A Thumbnail of Contemporary Gay History
Significant Events of The Twentieth Century

• 1903 Adol Brand Founded Gemeinschaft der Eigenen (Community of Self-Owners)
  It's goal was to work for the love of friends. Brand also published the first known gay journal Der Eigene which he published from 1896-1931.

• 1906 Maximilian Harden, Published a Warning of the Danger Presented by Homosexual Conspiracy.
  Writing in Berlin's Die Zukunft he warned, Homoseuals are "a comradeship ... which brings together men of all creeds, states, and classes. These men are to be found everywhere, in the army and navy, in newspaper offices, behind teachers desks, even in courtrooms." Although he was correct in what he said, his homophobia prevented him from seeing the positive benefits of bringing together men of all creeds, states, and classes.

• 1908 Edward Carpenter Published The Intermediate Sex in England.
  In this work, Carpenter idealizes the concepts of friendship and homosexuality.

• 1909 Oral Sex Outlawed in Kentucky.
  Two black men, accused of mutual oral sex could not be convicted because the judge couldn't fina any existing law with which to convict them. On his recommendation, Kentucky and several other states outlawed oral sex.

• 1911 Holland Passed a Law Prohibiting Homosexual Conduct Between Men Under the Age of 21.

• 1912 The Scientific Humanitarian Committee (founded 1897 in Germany) Began Polling of Political Candidates.
  91 of 96 candidates in the Reichstag election responded that they favored gay rights.

• 1913 Alfred Redl was Exposed as an Austrian Double Agent Working for the Russians.
  The significance of this is event is that Redl committed suicide the day after he was exposed and investigators found photos of nude men, perfumed love letters from another man, and other evidence that he was a homosexual. The case was widely publicized and fueled th notion that homosexuals present security risks. In 1950 Senator Joseph McCarthy cited the Redl case to substantiate similar claims.

• 1917 Soviet Union New Revolutionary Government Repeals the Anti-gay Laws of the Tsarist Regime.

• 1919 Magnus Hirschfeld Founded the Institute for Sexology in Berlin.
  The institute purchased a palace in Berlin to house the world's first sex counseling center, a museum, and a series of educational events. The institute devoted it work to civil rights for women, civil rights for gays, lealization of contraception, legalization of abortion, sex education, and confidential treatment of sexually transmitted diseases. Magnus Hirschfeld also starred with Konrad Veidt in the film Different From Others possibly the first film ever to offer a positive perspective on homosexuality.

• 1921 Marcel Proust Published Sodeme et Gomorrhe in France.
  This book helped to demystify homosexuality and is most noted for depicting homosexuality as a social world instead of isolated individuals.

• 1921 Theatre des Eros was Founded in Berlin.
  Theatre des Eros is believed to be the first theater devoted entirely to gay plays.

• 1922 Soviet Union Re-introduces "Crimes Against Nature" and Recriminalized Homosexuality.

• 1922 Sholom Asch's Play The God of Vengeance Was Produced in Provincetown
  This was the first play on an American stage to depict gay or lesbian characters. The play created an outcry against homosexuality the following year when it went on Broadway.

• 1922 Magnus Hirschfeld presented a petition to abolish paragraph 175 to the Reichstag.
  Paragraph 175 was Germany's anti-gay law. The petition was unsuccessful although it was signed by such prominent intellectuals as Magnus Hirscfeld, Albert Einstein, Herman Hesse, Thomas Mann, and Leo Tolstoy.

• 1924 Henry Gerber incorporated the Society for Human Rights.
  Society for Human Rights was a nonprofit corporation in Illinois and is believed to be the first homosexual organization in the United States. The organization published the first gay magazine published in the United States, Friendship and Freedom which lasted for two issues. The wife of one member found their literature and turned it over to the police. Gerber and others were arrested, and although the charges were eventually dropped, Gerber lost his job and was psychologically devastated by the lack of support from his gay friends. Gerber moved to New York and joined the army. The organization lasted only a few months but had a significant place in gay history for the affect it had on future generations of gay organizers.

