At Christopher Street Tours, LGBTQ+ history is the heart of our work. Our mission is to increase access to LGBTQ+ history by sharing stories and uplifting voices of those who paved the way before us. When I launched Christopher Street Tours in 2018, I spent countless hours in the archives, buried in books and articles. I read dozens of books, listened to even more interviews and podcasts, and watched several documentaries. My responsibility then was to synthesize all of that history and information into a seamless, two-hour walking tour that was engaging and fun for the general public.
Since then, our Village Pride LGBTQ+ History walking tour has welcomed thousands of people from all over the world. But in addition to all of the information I’ve collected, there’s something else I wasn’t expecting to gain once I started giving tours: personal stories from LGBTQ+ elders. I had watched and listened to various interviews and conversations between leaders of the movement and people who are now considered queer elders. Yet, I hadn’t sat down as a young, queer person across the table from someone who had actually lived through the history. Naively, I thought that all the interviews had already been conducted, that people’s stories had already been shared, and I just was grateful to the previous and current historians and interviewers who collected those stories. How wrong I was!
Time and again, older queer people who have lived in the Village for decades would stop as they passed by a tour group. They’d listen for a moment, and then quietly approach me, often offering words of encouragement or gratitude for sharing part of their history. Queer history is unique and special in the way that so many significant moments have happened in the past 50-75 years. I’d consider this to be incredibly modern history. The gift in that is that many of the people who experienced that history are still here to tell it.
Earlier this month, I had lunch with a 79-year-old gay man who has lived in the Village for over 50 years. What started as a simple invitation turned into a four-hour conversation. He shared his early memories of the Stonewall Inn, marching in the first Christopher Street Gay Liberation Day March in 1970 (what we now call Pride), the heartbreak during the AIDS epidemic, how the Village has changed over decades, and how community has ebbed and flowed.
At times, he paused, almost apologetically, wondering if his story was “significant enough” to share because technically, he hadn’t been at the Stonewall Riots, or a well-known leader of Gay Liberation, or an active member of ACT UP. But to me, his everyday perspective is what make his story extraordinary.
History isn’t just about the “big names” or headline moments. It’s about the lived experiences of people who came before us, those who carried their truth in ways big and small, visible and unseen.
So, what’s the best way to learn LGBTQ+ history? Start by talking with queer elders. Listen to their stories. Invite them to share their memories. Because while archives preserve our past, stories and conversations help to breathe life into it. Each time we include these personal stories on our tours, they enrich the history, making it not only something to learn, but something to feel.
