Timeline of LGBT history in the United States

1924-1925

• The Society for Human Rights, established in Chicago in 1924, was the first recognized gay rights organization in the United States, having received a charter from the state of Illinois, and produced the first American publication for homosexuals, Friendship and Freedom.^[1] Society founder Henry Gerber was inspired to create it by the work of German doctor Magnus Hirschfeld and the Scientific-Humanitarian Committee. A few months after being chartered, in 1925, the group ceased to exist in the wake of the arrest of several of the Society's members. Despite its short existence and small size, the Society has been recognized as a precursor to the modern gay liberation movement.

1950

• The Mattachine Society, founded in 1950, was one of the earliest LGBT (gay rights) organizations in the United States, probably second only to Chicago's Society for Human Rights. Communist and labor activist Harry Hay formed the group with a collection of male friends in Los Angeles to protect and improve the rights of gay men.

1951

• The Black Cat Bar, located in San Francisco's North Beach neighborhood, was the focus of one of the earliest victories of the homophile movement when in 1951 the California Supreme Court affirmed the right of gay people to assemble in a case brought by the heterosexual owner of the bar.

1952

• Christine Jorgensen was an American transgender woman who was the first person to become widely known in the United States for having sex reassignment surgery. She traveled to Europe and in Copenhagen, Denmark, obtained special permission to undergo a series of operations starting in 1951.^[2] Her transition was the subject of a New York Daily News front-page story in 1952.

1955

• The Daughters of Bilitis /bɪˈliːtɪs/, also called the DOB or the Daughters, was the first^[3] lesbian civil and political rights organization in the United States. It was formed in San Francisco in 1955.

1958

• The first gay leather bar, the Gold Coast, opened in Chicago in 1958.
• One, Inc. v. Olesen 355 U.S. 371 (1958) is a landmark United States Supreme Court decision for LGBT rights in the United States. It was the first U.S. Supreme Court ruling to deal with homosexuality and the first to address free speech rights with respect to homosexuality. The ruling held that pro-homosexual writing is not per se obscene.

1959

• The Cooper Do-nuts Riot happened in 1959 in Los Angeles, when the lesbians, gay men, transgender people, and drag queens who hung out at Cooper Do-nuts and who were frequently harassed by the LAPD fought back after police arrested three people, including John Rechy. Patrons began pelting the police with donuts and coffee cups. The LAPD called for back-up and arrested a number of rioters. Rechy and the other two original detainees were able to escape.^[4]

1961

• José Sarria ran for the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1961, becoming the first openly gay candidate for public office in the United States.^[5] He did not win, however.^[6]

1965

• In April 150 gender non-conforming people came to Dewey's Coffee Shop in Philadelphia to protest the fact that the shop was refusing to serve young people in "non-conformist clothing".^[7] After three protesters refused to leave after being denied service they, along with a black gay activist, were arrested. This led to a picket of the establishment organized by the black GLBT population. Later, in May of that same year another sit-in was organized and Dewey's agreed to end their discriminatory policies.^[8]

1966

• The Compton's Cafeteria Riot occurred in August 1966 in the Tenderloin district of San Francisco. This incident was one of the first recorded LGBT-related riots in United States history.^{[note 1]} It marked the beginning of transgender activism in San Francisco.^[9]

1967

• 1 January – The Black Cat Tavern was the site of one of the first riots in the United States protesting police harassment of LGBT people.
• 21 April – New York decided that it could no longer forbid bars from serving gay men and lesbians after activists staged a "Sip-In" at Julius, a bar, on April 21.
• 24 November – The first bookstore devoted to gay and lesbian authors was founded by Craig Rodwell on November 24, 1967 as the Oscar Wilde Memorial Bookshop.^[10][11] It was initially located at 291 Mercer Street.^[12][13][11]

