man. He pulls all his men inside. And there was tear gas on Saturday night, right in front of the Stonewall. David Huggins Glenn Fukushima The term like "authority figures" wasn't used back then, there was just "Lily Law," "Patty Pig," "Betty Badge." And the people coming out weren't going along with it so easily. Transcript Aired June 9, 2020 Stonewall Uprising The Year That Changed America Film Description When police raided the Stonewall Inn, a popular gay bar in the Greenwich Village section of. Corbis And so there was this drag queen standing on the corner, so they go up and make a sexual offer and they'd get busted. 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. Virginia Apuzzo: I grew up with that. The homosexual, bitterly aware of his rejection, responds by going underground. You know, it's just, everybody was there. Ed Koch, Councilman, New York City:There were complaints from people who objected to the wrongful behavior of some gays who would have sex on the street. Clever. Raymond Castro:Incendiary devices were being thrown in I don't think they were Molotov cocktails, but it was just fire being thrown in when the doors got open. 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. Lucian Truscott, IV, Reporter,The Village Voice:And then the next night. Lucian Truscott, IV, Reporter,The Village Voice:It was a bottle club which meant that I guess you went to the door and you bought a membership or something for a buck and then you went in and then you could buy drinks. John O'Brien:Heterosexuals, legally, had lots of sexual outlets. Because if they weren't there fast, I was worried that there was something going on that I didn't know about and they weren't gonna come. Martha Babcock I famously used the word "fag" in the lead sentence I said "the forces of faggotry." All the rules were off in the '60s. 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 . Susana Fernandes When you exit, have some identification and it'll be over in a short time." Narrator (Archival):Richard Enman, president of the Mattachine Society of Florida, whose goal is to legalize homosexuality between consenting adults, was a reluctant participant in tonight's program. Jerry Hoose:And I got to the corner of Sixth Avenue and Eighth Street, crossed the street and there I had found Nirvana. The only faces you will see are those of the arresting officers. I met this guy and I broke down crying in his arms. But everybody knew it wasn't normal stuff and everyone was on edge and that was the worst part of it because you knew they were on edge and you knew that the first shot that was fired meant all the shots would be fired. [00:00:55] Oh, my God. Seymour Pine, Deputy Inspector, Morals Division, NYPD:Well, we did use the small hoses on the fire extinguishers. Well, little did he know that what was gonna to happen later on was to make history. 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. Mike Nuget Hugh Bush And that crowd between Howard Johnson's and Mama's Chik-n-Rib was like the basic crowd of the gay community at that time in the Village. We don't know. The newly restored 1984 documentary "Before Stonewall: The Making of a Gay and Lesbian Community," re-released to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the seminal Stonewall riots, remains a . If you came to a place like New York, you at least had the opportunity of connecting with people, and finding people who didn't care that you were gay. 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. Before Stonewall 1984 Directed by Greta Schiller, Robert Rosenberg Synopsis 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. It was a 100% profit, I mean they were stealing the liquor, then watering it down, and they charging twice as much as they charged one door away at the 55. I was a homosexual. Jerry Hoose:The bar itself was a toilet. They were to us. 1984 documentary film by Greta Schiller and Robert Rosenberg, "Berlinale 2016: Panorama Celebrates Teddy Award's 30th Anniversary and Announces First Titles in Programme", "Guest Post: What I Learned From Revisiting My 1984 Documentary 'Before Stonewall', "See the 25 New Additions to the National Film Registry, From Purple Rain to Clerks", "Complete National Film Registry Listing", "Before Stonewall - Independent Historical Film", Before Stonewall: The Making of a Gay and Lesbian Community (Newly Restored), https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Before_Stonewall&oldid=1134540821, Documentary films about United States history, Historiography of LGBT in the United States, United States National Film Registry films, Short description is different from Wikidata, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, This page was last edited on 19 January 2023, at 05:30. The Laramie Project Cast at The Calhoun School Jeremiah Hawkins Patricia Yusah, Marketing and Communications Lester Senior Housing Community, Jewish Community Housing Corporation I said, "I can go in with you?" Dick Leitsch:There were Black Panthers and