In February 2019, the
National LGBTQ Task Force and
Imperial Court System announced their plans for the Wall of Honor.[4] The monument committee accepted nominations to honor "the lives of LGBTQ trailblazers, pioneers and s/heroes who have passed", and have had a positive impact on
LGBTQ civil rights.[3]
Gloria Allen was a transgender activist who ran a non-profit charm school for trans youth. In addition to inspiring the play Charm, she received the Living Legend Award at the Trans 100 Awards and a Carmen Vázquez Award for Excellence in Leadership on Aging Issues from
SAGE. She was added to the wall in 2023.[9]
Ivy Bottini was a lesbian artist, activist and co-founder of the New York branch of the NOW, for whom she designed the logo in 1969. She was added to the wall in 2021.[10]
C
Michael Callen was a gay singer, songwriter, composer, author, and influential early AIDS activist.
Darcelle XV was a drag queen and coffee shop owner from Portland, OR. From 2016 until her death, she was recognized as the "world's oldest performing drag queen" by the
Guinness Book of World Records.[11] She was added to the wall in 2023.[9][12]
Ruth Ellis was an African American activist recognized as the oldest living out lesbian, passing away at 101. The
Ruth Ellis Center is named in her honor. She was added to the wall in 2021.[10]
Leslie Feinberg was a butch
transgender lesbian, author, communist organizer, and early
transgender activist, whose writings have been foundational in the field of
gender studies, as well as setting the standard for much of the terminology around gender identity.
Keith Haring was a gay
pop artist whose
graffiti-like work grew out of the New York City street culture of the 1980s addressing political and societal themes—especially homosexuality and
AIDS—through his own iconography and sexual allusions.
Heklina was a drag queen and stage actress. She co-founded Trannyshack (now called Mother), a long-running series of drag shows, and frequently collaborated with fellow drag queen and filmmaker
Peaches Christ. She was added to the wall in 2023.[14]
C. Wayne Hussey was one of the first openly gay residents of
Anchorage, Alaska. He was a drag queen and LGBTQ activist who founded the Alaskan
Imperial Court System.[16] In 1974 he was the first recipient of the Peter Dispirito Public Service Award, presented "to the person elected by the Alaska Gay and Lesbian Community who has contributed most to the advancement of the community."[17]
June Jordan was a Black bisexual poet, essayist, teacher, and activist who used her writing to discuss issues of gender, race, immigration, and representation. She advocated for
Black English Vernacular, and influenced
feminist, and
queer theory.
Leslie Jordan was an openly gay,
Emmy Award-winning actor best known for playing a supporting role on
Will & Grace. Over a forty-year long career, he appeared in many films, plays, and TV shows, and became a popular
Instagram personality during the
COVID-19 pandemic. He was added to the wall in 2023.[14]
Audre Lorde was a lesbian
feminist writer, librarian, and
civil rights activist whose work was influential in the formation of
womanism and the early versions of
identity politics. As a poet, she is known for both technical mastery and emotional expression, as well as her poems that express anger and outrage at civil and social injustice. Her poems and prose largely deal with issues related to
civil rights,
feminism, lesbianism, and the exploration of Black female identity.
Phyllis Lyon, was a lesbian
feminist and
LGBTQ rights activist who, along with her wife Del Martin founded the
Daughters of Bilitis (D.O.B.) in 1955. D.O.B. was the first social and political organization for lesbians in the U.S. and the couple acted as president and editor of the organization's magazine,
The Ladder. The couple joined NOW together, the first openly lesbian couple to do so. They were the first couple married in the historic
San Francisco 2004 same-sex weddings. As these weddings were ruled legally invalid, they were the first couple married again in June 2008, after the
California Supreme Court's decision In re Marriage Cases. She was added to the wall in 2020.[7]
Technical SergeantLeonard Philip Matlovich was a gay
Vietnam War veteran who fought to stay in the
United States Air Force after
coming out of the closet. He became a cause célèbre around which the gay community rallied. His photograph appeared on the cover of the September 8, 1975 issue of Time magazine, making him a symbol for thousands of gay and lesbian service members and gay people generally.[19][20][21] Matlovich was the first named openly gay person to appear on the cover of a U.S. news magazine.[22]
Jeffrey Montgomery was an American
LGBT activist and public relations executive. In 1984, his partner was shot to death outside a Detroit gay bar, prompting Montgomery to engage in LGBT advocacy. He started work on LGBT anti-violence issues upon learning that the police were not spending many resources on solving the murder, calling it "just another gay killing".[25] In 1991, Montgomery helped found the Triangle Foundation (now
Equality Michigan) in order to advocate for
LGBT victims of violence and to improve handling of LGBT related cases. He became nationally known for his work and served at numerous organizations.