1969

• 28 June – The Stonewall riots (also referred to as the Stonewall uprising or the Stonewall rebellion) were a series of spontaneous, violent demonstrations by members of the gay (LGBT) community^{[note 2]} against a police raid that took place in the early morning hours of June 28, 1969, at the Stonewall Inn in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. They are widely considered to constitute the most important event leading to the gay liberation movement^[14][15][16] and the modern fight for LGBT rights in the United States.^[17][18]
• 31 October – Sxty members of the Gay Liberation Front and the Society for Individual Rights staged a protest outside the offices of the San Francisco Examiner in response to a series of news articles disparaging LGBT people in San Francisco's gay bars and clubs.^[19][20] The peaceful protest against the "homophobic editorial policies" of the Examiner turned tumultuous and were later called "Friday of the Purple Hand" and "Bloody Friday of the Purple Hand".^{[20][21][22][23][24]} Examiner employees "dumped a bag of printers' ink from the third story window of the newspaper building onto the crowd".^[20][22] Some reports state that it was a barrel of ink poured from the roof of the building.^[25] The protesters "used the ink to scrawl 'Gay Power' and other slogans on the building walls" and stamp purple hand prints "throughout downtown San Francisco" resulting in "one of the most visible demonstrations of gay power".^[20][22][24] According to Larry LittleJohn, then president of SIR, "At that point, the tactical squad arrived – not to get the employees who dumped the ink, but to arrest the demonstrators. Somebody could have been hurt if that ink had gotten into their eyes, but the police were knocking people to the ground."^[20] The accounts of police brutality include women being thrown to the ground and protesters' teeth being knocked out.^[20][26]

1973

• 24 June – The UpStairs Lounge arson attack occurred on June 24, 1973, at a gay bar located on the second floor of the three-story building at 141 Chartres Street in the French Quarter of New Orleans, Louisiana, in the United States.^[27] Thirty-two people died as a result of fire or smoke inhalation. The official cause is still listed as "undetermined origin".^[28] The most likely suspect, a gay man named Roger Nunez who had been ejected from the bar earlier in the day, was never charged and took his own life in November 1974.^[29][30][31] No evidence has ever been found the arson was motivated by hatred or overt homophobia.^[31] Until the 2016 Orlando nightclub shooting, the UpStairs Lounge arson attack was the deadliest known attack on a gay club in U.S. history.
• The American Psychiatric Association declassified homosexuality as a mental disorder.^[32]

1976

• Harvey Milk became the first openly gay male non-incumbent elected in the United States (and the first openly gay person elected to public office in California), when elected as a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors.^[33]

1978

• Harvey Milk, the first openly gay male non-incumbent elected in the United States (and the first openly gay person elected to public office in California), was assassinated in 1978 by Dan White (who also killed Mayor George Moscone).^[33]
• Gilbert Baker designed the rainbow flag for the 1978 San Francisco Gay Freedom Celebration.

1979

• 21 May – The White Night riots were a series of violent events sparked by an announcement of the lenient sentencing of Dan White for the assassinations of San Francisco Mayor George Moscone and of Harvey Milk, a member of the city's Board of Supervisors who was the first openly gay male non-incumbent elected in the United States (and the first openly gay person elected to public office in California). The events took place on the night of May 21, 1979 (the night before what would have been Milk's 49th birthday) in San Francisco. Earlier that day, White had been convicted of voluntary manslaughter, the lightest possible conviction for his actions. As well, the gay community of San Francisco had a longstanding conflict with the San Francisco Police Department. White's status as a former police officer intensified the community's anger at the SFPD. Initial demonstrations took place as a peaceful march through the Castro district of San Francisco. After the crowd arrived at the San Francisco City Hall, violence began. The events caused hundreds of thousands of dollars' worth of property damage to City Hall and the surrounding area, as well as injuries to police officers and rioters. Several hours after the riot had been broken up, police made a retaliatory raid on a gay bar in San Francisco's Castro District. Many patrons were beaten by police in riot gear. Two dozen arrests were made during the course of the raid, and several people later sued the SFPD. In the following days, gay leaders refused to apologize for the events of that night. This led to increased political power in the gay community, which culminated in the election of Mayor Dianne Feinstein to a full term the following November. In response to a campaign promise, Feinstein appointed a pro-gay Chief of Police, which increased recruitment of gay people in the police force and eased tensions. The SFPD never apologized for its indiscriminate attacks on the gay community.

