from the Commercial Observer

“Literally nobody was addressing this history through landmark designations, or even just talking about how we were an important community that had its own history,” said Jay Shockley, a former senior historian for the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission. He was another member of the small circle of historic preservationists who got the landmark conversation going, along with Gale Harris, Andrew Dolkart and Ken Lustbader.

It’s a little-known paradox in the recondite world of historic preservation that the National Register of Historic Places, which contains some 90,000 sites and is overseen by the National Park Service, plays almost no role in shaping the fate of these sites or protecting them from real estate interests (outside of a narrow set of rules that apply only to federally funded development projects like interstate highways).

“The National Register is important because it recognizes nationally important sites, but it doesn’t have any teeth at all,” Shockley said. “It’s an honorary listing. So properties on the National Register can be demolished.”

But for Shockley and his co-conspirators, the Stonewall Inn was a launching pad for the larger LGBTQ landmarking effort they went on to launch officially in 2015, calling it the NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project.

The group decided to take their moonshot in 1999 when there was momentum to nominate Stonewall to the National Register before the end of the Clinton administration, according to Shockley. There was just one problem: Private property owners wield veto power in the nomination process, and the Duell family was not on board.

Read the full article from the Commercial Observer.

Featured thumbnail photo by Spencer Platt / Getty Images.

PRESS CONTACT
Ken Lustbader, NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project
(917) 848-1776 / [email protected]

Audio Featuring First-hand Stories from History-Making Trailblazers and More

NEW YORK, NY—Tuesday, June 25, 2024—The NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project, an award-winning initiative committed to documenting and presenting historic sites connected to the LGBT community throughout New York City, announces the launch of their featured audio tours and more on the Bloomberg Connects mobile app.

“We’re thrilled to be among the newest cultural organizations and institutions invited to share on the Bloomberg Connects mobile app. Our digital guide has the power to immerse you in NYC’s LGBT history, from anywhere in the world.” — Amanda Davis, manager of the NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project

The Project’s content on the app features stories and historic images of LGBT historic sites — residences, bars, bookshops, community spaces, public places, businesses, and more. Engaging audio and video clips from the Project team, leading LGBT scholars, and activists who made LGBT history immerse you in history, from anywhere in the world.

“As historic preservationists with over 30 years of experience documenting LGBT history, we are proud to make an invisible history visible through our digital guide on the Bloomberg Connects app.” — Ken Lustbader, co-director of the NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project

CONNECT ANY TIME, FROM ANYWHERE

Take a self-guided audio tour in the vicinity of Stonewall National Monument, or explore thematic tours focusing on 1970s lesbian activism and transgender history (with more in development). Virtually visit the physical locations and streetscapes where LGBT history was made.

ENGAGING AND IMMERSIVE AUDIO

Ellen Broidy, activist and co-planner of the first ever Christopher Street Liberation Day March (today’s Pride March). “Craig [Rodwell] suddenly said, ‘it’s time to take some direct action.’ The more we talked, the clearer we could see the beginnings of what could be a mass movement.”

Author Hugh Ryan speaking about the extant Jefferson Market Courthouse and (since demolished) Women’s House of Detention. As Hugh shares, queer women and people who today might identify as nonbinary or transgender were prosecuted for “failures of femininity.”

Trailblazing gay rights activist Randy Wicker, who participated in the consequential “Sip-In” at Julius’ bar in 1966: “This was the first time a gay organization had publicly challenged the laws and regulations that forbid homosexuals to have access to public accommodations. It was against the liquor laws of New York State to allow any homosexuals to assemble or to be served alcohol in a bar.”

Project co-director Jay Shockley, sharing the events of the Snake Pit raid, which led to 167 gay men being arrested by the NYPD and one young man impaled on an iron fence: “Any way you look at it, that boy was pushed!! We are all being pushed.”

Project manager Amanda Davis, on the Oscar Wilde Memorial Bookshop, founded and owned by an “unsung hero of the LGBTQ rights movement,” Craig Rodwell. In the face of mainstream propaganda that said being LGBTQ was wrong, one could walk into the Bookshop “and read books that are saying exactly the opposite [which] must have been so incredible.”

Project co-director Ken Lustbader, narrating your visit to the Stonewall Inn, the site of the history-changing uprising in June 1969: “When you oppress people for so long, when you tell them that their lives aren’t legitimate, and you tell them that their identity isn’t real, it only takes a little moment to have an explosive response.”

PREVIEW FROM FEATURED AUDIO TOUR, “PLACING STONEWALL”:

LGBTQ+ activism didn’t begin at Stonewall, and it didn’t end there either.

It’s location in Greenwich Village is key in placing the 1969 uprising in LGBTQ+ history. An early “gayborhood,” the Village has been an important epicenter of LGBTQ+ life in New York City for well over a century.

In the pre-Stonewall years, amidst an atmosphere of fear and repression, gay bars and other social gathering spaces were crucial in creating a sense of community and brewing political agitation. Though discrimination remained post-Stonewall, the gay liberation era of the early 1970s ushered in a new wave of unapologetic activism and increased visibility.

About the NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project
The NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project, launched in 2015 by preservation professionals, is an award-winning cultural heritage initiative and educational resource documenting and presenting historic sites connected to the LGBT community throughout New York City. Its website, including an interactive map, features 450+ diverse places from the 17th century to 2000 that are important to LGBT history and illustrate the community’s influence on NYC and American culture.

The project researches and nominates LGBT sites to the National Register, advocates for the official recognition of LGBT historic sites, provides walking tours (also accessible through a free-app), presents lectures, engages the community through events, develops educational programs for New York City public school students, and disseminates its content through robust social media channels. Its goal is to make an invisible history visible while fostering pride and awareness.

Web: www.nyclgbtsites.org
Instagram: @nyclgbtsites
Twitter: @nyclgbtsites
Facebook: /nyclgbtsites

The New York Times has a newly-published guide about places to visit in New York City during Pride 2024, and talked to Project co-director Ken Lustbader about Woodlawn Cemetery’s importance as a final resting place for important LGBT figures.

“It’s moving to know that there were people who lived these lives very bravely, heroically in the past,” said Ken Lustbader, a co-founder of the NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project. “Without the support systems that exist today, but paving the way for the visibility and allies that we have today through their actions.”

Each year for Pride, his organization offers a trolley tour of the [Woodlawn] cemetery, highlighting the stories behind some of the burial sites and making them more visible by placing rainbow flags next to them.

For the full article, visit the New York Times.