• 1924 Andre' Gide Made His Homosexuality Public.
  In If it Die Gide made his homosexuality public. He was the first major public figure to come out publicly in modern times.

• 1928 Radclyffe Hall Published The Well of Loneliness.
  It is one of the first and best known book with a lesbian theme. In it's time it gave hope to many lesbians by breaking the silence on the subject of lesbianism and depicting a relationship between two women.

• 1933 Hitler Banned the Gay Press in Germany.
  On January 30, 1933 Hitler banned the gay press and raided five gay newspapers.

• 1933 Hitler Raided the Instutue for Sexology.
  In the raid, an estimated twelve thousand books, periodicals, and other documents from the Institute library were burned. Among the irreplaceable items lost wer unpublished manuscripts by Karl Ulrichs and Richard von Krafft-Ebing. This event marked the end of the gay rights movement in Germany.

• 1933 Denmark Repealed Its Anti-sodomy Laws.

• 1934 The Anti-Gay Holocaust Began on June 28th in Germany.
  On June 28th, 1934 the SS troops rounded up some 200 people and executed them. Hitler announced that the purge victims were "homosexual pigs who have besmirched the honor of the party". This event became known as "the Night of the Long Knives". Among the high ranking officers was Hitler's deputy Ernst Rohm. Rohm was briefly imprisoned and asked to commit suicide, but when he declined, he wa murdered. As the year progressed, the anti-gay holocost intensified as the Nazis rounded up gay people from other occupied countries and sent them to German concentration camps.

• 1934 The Soviet Union Decreed Homosexuality was Degeneracy of the Fascist Bourgeoisie.
  The new law carried a five year jail sentence for homosexual acts.

• 1935 Nazi's Outlaw Gay Kissing, Embraces Between Men, and Gay Fantasies.

• 1936 "Mona's", the First Lesbian Bar in San Francsico Opened at 140 Columbus Street.
  Although not the first lesbian bar in the United States, it was a famous gathering spot for women and with the help of a marquee that read "Where Girls Will Be Boys", it became a famous tourist attraction.

• 1937 The Nazi Regime Began Using an Inverted Pink Triangle to Identify Gay People in Concentration Camps.

• 1937 Switzerland Repealed its Anti-gay Laws.

• 1937 Bachelor magazine began publication.
  It promised to mirror the varied interests of the discerning cosmopolite in society, business, profession, politics, sports, theater, adventure, arts, and sciences. Hunks of the day such as "Tarzan" Buster Crabbe and Tyrone Power appeared in swimsuits and a cartoon showed two naked women emerging from the water with one saying to the other, "don't look now, but I think we've come up in the wrong magazine!". The magazine lasted only for nine issues.

• 1941 Word War II Began.
  The significance of this event to gay history is in the platooning of men and women in sex-segregated environments in which many men and women discovered their gay feelings. Historians attribute the growth of gay consciousness in the following decades to the sex-segregated environments.

• 1941 U. S. Surgeon General Declared Homosexual Relationships Should be Tolerated if Kept Private.
  WAC officers were told to tolerate lesbian relationships as much as possible. One edict threatened a severe reprimand to any officer bringing an "unprovable" charge against a woman.

• 1944 Sweden Repealed its Anti-gay Laws.

• 1945 Bob Mizer Founded the Athletic Model Guild in Los Angeles.
  The Athletic Model Guild was a pioneer in erotic male photography. At the time it was published as physique and bodybuilding literature. The AMG was first housed in his mother's home at 1834 West Eleventh Street in Los Angeles. After initially failing at a photo studio selling prints to aspiring actors and models, Bob began concentraing on physique photography and men began appearing in numbers to be photographed. AMG was an oasis in a heterosexual desert and was deluged with order from every continent. Bob Mizer published Physique Pictorial from 1951 to 1990 and your webmaster was a subscriber. Bob Mizer could be charactarized as the father of gay erotica. Look for a seperate web page on Bob Mizer in The Gay Village University.

