National March! On Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights: Official Souvenir Program Page: 8
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Blacks or others: "What do you know, man? You ain't felt the shit
always coming down!" Like Sgt. Matlovich later, we dared not say
how we knew about the shit coming down.
In 1944 [military mobs chasing Zoot Suiters beat up gays as well]
I heard about the Sons of Hamidy, billed as a prestigious national gay
league. I recruited several San Francisco queens, but soon realized
that SOH (named for Athenian hero Harmodius) was mythical. I
was attacked in print for publishing a prophetic poem with the lines:
"Hamidy also shall prosper/ and the ban on comradeship be lifted/
The unspeakable shall be open and unashamed."
Back to the closet. Joined two Left-led marches on Washington
about 1947, for peace, Black rights and housing. The Left then
viewed gays as a cancerous symptom of burgeois decay, so while
some of us waited to see a reluctant liberal congressman, one guy
suggested threatening to expose the congressman as queer. I trembled
in rage, but apparently gay Black squelched the move. If I'd spoken
out I'd have been drummed out of the movement. I was anyhow, as
were many gays, once I admitted my gayness.
Back to D.C. in 1967 during the Third National Conference of
Homophile Organizations. Four of us from L.A., one a Latin, visited
liberal congressman George Brown and actually agreed not to em-
barrass him by a "kiss of death" endorsement. Brown narrowly lost
his seat later after refusing to answer an Advocate questionnaire. I
tell this to show how painfully we had to evolve ideas now taken for
granted. Even in 1967, most gay activists wanted only to "get the
law off our backs" and have no further truck with other queers.
That gets ahead of our story. Each year thousands of gay bars
were raided, tens of thousands arrested. A few asked, how long?
In 1943 while trying to come out, I saw a raid at San Francisco's
old Black Cat. As I approached, hot to join my brothers and sisters,
the cops beat me to the door, and despite quixotic visions of playing
hero, I hid and watched a dozen cowed macho types hauled out, and
a dozen screaming, struggling drags. Their noisy resistance inspired
me, but lacked the spark to flare into group action. Had I but yelled
"Gay Power!" as Craig Rodwell would 26 years later at Stonewall!
One queen paid dearly for screaming at his captor, "Don't shove,
bastard, or I'll bite yer fuckin balls off!"
THE MOVEMENT STARTS
The military busted out tens of thousands of gay men and lesbians
during and after World War II, and many more "suspected perverts"
lost federal and private jobs as a result of gossip or "psychological
tests."
In 1950, after Kinsey had told the world how numerous we were,
with the Korean War begun and the Red Hunt going wild, Henry Hay
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D.C. Media Committee. National March! On Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights: Official Souvenir Program, pamphlet, 1979; Washington D.C.. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc276226/m1/10/: accessed June 18, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting UNT Libraries Special Collections.