Christopher Street

History

Described by The Gay Insider (1971) as the “near-legendary path of gays for decades,” Christopher Street historically served as the main corridor to the busy Greenwich Village waterfront. The piers, ships, bars, and seamen made the waterfront a popular cruising area for gay men since at least World War I. By the mid-1960s, Christopher Street gained a national reputation as a gay cruising ground.

Christopher Street between Seventh Avenue South and Greenwich Avenue featured prominently during the June 1969 police raid of the Stonewall Inn, when large crowds gathered on the street in front of the bar. This included young people hanging out in the adjacent Christopher Park, a longtime hangout for a diverse group of (often homeless) LGBT street youth. During the subsequent uprising, people shouted, “Christopher Street belongs to the queens!” and “Liberate Christopher Street,” according to gay rights activist Dick Leitsch, who witnessed the event. He also noted that the street “had become an almost solid mass of people – most of them gay. No traffic could pass, and even walking the few blocks on foot was next to impossible.”

In the 1970s, the street took on global significance as LGBT activists organized marches to commemorate the uprising. Christopher Street Liberation Day was chosen as the name for the first NYC Pride March, in 1970. That same year, organizers in Los Angeles named their inaugural march Christopher Street West. In 1978, the first Christopher Street Day was held in Europe. (The block of Christopher Street between Waverly Place and Seventh Avenue South, the location of the Stonewall building, was co-named Stonewall Place in 1989.)

In the years leading to the uprising, the center of LGBT life in Greenwich Village had begun moving west from Washington Square and Greenwich Avenue to Christopher Street. Recognizing the street’s increasing importance to the LGBT community, the Mattachine Society, the leading pre-Stonewall gay rights group, moved its offices to 59 Christopher in 1972; Craig Rodwell moved his Oscar Wilde Memorial Bookshop to 15 Christopher in 1973. The street name has also been used in gay press, including the magazine Christopher Street (1976-1995).

The narrow, east-west thoroughfare, with its many gay bars and businesses, lent itself to being a more intimate and safe cruising area for gay and bisexual men and those who might identify today as transgender. Since the 1960s, at one point or another, bars, restaurants, cabaret theater, Off-Broadway theater, bookstores, and clothing, adult, and other specialty shops catering to the LGBT community have operated on every block of Christopher Street, which spans from Sixth Avenue to the waterfront. A 1977 issue of Blueboy noted that the gift shop Laminations, at no. 35, was “the newest addition to Christopher Street’s world-famous array of specialty shops.”

A selection of other gay-owned businesses include The Leather Man, a leather and S&M shop that opened at no. 85 in 1965 and moved to no. 111, where it still operates, in 1978; Ty’s, a self-described “man’s bar” that has operated at no. 114 since 1972; and Boots & Saddle, which, for 40 years beginning in 1974, operated at no. 76 as one of Christopher Street’s longest-running gay bars before a rent increase forced it to close.

Trilogy (1978-c. 1987) at 135 Christopher was “filled with handsome men who rarely glance at their food,” according to The Advocate. The space later held Chi Chiz (1999-2011), popular with Black gay men and transgender people. Christopher Street Book Shop (1972-2006) at 500 Hudson Street, corner of Christopher, was a popular gay male erotica shop; a sex club in the basement closed during the height of the AIDS epidemic.

In the 1970s and 1980s, the western end, at Weehawken and West Streets, became a nucleus for gay bars and was famous for the huge crowds of men on the weekends. Bars included West Beach Bar & Grill (c. 1970-80) and Badlands (c. 1983-91) at 388-390 West Street; Choo Choo’s Pier (c. 1972) and Sneakers (c. late 1970s-99) at 392-393 West Street; Peter Rabbit (c. 1972-88) at 396-397 West Street; Ramrod (c. 1976-80) at 394-395 West Street; and Dugout (c. 1985-2006) at 185 Christopher Street.

The large loss of life brought on by the AIDS epidemic in the 1980s and 1990s dramatically impacted Christopher Street’s identity as a prominent gay thoroughfare. In response to the crisis, St. Veronica’s, at 149-155 Christopher, was one of the few welcoming Roman Catholic churches for people living with HIV/AIDS. In 1996, Bailey-Holt House opened at 180 Christopher as the nation’s first permanent home for people living with AIDS.

Despite this devastating period, Christopher Street continues to be synonymous worldwide with LGBT people – a testament to the street’s long-standing importance to the community – and several LGBT businesses still operate there. Since 1970, the street, particularly by Stonewall and Christopher Park (designated Stonewall National Monument in 2016), has been a site of commemoration and protest.

Landmark Designations for LGBT Significance
See a detailed list of LGBT businesses along and off Christopher Street by viewing the additional documentation to the Greenwich Village Historic District (National Register of Historic Places) – completed by the NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project in 2024 – in the “Read More” section below.

Entry by Amanda Davis, project manager (May 2025).

NOTE: Names above in bold indicate LGBT people.