• 1946 C. O. C. founded in Holland.
  C.O.C. by 1966 was the world's largest known homosexual organization.

• 1947 Edythe Eyde Under Pseudonym Lisa Ben published Vice Versa.
  Vice Versa was the first lesbian magazine in the United States.The magazine was hand typed using carbon paper and circulated clandestinely among readers who made copies for their friends. The magazine claimed to be America's gayest magazine.

• 1948 Alfred Kinsey Published the Kinsey Report.
  The significance of the report is that until this report was published, most gay people felt they were one of a kind. The Kinsey Report found that 4%of adult men were exclusively homosexual, 13% were more than incidentally homosexual, and 37% of adult men had a homosexual experience in their adult lives. This report gave hope to millions of surpised, closeted gays who until then believed they were alone in their feelings and experiences.

• 1948 Gore Vidal Published The City and the Pillar.
  Although not the first gay novel, it received widespread attention and marked the beginning of the post-war surge in gay writing.

• 1950 Harry Hay Began The Mattachine Society.
  Society for Human Rights was the first gay organization in America and inspired Harry Hay, but The Mattachine Society was the first to grow and inspire other organizations. Historian give credit to Harry Hay and The Mattachine Society as being the start of the modern organized gay movement. Ironically, Harry Hay and two other of its founders were former members of the communist party and although it was communist organizing skills that made The Mattachine Society successful, their former communist affiliation became public knowledge and forced them to resign. For a more complete biography of Harry Hay, look for a separate page in The Gay Village University.

• 1950 Joseph McCarthy Begins Gay Witch-Hunts.
  Speaking to a subcommittee of the U. S. House Committee on Un-American Activities, McCarthy proclaimed that "those who engage in overt acts of perversion lack the emotional stability of normal persons..." He concluded, "...even one sex pervert in a Government agency tends to have a corrosive influence." This was the beginning of the purge of lesbians and gay men from the government and military.

• 1951 California Supreme Court Decides the Black Cat Case.
  In 1949 the California Alcoholic Beverage Control Department closed the Black Cat, charging it was a disorderly house and meeting place for persons of known homosexual tendencies. Patrons and other supporters fought the charges and the California Superme Court ruled in 1951 taht mere patronage of a public restaurant and bar by homosexuals was not suffieient reason to close it. This was a major event in gay history as it marked the first time openly gay men and lesbians had legally won the right to gather openly and publicly.

• 1951 Dorr Legg and Merton Bird Formed Knights of the Clock.
  Knights of the Clock was an interracial gay social club.

• 1952 The Mattachine Society Defended Dale Jennings Against Charges of Soliciting for Sex.
  The Jennings case involved a Los Angeles man accused of soliciting a police officer for sex. He admitted being gay, but denied having solicted the officer. The Mattachine Society defended Jennings and the charges against him were dismissed. The case was important in gay history because it marked the transition in The Mattachine Society from intellectual discussion and debate to activism. The case also brough wide media coverage, a surge in membership, and a new morale.

• 1952 One, Inc. is founded by Dorr Legg, Martin Black, Dale Jennings, Guy Rousseau, Merton Bird, Don Slater, and Tony Reyes.
  On October 15, 1952 the organization was Incorporated in California. The name ONE was suggested by a black man and founding member Guy Rousseau who suggested the name based on a quote from Thomas Carlyle, "A mystic bond of brotherhood makes all men one."

• 1953 One, Inc. Begins Publishing an Openly Gay Magazine and Begins a Long Term Legal Battle with The U. S. Post Office.
  Although not the first openly gay magazine in the United States, it was the first to achieve wide circulation. One relied on the U. S. Post Office for circulation, and postal authorities claimed that articles about homosexuality were inherently obscene and specifically objected to an article on "gay marriages". The case against One, Inc. continued until 1958 when the U. S. Supreme Court ruled in One, Inc.'s favor.