1980

• Transgender people were officially classified by the American Psychiatric Association as having "gender identity disorder."^[34]

1983

• Gerry Studds became the first openly gay member of Congress when he came out in 1983.^[35]

1986

• Bowers v. Hardwick, 478 U.S. 186 (1986), is a United States Supreme Court decision that upheld, in a 5–4 ruling, the constitutionality of a Georgia sodomy law criminalizing oral and anal sex in private between consenting adults, in this case with respect to homosexual sodomy, though the law did not differentiate between homosexual sodomy and heterosexual sodomy.^[36] This case was overturned in 2003 by a case styled Lawrence v. Texas.

1987

• Barney Frank became the first member of Congress to voluntarily identify themselves as gay.^[37]

1989

• The rainbow flag came to nationwide attention in the United States after John Stout sued his landlords and won when they attempted to prohibit him from displaying the flag from his West Hollywood, California, apartment balcony.^[38]

1993

• Brandon Teena was an American transgender man who was raped and murdered in Humboldt, Nebraska in 1993.^{[note 3][39][40]} His life and death were the subject of the Academy Award-winning 1999 film Boys Don't Cry, which was partially based on the 1998 documentary film The Brandon Teena Story. Both films also illustrated that legal and medical discrimination contributed to Teena's violent death.^[41] Teena's murder, along with that of Matthew Shepard, led to increased lobbying for hate crime laws in the United States.^[42][43]

1994

• "Don't ask, don't tell" was the official United States policy on military service by gays, bisexuals, and lesbians, instituted by the Clinton Administration on February 28, 1994, when Department of Defense Directive 1304.26 issued on December 21, 1993, took effect,^[44] lasting until September 20, 2011. The policy prohibited military personnel from discriminating against or harassing closeted gay or bisexual service members or applicants, while barring openly gay, lesbian, or bisexual persons from military service.

1996

• Romer v. Evans, 517 U.S. 620 (1996),^[45] is a landmark Supreme Court of the United States case dealing with sexual orientation and state laws. It was the first Supreme Court case to address gay rights since Bowers v. Hardwick (1986),^[46] when the Court had held that laws criminalizing sodomy were constitutional.^[47] The Court ruled in a 6–3 decision that a state constitutional amendment in Colorado preventing protected status based upon homosexuality or bisexuality did not satisfy the Equal Protection Clause.^[45] The majority opinion in Romer stated that the amendment lacked "a rational relationship to legitimate state interests", and the dissent stated that the majority "evidently agrees that 'rational basis'—the normal test for compliance with the Equal Protection Clause—is the governing standard".^[45][48] The state constitutional amendment failed rational basis review.^{[49][50][51][52]}

1998

• Tammy Baldwin became the first openly gay person elected to the House of Representatives, and the first open lesbian elected to Congress.^[53][54]
• Matthew Shepard was a gay American student at the University of Wyoming who was beaten, tortured, and left to die near Laramie on the night of October 6, 1998.^[55] He was taken to Poudre Valley Hospital in Fort Collins, Colorado, where he died six days later from severe head injuries. Perpetrators Aaron McKinney and Russell Henderson were arrested shortly after the attack and charged with first-degree murder following Shepard's death. Significant media coverage was given to the killing and to what role Shepard's sexual orientation played as a motive in the commission of the crime. Both McKinney and Henderson were convicted of the murder, and each received two consecutive life sentences. Shepard's murder, along with that of Brandon Teena, led to increased lobbying for hate crime laws in the United States.^[42][43]
• Rita Hester was a transgender African American woman who was murdered in Allston, Massachusetts in 1998.^[56] In response to her murder, an outpouring of grief and anger led to a candlelight vigil held the following Friday (December 4) in which about 250 people participated. The community struggle to see Rita's life and identity covered respectfully by local papers, including the Boston Herald and Bay Windows, was chronicled by Nancy Nangeroni.^[57] Her death also inspired the "Remembering Our Dead" web project and the Transgender Day of Remembrance.^[58]

