When they found a gay man hiding behind a tree they beamed powerful lights into his face. Growing at times to 40 strong, they prowled the park like packs of hunting dogs in search of prey. Then, the Tactical Patrol Force arrived and eventually forced the rioters out by 4am.But that didn’t stop the locals forming vigilante groups.
#Gay bars mafia windows#
They broke the windows of the Stonewall Inn using whatever projectiles they could find, used a parking meter as a battering ram, and put flaming garbage through the broken windows. They weren’t going to be pushed around anymore and they were done asking politely for their rights to be granted. Johnson, a transwoman-of-color, threw the first shot glass.) All they knew was that something had changed. This is where the reports tend to differ because there was no leader in this movement, so nobody really knows who threw the first brick. Soon the police were outnumbered by 500-600 people, so they barricaded themselves, several handcuffed detainees, and a couple of bystanders inside the Stonewall Inn for protection. More people were attracted by the commotion. Some of the crowd picked up bricks at a nearby construction site. Storme DeLarverie, a butch lesbian-of-color, complained about the tightness of her handcuffs and police hit her with a baton, while other police officers knocked some of the crowd over. Onlookers started throwing pennies and beer bottles at the wagons. Someone in the crowd shouted “Gay Power!”, while another started singing “We Shall Overcome!”, but it was fairly calm outside until rumors began to spread that the patrons still inside were being beaten by police. Soon enough, up to 150 people were gathered outside some of whom had never been in the bar to begin with but had been attracted by the scene happening in the largely LGBT neighborhood. For the first time ever, the LGBT people stayed because many of them had a low risk of being outed. Stonewall was unique because it was frequented by many transgender and queer patrons who were homeless or had unstable housing and employment because they were openly queer.
Those who hadn’t been arrested did not flee, even when pushed out of the bar by the police. All the while, tensions only grew between LGBT people and the police. However, the patrol wagons were slow to arrive and the mafia and bar employees were carted away first. At the time, being outed frequently resulted in loss of personal relationships but also being blacklisted from work opportunities indefinitely. The police decided to arrest them and take them downtown – a deeply terrifying prospect for anyone, but especially to those not out to their families or at work. The patrons refused to show their IDs or allow police to inspect their genitals and the police resorted to violence and sexual assault while frisking the patrons. There were just over 200 patrons in the Stonewall Inn that night, most of whom had never seen a police raid before. who was there at Stonewall), but what is clear, is that something changed that night.Īt roughly 1.20am, four plainclothes police officers, two patrol officers, and two detectives entered the bar, yelling “Police! We’re taking the place!” (Some report that four undercover police officers had entered the bar earlier that evening to gather evidence, while the Public Morals Squad waited outside.) There are several contradictory reports about what happened (i.e. Many wandered downtown after the funeral with their friends for a drink after the services. Emotions were high because many gay men felt they’d lost one of their only public advocates. Her funeral was attended by more than 20,000 people including some of the biggest names in Hollywood at the time, which forced New York City officials to shut down traffic for the hoards of sweaty fans waiting to pay their final respects and catch a glimpse of the stars. For context, it was a brutally hot June evening and happened to be the day of the funeral of one of the most beloved celebrities of the gay community, Judy Garland.