• 1953 President Dwight D. Eisenhower Issued Executive Order Prohibiting Gay People from Federal Employment.
  In one of his first acts as President, Eisenhower issued the order prohibiting employment of gay men and lesbians in federal jobs. The order was soon followed by state and local governments and government contractors. Historians estimate that more than 20% of jobs were unavailable to gays and lesbians.

• 1953 The Mattachine Society Convention in Los Angeles.
  Harry Hay and other founding members of The Mattachine Society were forced to resign by members who threatened to turn their names into the FBI as communists. Look for another web page on Harry Hay in The Gay Village University. The convention marked the decline of The Mattachine Society in Los Angeles and a gentrification of the organization in other cities with the recruitment of "professional" people as it's core membership.

• 1955 The American Law Institute published its Model Penal Code.
  The Institutes code recommended decriminalizing of private sexual acts between consenting adults. Illinois became the first state to adopt the code and became the first state in the United States to decriminalize homosexual acts.

• 1955 The Boys of Boise Case Began in Boise, Idaho.
  Starting with the arrest of three men for homosexual activity, the case exploded into a major witch-hunt resulting in the investigation of over 1,000 men in a city of only 40,000 people. Nine men were ultimately sentence to prison terms of 15 years each. This case is the basis for the book by John Gerassi (former Time and Newsweek editor) The Boys of Boise in which he reveals the investigations were politically motivated by the mayor, prosecuting attorney, and police who wanted to capitalize on homophobia to build their own politcal careers.

• 1956 Phyllis Lyon Begins Publishing The Ladder .
  The Ladder was published by the San Francisco Daughers of Bilitis.

• 1956 The Church of ONE Brotherhood was founded in Los Angeles.
  Although it only lasted for one year, it is believed to have been the first gay church.

• 1957 The British Government Published the Wolfenden Report.
  The report recommended homosexual acts be legalized. The British Medical Association endorsed the report. While emphasizing that it believed homosexuality to be a sin, even the Catholic Church endorsed the report. After a three year national debate the proposal was defeated 2-1 in the House of Commons.

• 1957 The Crittenden Report.
  The Crittenden Report was sponsored by the U.S. Department of Defense, but was dismissed and ignored because the report concluded that security concerns about homosexuals in the military are exaggerated.

• 1957 American Civil Liberties Union Agrees Homosexuals are Security Risks.
  The ACLU expresses complete disinterest in gay rights cases, saying the govermnet was correct in classifying gays as security risks.

• 1957 Professor Dr. Evelyn Hooker Issues Her First Report on Male Homosexuals.
  UCLA sex researcher Evelyn Hooker issed the first of several reports disputing the belief that homosexual men are likely to have psychological problems. Her reports differed from previous studies because she did not focus on men who sought to be "helped". For her own studies Dr Hooker found subjects through gay organizations such as The Mattachine Society. Look for a seperate web page on Dr. Evelyn Hooker in The Gay Village University.

• 1958 Barbara Gittings Elected First President of New York Daugheters of Bilitis.
  Barbara Gittings served as president of the first East Coast Daughters of Bilitis until 1961.

• 1961 The Rejected was Broadcast in San Francisco by KQED Public Television.
  The Rejected was the first TV special on homosexuality. Margaret Mead was among the guests.

• 1961 Jose Sarria Ran for San Francisco Supervisor.
  Jose Sarria is credited with being the first opnely gay person to run for public office anywhere in the United States. Sarria was famous as an entertainer at the legendary Black Cat (see 1951) .

• 1962 Dr. Irving Bieber Concluded Homosexuality Was Casused by Seductive Mothers and Hostile Fathers.
  Dr Bieber claimed to analyze homosexuality scientifically and concluded that it was caused by seductive mothers and hostile fathers. Although the theory was not new, he gave it new widespread publicity.