P
Pat Parker was a Black lesbian
feminist poet and activist.[26][27] Her poetry addressed her tough childhood growing up in poverty, dealing with sexual assault, and the murder of a sister, along with many issues facing lesbians and Black women in contemporary culture.[28] After two divorces she
came out as a lesbian, "embracing her
sexuality" she was liberated and "knew no limits when it came to expressing the innermost parts of herself".[28] Parker participated in political activism and had early involvement with the
Black Panther Party, Black Women's Revolutionary Council and formed the
Women's Press Collective.[29] She participated in many forms of activism especially regarding gay and lesbian communities,
domestic violence, and rights of
people of color.[30] After she became too ill to perform, other poets and musicians continued to perform her work at music and arts festivals, "Movement in Black" being particularly popular.
Jimmy Pisano was a gay man who purchased the original
Stonewall Inn location and reopened it as a bar called "Stonewall" in 1990. It never turned a profit, but Pisano and his then-partner kept the bar open until Pisano's death from AIDS complications in 1994.[31] He was added to the wall in 2021.[10]
Achebe Betty Powell was the first Black lesbian to serve on the board of directors of the
National Gay Task Force, and a founding member of the
Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice. She attended the historic meeting of lesbian and gay leaders at the
Carter White House in 1977, and worked with several feminist organizations around the world. She was added to the wall in 2023.[14]
R
Chuck Renslow was an openly gay photographer, activist and businessperson, known for pioneering modern
homoerotic photography, and establishing landmarks of gay male culture, including significant contributions to the
leather subculture. His accomplishments included opening the Gold Coast bar in 1958. It was the world's first gay
leather bar, and hosted a leather contest that grew into the
International Mr. Leather competition. His lover of 43 years was
Dom Orejudos, aka the artist "Etienne" and "Stephen". Renslow also formed the
Leather Archives and Museum with
Tony DeBlase in Chicago in 1991.[32][33]
Adrienne Rich was a lesbian
feminist poet and essayist, called "one of the most widely read and influential poets of the second half of the 20th century", and credited with bringing "the oppression of women and lesbians to the forefront of poetic discourse." Rich criticized rigid forms of feminist identities, and valorized what she coined the "lesbian continuum"; a female continuum of solidarity and creativity which has impacted and filled women's lives. She famously declined the
National Medal of Arts, protesting then-
House SpeakerNewt Gingrich's attempt to end the
National Endowment for the Arts.
Monica Roberts was an African-American blogger, writer, and transgender rights advocate. She was the founding editor of TransGriot, a blog focusing on issues pertaining to trans women, particularly African-American and other women of color. Roberts' coverage of transgender homicide victims in the United States is credited for bringing national attention to the issue. She was added to the wall in 2021.[10]
Craig Rodwell was a gay activist known for founding the first bookstore devoted to gay and lesbian authors (Oscar Wilde Memorial Bookshop in November 1967), and as the prime mover for the creation of
New York City Pride. Rodwell is considered by some to be the leading
gay rights activist in the homophile movement of the 1960s.
Vito Russo was a gay
LGBT activist,
film historian and author best known for The Celluloid Closet (1981, revised edition 1987), described in The New York Times as "an essential reference book" on homosexuality in the US film industry.[34] It was later turned into a documentary film. In 1985 he co-founded the
Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD), a watchdog organization that strives to end
anti-LGBTQ rhetoric, and advocates for LGBTQ inclusion in popular media.
José Sarria better known as Absolute Empress I de San Francisco, and the Widow Norton, was a gay community organizer and political activist who became the first openly gay candidate for public office in the United States in 1961. He performed for years as a live-singing
drag queen doing
parodies of operas at the
Black Cat Bar and founded the
Imperial Court System, one of the oldest and largest LGBT organizations in the world, with chapters throughout North America.
