Dallas Voice (Dallas, Tex.), Vol. 26, No. 05, Ed. 1 Friday, June 19, 2009 Page: 17 of 96
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stonewall
Stonewall today: Making sure people remember
Trip to New York bar where
patrons fought back against
harassment 40 years ago a
pilgrimmage of sorts —
for those who remember
By Samantha Fields Keen News Service
NEW YORK — It was 40 years ago this
month that the patrons of a gay bar in New York
City fought back against police harassment. The
bar was the Stonewall Inn, in New York's West
Village, and it is still in operation today — both
as a bar and as a beacon to gay people who
know its historic past.
" It's like a wailing wall — you have to kiss it,"'
said Andrew Wind, who first came to the
Village at the age of 22, specifically to see the
Stonewall.
People walking by on a recent day knew at
least something about the significance of the bar
with its distinctive half brick wall and arched
black doorways.
"The only thing I know is there was some sort
of rebellion in there, something about gay
rights," said Bruce Bunner, who lives in the
neighborhood. David Anthony, who also lives
in the area and says he "kinda vaguely" knows
the history of the place, that "a lot of gay rights
stuff happened here."
Many people refer to that "stuff" as the
Stonewall Rebellion. And many say it was the
beginning of the modern gay civil rights move-
ment.
But that distinction relies heavily on over-
looking organized pickets in front of the White
House and a concerted effort by many in the
gay community to work within the political and
legal systems during the 1950s and 1960s.
What really sets Stonewall apart is that it was
one of the first times gay people physically resis-
ted harassment.
Being gay was not OK in the 1960s. Back then,
most gay people were closeted, because to be
openly gay often meant losing their jobs, their
families,, even their lives,
In many states, it was illegal for two people of
the same gender to have sex even in the privacy
of their own homes. And some states had laws
prohibiting the sale Of alcoholic beverages to
"homosexuals" in bars and restaurants.
That was the case in New York until 1967,
when court rulings struck down such discrimi-
natory regulations. But, as David Eisenbach
wrote in "Gay Power: An American
Revolution," the New York State Liquor
Authority could, in 1969, still revoke the liquor
license of any bar in which there was "substan-
tial evidence of indecent behavior."
The language was vague enough to give the
police the ability to selectively harass gay bars.
And they did.
Many accounts say that the Stonewall Inn, in
1969, was run by members of the Mafia who
persuaded the police to look the other way
while the bar sold alcohol and illegal drugs to its
customers. There was little effort made to super-
vise any aspect of the Stonewall's business.
In "Stonewall: The Riots that Sparked the Gay
Revolution," David Carter writes that there was
no running water in the bar; bar staff filled two
sinks with water at the start of the evening and
simply dipped dirty glasses into increasingly
f
SAMANTHA A FIELDS/Keen Service
Two young men walk past the front window of the Stonewall Inn. The owners of the bar, which has been designated as a historical landmark, have photos depicting the club's past
and its role in the gay rights movement in the front window.
murky water and re-used them.
The toilets would frequently overflow onto
the floors. The building had no fire safety equip-
ment or exits. And there were reports that the
staff collected information about patrons with
which to blackmail them.
When police conducted their raids of the
Stonewall and other gay bars, it was not so
much to ensure that any laws were: being
obeyed as a routine collection of bribes to look
the other way. But, according to some, police
would occasionally demonstrate at least an
appearance of law enforcement by rounding
everybody up, checking for their identification
and kicking them out of the bar.
Until June 28,1969, when the patrons of the
Stonewall Inn fought back.
That night, when the police began escorting
patrons out of the bar, many lingered outside 53
Christopher St. and watched. Various eyewit-
ness accounts of what happened next differ in
some respects, but most accounts agree that the
melee began when police began handcuffing
some of the patrons and pushing them into
police wagons. One of the patrons — some say
it was a woman, some say a man dressed like a
woman — struggled against the police and
called out to the crowd, "Why don't you do:
something?"