• 1962 Hungary Repealed its Anti-gay Laws.

• 1963 Randy Wicker Organized First Gay Rights Picketing.
  Organized to protest unfair treatment of gays by the military, Randy Wicker picketed a New York Draft Induction Center.

• 1964 SIR Society For Individual Rights founded.
  SIR was founded by disgruntled members of an earlier organization, the League for Civil Education. SIR published a magazine called Vector and became the leading gay advocacy group on the west coast. Your webmaster was a subscriber of Vector and a non-active member of SIR.

• 1965 The First Drag Ball in San Francisco.
  500 lesbians and gay men crossed a picket line of cops to attend the first drag ball in San Francisco. Police photographers were on hand to document everyone who went in or out the floodlighted entrance. Publicity over the police handling of the event led to formation of a "Police Liason to the Gay Community".

• 1965 Gay Organizations Picketed the U. S. State Department
  The Daughters of Bilitis, The Mattachine Society, and other gay organizations protested the security policies of the U S Government by picketing the State Department, Civil Service Commission, Pentagon, and White House in Washington, D.C., and Indepence Hall in Philadelphia.

• 1965 Dean Rusk Vows State Department Will Discharge Any Employees Identied as Homosexual.
  On August 26, 1965 Dean Rusk issued a statement to the press that the State Department did not knowingly employ homosexuals, and would discharge any such employees if they were identified. The policy remained in effect for 12 years before being modified.

• 1966 Johannesburg Raid
  Police raided a gay party in a wealthy suburb of Johannesbur, South Africa which resulted in a parliamentary investigation into the extent of homosexuality. After two years of investigation, the report concluded that "all levels of society practice homosexuality on a scale which was hitherto unthinkable."

• 1966 Forty Delegate Meet in Kansas City, MO and for NACHO
  NACHO (North American Conference of Homophile Organizations) was formed by delegates of regional gay organizations and made plans at its' first meeting for a nationwide protest of the military's discriminatory policies. The organization disolved in 1970.

• 1966 Dick Michaels Arrested in Raid of Yukon Club in Los Angeles.
  Along with forty other patrons Dick Michaels was handcuffed, arrested, and hauled off to jail in a raid on the popular gay bar, the Yukon Club. This even so outrage Dick Michaels he became politically active and in 1967 began publishing The Los Angeles Advocate.

• 1966 Vanguard was Formed in San Francisco.
  Vanguard was a new kind of gay organization in which anarchists, communists, hippies, hustlers, and others joined together. The organization of radical street people was a dramatic departure from previous gay liberation organizations.

• 1967 Dick Michaels Begins Publishing The Los Angeles Advocate.
  At age 45 Dick Michaels invested $200 for a press run of 500 copies and within a year had reached 3,500 circulation. The newspaper changed formats many times over the years and remains the country's most prominent gay publication.

• 1967 Robert A. Martin Obtains School Charter for Homophile League.
  The homophile League chartered at Columbia College in New York City was the first gay campus group.

• 1967 N.Y.P.D. TV Program Features Gay Blackmail in First Episode.
  On September 5, 1967 the television show N.Y.P.D. featured a story about a blackmail ring that preyed on gay people. This was the first time a network program portrayed gay characters. The episode avoided stereotypes and featured a black police officer who saw the correlation with his own situation and sympathized with the gay characters.

• 1967 Mike Wallace Hosts CBS Special Report "The Homosexual"
  The report said, "...the average homosexual, if there be such, is promiscuous. He is not interested in, nor capable of, a lasting relationship, like that of a heterosexual marriage. His sex life, his love life, consists of a series of chance encounters at the clubs and bars he inhabits, and even on the streets." Although gay men are capable of a lasting relationship (ie my own 12 year relationship), in 1967 his depiction was probably the mode. As I recall, by 1967 sex clubs such as The Covered Wagon in San Francisco were all the rage and it is surprising he didn't mention them...even so, his depiction was quite shocking for TV in 1967.It was shocking to me when I first heard of sex clubs and quite unbelievable when I first witnessed one. I eventually got over it and joined in on the activity.