Sean Sasser was an American educator, activist, pastry chef and reality television personality best known for his appearances on MTV's The Real World: San Francisco, which depicted his relationship with fellow AIDS activist
Pedro Zamora. This included a
commitment ceremony in which the two exchanged vows, the first such ceremony for a same sex couple on television, and considered a landmark event in the medium.[35] He was added to the wall in 2020.[7]
Stephen Sondheim, a New York gay man, was a composer and lyricist of some of the most influential musicals of the modern era. He was added to the wall in 2022.[9]
Aimee Stephens was an American funeral director known for her fight for civil rights for
transgender people.[36] She worked as a funeral director in Detroit and was fired for being transgender. Based on
her court case, in a historic 2020 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the
1964 Civil Rights Act protects gay, lesbian, and transgender employees from discrimination based on sex.[37] She was added to the wall in 2020.[7]
Lou Sullivan was a
trans man author and activist known for his work on behalf of trans men. He was perhaps the first transgender man to publicly identify as gay and is largely responsible for the modern understanding of
sexual orientation and
gender identity as distinct, unrelated concepts. He was a pioneer of the grassroots female-to-male (FTM) movement and founded
FTM International, the first advocacy group for transgender men. He lobbied the
American Psychiatric Association and the
World Professional Association for Transgender Health for them to recognize his existence as a gay trans man determined to change people's attitudes towards trans homosexuals and to change the medical process of
transitioning making the process "orientation blind".
U
Virginia Uribe was lesbian and an educator, counselor and
LGBTQ youth education outreach advocate. She was best known for founding Project 10, an educational support and
drop-out prevention program for LGBTQ youth. She founded Project 10 in 1984 to help schools curtail harassment of, and reduce the
dropout rate of, LGBTQ students in the
Los Angeles Unified School District.
V
Urvashi Vaid was an Indian-born American LGBT rights activist, lawyer, and writer. She held a series of roles at the
National LGBTQ Task Force, wrote multiple books, and founded LPAC, the first lesbian
Super PAC. She was added to the wall in 2022.[9]
Carmen Vázquez was a
Puerto Rican lesbian and advocate for LGBT health, serving in or founding numerous organizations. She was added to the wall in 2021.[10]
Bruce Raymond Voeller was a gay rights activist and
biologist who conducted research primarily in the field of AIDS. In 1973, he co-founded the
National Gay Task Force (now renamed National LGBTQ Task Force). In 1977, President
Jimmy Carter welcomed
openly gay and lesbian Task Force leaders for the first official discussion of
gay and lesbian rights in the White House. Within the
first few years of the AIDS pandemic, Voeller coined the term acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) that is still used today.
Edith "Edie" Windsor was a lesbian
LGBT rights activist and a technology manager at
IBM. She was the lead plaintiff in the United States Supreme Court case United States v. Windsor (2013). The case overturned Section 3 of the
Defense of Marriage Act, which was a major victory in the struggle for same-sex marriage in the U.S. The decision led federal agencies in the Obama administration to extend rights, benefits, and privileges to same-sex married couples.
Soni Wolf was a self-described
dyke, motorcycle enthusiast, former
U.S. Air ForceVietnam-era veteran, and "tenacious"
queer activist.[40] She co-founded the
Dykes on Bikes (DOB) at the 1976
San Francisco Pride parade and rode with them each year until her death in 2018.[40] The group was a highly visible symbol of empowerment and
LGBT pride.[40] DOB did "philanthropic work for LGBT causes and organizations around the world".[40] Wolf continued to nurture DOB chapters worldwide and fought for their right to use the
reclaimed term dyke;[40] the DOB won a lawsuit against the
U.S. Patent and Trademark Office so they could trademark their name.[41]
Z
Pedro Zamora was an
openly gayCuban-American AIDS educator and television personality who appeared on
MTV's reality television series The Real World: San Francisco as one of the first openly gay men and person with AIDS to be portrayed in popular media. He brought international attention to HIV/AIDS and gave one of the first views into the daily lives of gay men. His interactions with his housemates exposed the
homophobia and prejudices faced by people with AIDS. Zamora's romantic relationship with
Sean Sasser was nominated by MTV viewers for the "Favorite Love Story" award.[42] The broadcast of their
commitment ceremony, in which they exchanged vows, was the first such
same-sex ceremony in television history, and is considered a landmark in the history of the medium.[43][44]
Sources
^Eric Rofes was omitted from the initial list but is listed on the Task Force's website.
^Lavietes, Matthew (June 27, 2019).
"LGBTQ heroes celebrated with wall of honour at Stonewall Inn in New York". Reuters. Retrieved December 25, 2022. Two others are considered martyrs of the LGBTQ cause: Harvey Milk, the first openly gay elected official in California whose assassination made him a martyr of the gay community and Matthew Shepard, a gay college student whose murder in 1998 garnered national attention;
^Ridinger, Robert (2005). "Founding of the Leather Archives & Museum". LGBT History, 1988–1992 [serial online]. LGBT Life with Full Text, EBSCOhost: 33–36.