1999

• The Transgender Pride Flag was created by American transgender woman Monica Helms in 1999.^[59][60]
• Transgender Day of Remembrance was founded in 1999 by Gwendolyn Ann Smith, a transgender woman,^[61] to memorialize the murder of transgender woman Rita Hester in Allston, Massachusetts.^[62] Since its inception, TDoR has been held annually on November 20,^[63] and it has slowly evolved from the web-based project started by Smith into an international day of action. It is now observed annually on November 20 as a day to memorialize all those who have been murdered as a result of transphobia^[64] and to draw attention to the continued violence endured by the transgender community.^[65]

2000

• The Transgender Pride Flag was first shown, at a pride parade in Phoenix, Arizona, United States in 2000.^[66]

2002

• Gwen Araujo was an American transgender teenager who was murdered in Newark, California in 2002.^[67] She was killed by four men, two of whom she had been sexually intimate with, who beat and strangled her after discovering that she was transgender.^[68][69] Two of the defendants were convicted of second-degree murder,^[70] but not convicted on the requested hate crime enhancements. The other two defendants pleaded guilty or no contest to voluntary manslaughter. In at least one of the trials, a "trans panic defense"—an extension of the gay panic defense—was employed.^[70][71] Some contemporary news reports referred to her by her birth name.

2003

• Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558 (2003)^[72] is a landmark decision by the United States Supreme Court. The Court struck down the sodomy law in Texas in a 6–3 decision and, by extension, invalidated sodomy laws in 13 other states, making same-sex sexual activity legal in every U.S. state and territory. The Court, with a five-justice majority, overturned its previous ruling on the same issue in the 1986 case Bowers v. Hardwick, where it upheld a challenged Georgia statute and did not find a constitutional protection of sexual privacy.

2008

• 22-year-old Lateisha Green, a trans woman, was shot and killed by Dwight DeLee in Syracuse, NY because he thought she was gay.^[73] Local news media reported the incident with her legal name, Moses "Teish" Cannon.^[74] DeLee was convicted of first-degree manslaughter as a hate crime on July 17, 2009, and received the maximum sentence of 25 years in state prison. This was only the second time in the nation's history that a person was prosecuted for a hate crime against a transgender person and the first hate crime conviction in New York state.^[75][76][77]

2008

• Angie Zapata was an American transgender woman beaten to death in Greeley, Colorado in 2008. Her killer, Allen Andrade, was convicted of first-degree murder and committing a hate crime, because he murdered her after learning she was transgender. The case was the first in the nation to get a conviction for a hate crime involving a transgender victim, which occurred in 2009.^[78] Angie Zapata's story and murder were featured on Univision's November 1, 2009 Aquí y Ahora television show.

2009

• The Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, also known as the Matthew Shepard Act, is an American Act of Congress, passed on October 22, 2009,^[79] and signed into law by President Barack Obama on October 28, 2009,^[80] as a rider to the National Defense Authorization Act for 2010 (H.R. 2647). The measure expands the 1969 United States federal hate-crime law to include crimes motivated by a victim's actual or perceived gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, or disability.^[81]

It also, among other things:

• Gives federal authorities greater ability to engage in hate crimes investigations that local authorities choose not to pursue;
• Provides $5 million per year in funding for fiscal years 2010 through 2012 to help state and local agencies pay for investigating and prosecuting hate crimes;
• Requires the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to track statistics on hate crimes based on gender identity.^[82][83]

2010

• Phyllis Frye became the first openly transgender judge appointed in the United States.^{[84][85][86][85]}

2011

• "Don't ask, don't tell" was the official United States policy on military service by gays, bisexuals, and lesbians, instituted by the Clinton Administration on February 28, 1994, when Department of Defense Directive 1304.26 issued on December 21, 1993, took effect,^[44] lasting until September 20, 2011. The policy prohibited military personnel from discriminating against or harassing closeted gay or bisexual service members or applicants, while barring openly gay, lesbian, or bisexual persons from military service.