• 1967 Glide Methodist Church Boycotted Companies Which Discriminated Against Homosexuals.
  The first economic boycott on behalf of gay rights was initiated by the Glide Methodist Church in San Francisco when they announced they would not buy goods or services from any company which discriminated against homosexuals and at the same time encouraged others to join the boycott.

• 1967 ACLU Revered its Position on Gays in the Military and Government.
  The ACLU which had previously been unsympathetic to gay causes called for an end to anti-gay laws and discrimination in security cases. It called for the burden of proof to be on the government to prove a gay employee was a security risk.

• 1968 Reverend Troy Perry Founds a Non-denominational Church for Gays and Lesbians.
  The Metropolitan Community Church met for the first time on October 6th, 1968 in Los Angeles. From it's original 12 members, the church grew to over 500 members within two years and now operates internationally. Although I was never a member of the church, I was interested in the church and subscribed to their newsletter for the first several issues. I recently uncovered these relic newsletters and returned them to Reverend Perry and the Metropolitan Community Church, just in time for their 30th year anniversary celebration. All of their original archives were destroyed in an arson fire. click here to see one of these newsletters.

• 1969 Gale Wittington and Leo Laurence "Out" Themselves in The Berkeley Barb.
  After outing themselves in an article titled "don't Hide It", Wittington was fired by his employer States Steamship Company. The Committee for Homosexual Freedom was formed in response to his firing and the organization picket States Steamship Company and held demonstrations elsewhere. The organization was an early voice of the gay movement. As a subscriber to The Berkeley Barb in 1969 I recall that it was not a gay newspaper, but provided a forum for a variety of divergent opinions. There were a lot of gay articles and ads in it and it was widely known and had a large circulation over a wide area. It was in The Berkeley Barb that I first heard of The Los Angeles Advocate and immediately became a subscriber. Until just a few years ago I still had my copy of the first issue of The Los Angeles Advocate but it was lost by a moving company along with many other collectible historical documents when I moved from Long Beach to Hollywood.

• 1969 The Stonewall Riots June 28 - June 29, 1969.
  Credited as being the begining of the gay revolution, you can see from the preceding events that it really wasn't the beginning, but it was an event that changed the shape and course of the gay movement. Historians agree the incident became the world's first gay riot. As a member of The Mattachine Society, I first read about it in an article by William B. Kelley in The Mattachine Newsletter of July 1969 (click here to see my copy of the newsletter). The event was reported in the New York Times of June 30, The Village Voice of July 3, and The Berkeley Barb of July 4th. Kelley wrote, "In an unprecedented display of brute 'gay power', hundreds of young people angered by the New York police's treatment of the Stonewall Bar and its patrons rioted outside the bar on Jun 28, threatening Police, trying to overturn a patrol wagon, chanting and chalking slogans on walls. The next night, crowds formed again and attempted a demonstration, but police tactical forces eventually broke them up. The Stonewall is in Greenwich Village and is very popular with quite a young clientele. The police had entered reportedly to seize illegally sold liquor, no to arrest patrons. Judging from the compete havoc their visit wreaked inside the bar, their behavior may have been a bit provocative, and it seems there was a citizen over-reaction." The Stonewall incident was followed by vigilante group of residents in the borough of Queens who cut down all of the trees in a neighborhood park frequented by homosexuals. Although the police responded to a call of disorderly conduct during the lumbering event, they took no action. The New York Times ran stories and editorials for three days, coming out against cutting down trees. Other accounts of the Stonewall Riots have the patrons calling the police "PIGS", throwing pennies, beer bottles, bricks, and even a parking meter at the police. The police took refuge inside the bar and the crowd began attacking the bar. As the riot was escalating to an estimated 400 people, police inside the bar were on the verge of resorting to gunfire into the crowd, but just in the nick of time police reinforcements arrived and the crowd dispersed on their own. The owners of the Stonewall Inn were arrested for selling liquor without a license, so on the following night they gave away drinks. The riots resumed that night and each night for several evenings.