there were anti-war people. We could easily be hunted, that was a game. Not able to do anything. The men's room was under police surveillance. My father said, "About time you fags rioted.". And they were having a meeting at town hall and there were 400 guys who showed up, and I think a couple of women, talking about these riots, 'cause everybody was really energized and upset and angry about it. It was not a place that, in my life, me and my friends paid much attention to. They call them hotels, motels, lovers' lanes, drive-in movie theaters, etc. And you felt bad that you were part of this, when you knew they broke the law, but what kind of law was that? Chris Mara And if enough people broke through they would be killed and I would be killed. [7] In 1987, the film won Emmy Awards for Best Historical/Cultural Program and Best Research. hide caption. David Carter, Author ofStonewall:There was also vigilantism, people were using walkie-talkies to coordinate attacks on gay men. We ought to know, we've arrested all of them. And the Stonewall was part of that system. Homosexuality was a dishonorable discharge in those days, and you couldn't get a job afterwards. I would wait until there was nobody left to be the girl and then I would be the girl. The most infamous of those institutions was Atascadero, in California. Barney Karpfinger 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? In 1999, producer Scagliotti directed a companion piece, After Stonewall. And they wore dark police uniforms and riot helmets and they had billy clubs and they had big plastic shields, like Roman army, and they actually formed a phalanx, and just marched down Christopher Street and kind of pushed us in front of them. When we got dressed for that night, we had cocktails and we put the makeup on. Saying I don't want to be this way, this is not the life I want. I mean, I came out in Central Park and other places. But it was a refuge, it was a temporary refuge from the street. John O'Brien:I was very anti-police, had many years already of activism against the forces of law and order. Gay people were never supposed to be threats to police officers. Martin Boyce:There were these two black, like, banjee guys, and they were saying, "What's goin' on man?" Fred Sargeant:The press did refer to it in very pejorative terms, as a night that the drag queens fought back. 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. And as I'm looking around to see what's going on, police cars, different things happening, it's getting bigger by the minute. Ed Koch, Councilman, New York City:Yes, entrapment did exist, particularly in the subway system, in the bathrooms. I was never seduced by an older person or anything like that. A sickness that was not visible like smallpox, but no less dangerous and contagious. You cut one head off. It was fun to see fags. And there, we weren't allowed to be alone, the police would raid us still. Getting then in the car, rocking them back and forth. If there's one place in the world where you can dance and feel yourself fully as a person and that's threatened with being taken away, those words are fighting words. I hope it was. For the first time, we weren't letting ourselves be carted off to jails, gay people were actually fighting back just the way people in the peace movement fought back. And I said to myself, "Oh my God, this will not last.". Do you understand me?". John O'Brien:In the Civil Rights Movement, we ran from the police, in the peace movement, we ran from the police. Transcript A gay rights march in New York in favor of the 1968 Civil Rights Act being amended to include gay rights. The groundbreaking 1984 film "Before Stonewall" introduced audiences to some of the key players and places that helped spark the Greenwich Village riots. But you live with it, you know, you're used to this, after the third time it happened, or, the third time you heard about it, that's the way the world is. Fred Sargeant:We knew that they were serving drinks out of vats and buckets of water and believed that there had been some disease that had been passed. (c) 2011 This, to a homosexual, is no choice at all. A few of us would get dressed up in skirts and blouses and the guys would all have to wear suits and ties. Seymour Pine, Deputy Inspector, Morals Division, NYPD:It was always hands up, what do you want? Mike Wallace (Archival):Two out of three Americans look upon homosexuals with disgust, discomfort or fear. William Eskridge, Professor of Law:All throughout the 60s in New York City, the period when the New York World's Fair was attracting visitors from all over America and all over the world. But as visibility increased, the reactions of people increased. People standing on cars, standing on garbage cans, screaming, yelling. Slate:In 1969, homosexual acts were illegal in every state except Illinois. America thought we were these homosexual monsters and we were so innocent, and oddly enough, we were so American. 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.