THE YEAR WAS 1969. It was illegal for LGBT people to get together and have a drink or dance with same-sex partners. Most bars wouldn't allow queers into their establishment, fearing police raids and fines. But there was one place where everyone could gather-all the fairies, drag queens, queers, trans people, and gender-nonconformers-The Stonewall Inn.

The police knew that gays went to Stonewall. They would raid the bar, arrest the queers, and fine the establishment. Many times, the raiding officers got rough, making police brutality a common occurrence at bar raids around the country. On June 28, 1969, a raid sent fairies, drag queens, queers, trans people, and gender-nonconforming folks into the streets in a three-day standoff that became known as the Stonewall Riots.

A year after the riots ended, the country's first public marches where LGBT people proudly and publicly claimed their identities occurred in New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles (the only city to technically call it...