Here is an excerpt of a fantastic timeline from the William Way LGBT Community Center highlighting the 50th year celebration of the Annual Reminders historic protests and subsequent LGBT Philadelphia history.
On July 4, 1965, a small group of courageous LGBT activists picketed for justice in front of Philadelphia’s Independence Hall. Women wore dresses and men were conservatively clad in suits and ties so they would all appear “normal.” They carried picket signs that unashamedly demanded equality for gays and lesbians from a society that treated them as criminals and deviants. These public demonstrations, repeated every year on the Fourth of July until 1969, were sparked by one person’s frustrated effort to bring a discrimination case before the Supreme Court of the United States. They would become the first sustained national effort to focus attention on the discrimination faced by gay people; they were a catalyst for future generations of LGBT Americans to organize for equality.
For the full time graphic time line click here.
More Annual Reminders resources available below: