Matthew Riemer - We Are Everywhere: Protest, Power, and Pride in the History of Queer Liberation

Copyright 2019 by Matthew Riemer and Leighton Brown.

Foreword copyright 2019 by Eric Marcus.

Photographs copyright by individual photographers or companies as noted.

All rights reserved.

Published in the United States by Ten Speed Press, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.

www.crownpublishing.com

www.tenspeed.com

Ten Speed Press and the Ten Speed Press colophon are registered trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.

Movement in Black, copyright by Anastasia Dunham-Parker-Brady; used with permission from the Estate of Pat Parker.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file with the publisher.

Hardcover ISBN9780399581816

Ebook ISBN9780399581823

Cover: Marsha P. Johnson and a friend, Christopher Street Liberation Day, New York City, June 27, 1976. Photo/copyright by Biscayne/Kim Peterson.

: Christopher Street West, Los Angeles, July 4, 1976. Photographer unknown. From the authors collection.

A note on color: The dominant color tone used throughout We Are Everywhere is a saturated fuchsia, the same color used in the triangle design of the SILENCE = DEATH Projects famous 1986 poster.

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This book is dedicated to the liberated spirits of

Ancestors

Magnus Hirschfeld, Henry Gerber, and Manuel boyFrank

Founders

Edythe Eyde, Harry Hay, Jim Kepner, W. Dorr Legg, Del Martin, Mabel Hampton, Christine Jorgensen, Reed Erickson, Marty Robinson, Brenda Howard, and Craig Rodwell

Radicals

Barbara Gittings and Frank Kameny

Outlaws

James Baldwin, Jeanne Crdova, Audre Lorde, and Pat Parker

Warriors

Sylvia Rivera and Leslie Feinberg

People With AIDS

Ortez Alderson, Michael Callen, Bobbi Campbell, John Lorenzini, Ray Navarro, Bob Rafsky, and Lou Sullivan

Victims

Gatan Dugas, Marsha P. Johnson, Hattie Mae Cohens, Brian Mock, Brandon Teena, and Chanelle Pickett

And to

all those whose stories are waiting to be told.

Acknowledgments

Because of the nature of this project, our gratitude has no beginning and no end. Its impossible for us to adequately thank all those whove made possible @lgbt_history, We Are Everywhere, our lives as proud queer people, or the incredible history we strive to convey. Above all, we are infinitely grateful to the queer community, our multi-faceted, extraordinarily complicated, exceedingly frustrating, underappreciated, beautifully diverse, inspiring, loving, angry, butch, flaming, non-binary, resilient family that refuses to be ignored. This book is for and about you; we hope we make you proud.

History is made and preserved by and for particular classes of people. A camera in some hands can preserve an alternate history.

David Wojnarowicz, 1990

Over the past few years, weve had the honor of getting to know and work with some of the countless photographers, historians, archivists, and activists whove spent their lives making, capturing, and protecting queer history, and were proud to call many of them our friends and family. We owe special thanks to Lynn Harris Ballen, Daniel Nicoletta, Dona Ann McAdams and Brad Kessler, Robert Fisch, Kim Peterson, Eric Marcus and Barney Karpfinger, Gerard Ilaria and Steve Wilkinson, Lance Black, Mariette Pathy Allen, Rich Wandel, Allan Clear, Marc Geller, Rick Gerharter, Kay (Tobin) Lahusen, Randy Wicker, David Robinson, Doreena Wong and Jenny Pizer, Sara Burningham, Ken Lustbader, Jay Shockley, Amanda Davis, Levi Jackman and Jake Connolly, Mark Segal, Gerard Koskovich, Gwenn Craig, Lori Seid, Peter Staley, Avram Finkelstein, Sue Hyde, Urvashi Vaid, Carolina Kroon, Saul Bromberger and Sandra Hoover, Martin Boyce, Stephen Vider, Tyger Latham, Jesse Whiting, Elvert Barnes, David Prasad, Alan Light, Saskia Scheffer, Morgan Gwenwald, J. D. Doyle, Larry Criscione, Adam Werner, Pat Rocco, Jason Baumann, Ken Selnick, Will Brant, Bob Skiba, Caitlin McCarthy, Bob Civil, Tommi Avicolli Mecca, Joseph Hawkins, Patricia Delara, Kevin T. Jones, Nancy Toder, Andrew Gould, Loni Shibuyama, the family of Fred W. McDarrah, Janson Wu, Mara Keisling, Professor Max Kirkeberg, Gary ONeil, Christina Moretta, Craig Simpson, Michael Key, and all those at Ten Speed Press, the USC/ONE National Gay & Lesbian Archives, the GLBT Historical Society in San Francisco, the LGBT Community Center National History Archive in New York City, Houstons Botts Collection of LGBT History, the Digital Transgender Archive, Chicagos Gerber/Hart Library and Archives, the Lambda Archives of San Diego, the John J. Wilcox, Jr. Archives at the William Way Center in Philadelphia, the Lesbian Herstory Archives, the History Project in Boston, the San Francisco History Center at the San Francisco Public Library, the Special Collections of the New York Public Library, the Schlesinger Library at Harvard University, the San Jos State University Special Collections & Archives, the Washington Blade, the Bay Area Reporter, and the Library of Congress.

We stand on the shoulders of those whove demanded our community look beyond dominant narratives in search not for the stories we want but instead for the history we have. Weve been inspired particularly by the works of James Baldwin, Allan Brub, Judith Butler, George Chauncey, Douglas Crimp, John DEmilio, Madeline D. Davis, Lillian Faderman, Leslie Feinberg, Deborah Gould, Lani Kaahumanu, Jonathan Ned Katz, Elizabeth Lapovsky Kennedy, Audre Lorde, Kevin J. Mumford, Joan Nestle, James T. Sears, Susan Stryker, James F. Wilson, and David Wojnarowicz.

This book wouldnt exist if not for the intelligence and patience of its designer, Annie Marino, and editor, Kaitlin Ketchum. Our appreciation and respect for them know no bounds.

We thank our families: Linda Brown and John Gallagher; Dottie and Steve Hall; Neil Riemer; Emily, Owen, Maddy, and Aidan Cottone; Mary Alice, Ben, Scarlett, Ginger, Rosalie, and Maria Gunther-Riemer; Jon and Amy Brown; Lindsay Brown; Morganne Pollie; Graham Ball; Dave Tierney; Coco Curtis; and Peter Reichertz.

Matthew thanks Kathryn Respess, may she rest in power, and Laura Camp, two incredible history teachers who found joy in the details that others ignored.

Matthew also thanks Leighton for his ceaseless capacity to inspire, challenge, excite, and brighten. You are my home, my heart, and the source of all the best things I know.

We both give special thanks to our dog, Virgil, for bearing with us.

And we thank Dick Leitsch, whose death shortly before we finished this book reminded us why we started in the first place: This is the gay community, not some heterosexual suburb where everyone has to be just like everyone else.