We don’t overpopulate.”Īnd parade watchers: “Bystanders reacted with now-I’ve-seen-everything smiles and magnanimous comment. Most gay pride parades and events also occur during a peak season of the year when the weather most ideal, yet another reason to book your trip during the event. ‘This is where I first heard the slogan: “Gay power!” ’ ” Visiting a destination during a pride event is a great way to not only see the city, its landmarks and learn its history, but also to immerse yourself in the local LGBTQ+ community. ‘This is where it all started,’ said John Paul Hudson, a contributor to homosexual publications, wearing the red sash of a grand marshal. “Yesterday the parade route took the marchers, most of whom were white and most of whom were young, past the boarded-up exterior of the bar, long since closed,” Mr. Originally, marches took place on the last Sunday in June as Gay Pride Day or Christopher Street Gay Liberation Day, but later. The first Pride march took place in New York City in 1970.
The Stonewall Inn - named a New York City landmark this week - made an appearance. Pride Month commemorates the Stonewall riots in New York City in 1969, largely credited as the catalyst of the modern-day LGBTQ+ rights movement in the U.S. “ Singing, chanting, clad in festive and arresting garb, thousands of homosexuals and supporters of homosexuals’ rights marched through mid-Manhattan yesterday, past smiling policemen, wide-eyed tourists and blasé New Yorkers who passed it off with a live-and-let-live shrug,” John Darnton reported. The next year, The Times reported, the marchers were “a coalition of eight homophile groups,” and “those who observed both said that this year’s crowd appeared to be about double last year’s.” The marchers chanted their way to Central Park: “2-4-6-8, Gay is twice as good as straight.” And their placards had sayings like “ Heterosexuality can be cured.”īy 1973, the parade was well established.