We may never know who threw the first brick outside the Stonewall Inn on Christopher Street in Manhattan’s Greenwich Village in the wee hours of June 28, 1969.
Was it a young white man from the Midwest (as suggested in “Stonewall,” a 2015 film that prompted boycott petitions launched by the Gay-Straight Alliance Network of school students and MoveOn.org under accusations of “whitewashing” the real history) or the transgender women of color who’ve been increasingly recognized as the first to fight back that night?
Either way, the patrons of that private club, who clashed with police during a raid ostensibly for selling liquor without a permit, helped catalyze the modern movement for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, questioning, intersex and asexual rights (LGBTQIA) in the United States and beyond.
Fifty years later, cities across the globe are gearing up for Pride events to celebrate civil rights victories won, push for greater equality and party down with friends.