Unlike our usual format of featuring one or two voices in each episode, in “Prelude to a Riot” we share multiple voices to set the stage for that now-iconic night on Christopher Street in Greenwich Village when LGBTQ people said “Enough!” in a voice so loud and angry that it was the police who ran from us and not the other way around. And that’s the story we cover in this first of four episodes marking the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall uprising. Just a riot and the rest was history.īut I quickly discovered that Stonewall had rich, complex, fraught, compelling, exciting, and inspirational backstory. Gay people fought back against police oppression and the gay rights movement was born.
Episode Notesįrom Eric Marcus: Context is everything! When I first started researching the Making Gay History book (originally called Making History and now available as an e-book ), I thought that the Stonewall uprising was a singular event. Credit: From the collection of Tom Bernardin. Matchbook cover advertising Bonnie’s Stonewall Inn, c.