And the crowd responded. People threw rocks,
bricks, coins and anything else they could get their
hands on. The police were outnumbered, and the
raucous confrontation grew into what some news
accounts referred to as a "riot." Those who were
there say they prefer the term "rebellion/'
Though various reports suggest the "riot"
continued for only 45 minutes that night, it start-
ed up again the next night and news of the
resistance spread quickly nationwide, giving
other communities, the courage to fight back
against harassment.
The gay civil rights movement may not have
begun in June 1969 at the Stonewall Inn, but it
Certainly burst into the public's awareness then
and there.
Thirty years later, in 1999, the Stonewall was
declared a National Historic Landmark. The
reason for its nomination for landmark status
read, in part, "Stonewall is regarded by many as
the single most important event that led to the
modern gay and lesbian liberation movement
and to the struggle for civil rights for gay and
lesbian Americans. The Stonewall uprising was,
as historian Lillian Faderman has written, 'the
shot heard round the world ... crucial because it
sounded the rally for the movement.'"
Bill Morgan, Tony DeCicco, and Kurt Kelly
say the Inn's fole in gay history is what prompt-
ed them to buy the bar in late 2006, when the
property came up for sale.
"We were concerned that it might end up
becoming another Starbucks, and we felt that
would be a real shame," said Morgan. "I believe
it's the only landmark gay establishment in the
U.S., and we felt it was the right thing to do for
the community. We felt it Was the right thing to
do for the neighborhood, and we felt that, his-
torically, it was really important for us, if we.
were able to do it, to step up and do something
about it. And we did."
They spent about six months doing renova-
tions on the bar — which Morgan said had been
neglected for years — and reopened it in March
2007.
"We decided to, as I was saying, dress the old
girl up and have a nice coming out," he said.
"And that's kind of what we've done. We've
been able to give it back to the community —
and not just the men, but the women as well."
These days, the bar is two floors — there will
often be different things going on upstairs than
down. Sometimes, it's "women's night" on one
floor and "men's night" on the other;
Downstairs, a long bar runs the length of an
exposed brick wall, and a pool table is situated
in a back corner of the big room. Upstairs, is.
another bar, a small stage and a scattering of
tables.
On a recent weeknight happy hour, nearly all
the seats at the bar downstairs were occupied,
primarily by men, and a few younger women
were laughing over a game of pool.
Morgan, DeCicco and Kelly have made a con-
certed effort to remind patrons and passereby of
the bar's history. Up behind the bar, hanging
above the rows and rows of liquor bottles, are
several T-shirts, available for purchase, that say
"The Stonewall Inn."
And in the front windows are several framed
black and white photos. One shows the boarded
up window of the Stonewall Inn with graffiti
Scrawled across the plywood saying "Gay
Prohibition Corrupts Copf Feed$ Mafia."
That one was taken in June 1969.
Mary McClain, 52, says she knows what hap-
pened here in June 1969, although, at the time,
she was just a kid.
"To stand up and fight back, to fight back and
not take it anymore, to say no to the authorities
— that's brave," says McClain.
Bar coowner Morgan says most people who
come to the bar know Stonewall's history. More
recently he said, he's noticed the younger
crowd asking about it.
"I've sat and listened to them ask the bar-
tenders, who obviously know the history 'So
this is a famous bar?' And they'll get a little bit
of a history lesson," said Morgan. "The hope is
perhaps they'll go on to go home and Google it
and See where they've been."
Outside Stonewall on a recent day, Miguel
Saona from Spain put down his bag and pulled
out his camera. He asked someone to take a pic-
ture of him in front of the bar. Having read and
seen so much about Stonewall and its history, he
wanted to see the place, l ie had come by the
day before, only to find the battery on his cam-
era was dead, but it was important enough to
him to come back the next day.
For him, he said, "It's something like a pil-
grimage."
© Keen News Service
06.19.09 I dallas voice I 17
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Nash, Tammye. Dallas Voice (Dallas, Tex.), Vol. 26, No. 05, Ed. 1 Friday, June 19, 2009, newspaper, June 19, 2009; Dallas, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth239069/m1/17/: accessed July 17, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting UNT Libraries Special Collections.