• 1969 American Sociological Association Condemns Oppression For Reasons of Sexual Preference.
  This action which condemned the firing, taking economic sanctions, and other oppressive actions against any persons for reasons of sexual preference is believed to be the first of its kind by any professional organization.

• 1969 U. S. Court of Appeals Holds Homosexuality Does Not Disqualify Government Employees.
  On July 1, 1969 the U S Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia ruled that homosexuality does not automatically disqualify a Government employee from continuing in his job. The decision came in the case of Clifford L. Norton in a suit against his former employer, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration employee. The court found that merely alleging homsexuality as evidence of a generalized immoraility is insufficient cause to discharge a Federal employee. The cas was unusual in that the decision went to the heart of the controversy, addressing whether immorality in the form of homosexuality is ground for discharge from the Civl Service rather than disposing of the case on more limited available grounds.

• 1970 Gay Activists in Four Cities Commemorate Stonewall Riots.
  On June 27 and 28th, 1970 gay activist in Los Angeles, New york, Chicago and San Francisco marched in parade fashion to commemorate the first anniversary of the Stonewall Riots of a year earlier. These anniversary events established the Stonewall Rebellion as the beginning of the modern gay movement. I attended the event in San Francisco only by accident when I stumbled upon it. At the time I was most interested in the attractive men and oblivious to the historical importance of the event. I suspect this has been the case for many men attending subsequent events. I attended every Christopher Street/Stonewall Parade in San Francisco until 1984 and then attended every Christopher Street/Stonewall Parade in West Hollywood until 1989 when I concluded the event had become a commercialized circuit party. For me the parades became painful reminders that ALL of the friends that had shared the fun and excitement of past parades were now dead from AIDS.

• 1970 NACHO Disolved After Convention in San Francisco.
  Bitterly divided by issues of the old leadership and the new gay liberationists, NACHO disolved after the August 25-28, 1970 convention in San Francisco. Arguments raged over such issues as wheter to permit heterosexuals to participate in the gay movement and whether or not to support the militant Black Panther Party.

• 1970 U. S. Commission on Obscenity and Pornography Urges Repeal.
  The Commission on Obscenity and Pornography sponsored by the Federal Government urged the repeal of most anti-pornography laws. The commission found that adult sex offenders actually had less exposure to erotica as adolescents than did the population at large and that most adults at some time had voluntarily viewed explicit material. Also of significance is that the commission also called for a massive increase in sex education programs for parents, teachers, doctors, and children.

• 1970 New York Bar Holds First Legislative Hearing on Gay rights.

• 1970 Rita Mae Brown and Other Lesbians Purged from N O W.

• 1971 N O W Acknowledged Oppression of Lesbians as a Feminist Concern.
  Only a year after purging their own organization of lesbians, The National Organization of Women at its annual convention acknowled the oppression of lesbians as a legitimate concern of feminism.

• 1971 Gay Community Services Center Opened in Los Angeles.
  The center provided counseling, rap groups, and a variety of other services and soon became the largest gay social service agency in the United States. Today the center is located a few blocks from where I live in Whitley Heights in Hollywood and occupies a high rise building formerly occupied by the Internal Revenue Service.

• 1972 William Johnson was Ordained a Minister by United Church of Christ.
  On April 30, 1972 William Johnson fielded questions from delegates of the United Church of Christ San Francisco area Ecclesiastical Council and was voted to be ordained as minister by 62 to 34.

• 1972 Washington, D.C. School Board Prohibits Anti-Gay Discrimination of Teachers.
  The Washington, D.C. School Board was the first in the United States to prohibit anti-gay discrimination in the hiring of teachers.