WITNESSES to the historic Stonewall Riots have recounted the chaotic scenes that unfolded during several days of unrest in New York City in 1969, laying the foundations for what is now known as the LGBTQ rights movement.
In the early morning hours of June 28, 1969, the police conducted one of their frequent raids on the Stonewall Inn, a gay club located in the heart of the Greenwich Village, and arrested more than a dozen revelers.
However, rather than running in fear or submitting to the officers’ show of brute force, swarms of angry patrons and activists gathered outside the bar and fought back against the police, chanting “gay power” and “gay pride.”
The skirmish lasted long into the night and sparked several more protests outside the bar in the days that followed.
Those protests are often credited as a flashpoint for LGBTQ rights in the US, and the first-ever Pride parade was held in New York in 1970 to mark the one-year anniversary of the riots.
The US Sun visited The Stonewall Inn on Friday ahead of the city’s annual Pride parade on Sunday and spoke with an 83-year-old bartender known only as Tree, who had been inside the now-iconic bar when the unrest first erupted.