2012

• Kyrsten Sinema became the first openly bisexual person to be elected to Congress.^[87]
• Tammy Baldwin was elected as the first openly gay senator in history.^[88]

2013

• United States v. Windsor, 570 U.S. 744 (2013) (Docket No. 12-307), is a landmark civil rights case^[89][90][91] in which the United States Supreme Court held that restricting U.S. federal interpretation of "marriage" and "spouse" to apply only to opposite-sex unions, by Section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), is unconstitutional under the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment. In the majority opinion, Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote: "The federal statute is invalid, for no legitimate purpose overcomes the purpose and effect to disparage and to injure those whom the State, by its marriage laws, sought to protect in personhood and dignity."^[92]
• DSM-5 was published by the American Psychiatric Association. Among other things, it eliminated the term "gender identity disorder," which was considered stigmatizing, instead referring to "gender dysphoria," which focuses attention only on those who feel distressed by their gender identity.^[93]
• Barney Frank married his long-time partner, James Ready, becoming the first member of Congress to marry someone of the same sex while in office.^[94]

2015

• Obergefell v. Hodges, 576 U.S. ___ (2015) (/ˈoʊbərɡəfɛl/ OH-bər-gə-fel), is a landmark civil rights case in which the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that the fundamental right to marry is guaranteed to same-sex couples by both the Due Process Clause and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The ruling requires all fifty states to perform and recognize the marriages of same-sex couples on the same terms and conditions as the marriages of opposite-sex couples, with all the accompanying rights and responsibilities.^[95][96]
• Philadelphia became the first county government in the U.S. to raise the transgender pride flag in 2015. It was raised at City Hall in honor of Philadelphia's 14th Annual Trans Health Conference, and remained next to the US and City of Philadelphia flags for the entirety of the conference. Then-Mayor Michael Nutter gave a speech in honor of the trans community's acceptance in Philadelphia.^[97]

2016

• 12 June – Omar Mateen, a 29-year-old security guard, killed 49 people and wounded 53 others in a terrorist attack inside Pulse, a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida, United States. Orlando Police Department (OPD) officers shot and killed him after a three-hour standoff. This, known as the Orlando nightclub shooting, is the deadliest incident of violence against LGBT people in U.S. history, and the deadliest terrorist attack in the U.S. since the September 11 attacks in 2001. At the time, it was the deadliest mass shooting by a single shooter in the U.S., being surpassed the following year by the Las Vegas shooting. Pulse was hosting a "Latin Night" and thus most of the victims were Latinos. In 2018, evidence suggested that Mateen may not have known that Pulse was a gay nightclub, having even asked the security guard at the nightclub where all the women were.^[98]
• For the first time the Justice Department used the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act to bring criminal charges against a person for selecting a victim because of their gender identity.^[99][100] In that case Joshua Brandon Vallum pled guilty to murdering Mercedes Williamson in 2015 because she was transgender, in violation of the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act.^[99][100]

2018

• 1 January – Openly transgender individuals were allowed to join the United States military starting at this time.^[101]
• 2 January – Phillipe Cunningham was sworn in to represent the 4th ward in the Minneapolis City Council. He was the first openly African American transman elected to public office in the United States.^[102]
• 2 January – Andrea Jenkins was sworn in to represent the vice-presidency and the 8th ward in the Minneapolis City Council. She was the first openly African American transwoman elected to public office in the United States.^[103]
• Danica Roem became the first person to both be elected and serve while openly transgender in any U.S. state legislature.^{[note 4][105][106]}
• America's first citywide Bi Pride event was held, in West Hollywood.^[107]