6 Iconic Sites that Celebrate Black LGBTQ+ History
Each June, LGBTQ+ Americans from coast to coast celebrate the storied, tragic, and triumphant history of their queer ancestors with a month of celebration, activism, and educational initiatives. Pride commemorates the Stonewall Riots, a six-day series of protests against police raids that erupted at a gay bar in New York City on June 27th, 1969; the first Pride parade was held in their honor the following year.
Pride Month has evolved over the years: from a grassroots movement in the ‘70s, to a presidential proclamation in 1999, to an expansion to including the full spectrum of gender and sexuality in 2011. But over the decades, Black queer Americans lament that their contributions to the culture have been overlooked even at the movement’s inception. Marsha P. Johnson, a trans activist who played a leading role at Stonewall, died in 1992 as a largely unsung hero outside of the community.
Nevertheless, there are landmarks around the country commemorating Black queer history in particular. Here are six sites that you can check out this Pride Month, and year-round:
1. The 267 House
New York had been an epicenter for Black queer culture far before the Stonewall Riots, where the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s and 1930's birthed canonical works of art. The 267 House provided shelter for Black literary giants such as Zora Neale Hurston, Langston Hughes, Richard Bruce Nugent, and Wallace Thurman, who anchored his 1932 satirical novel Infants of the Spring there. The building was demolished in 2002, but you can still visit the parking lot and townhouse where it once stood.
2. Bayard Rustin's NYC Home
Born on March 17, 1912, civil rights leader Bayard Rustin pioneered Mahatma Gandhi’s nonviolent resistance as a protest tactic and orchestrated the historic 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.
Rustin was a gay man, placing an additional target on his back that contributed to him stepping down from public leadership in the Civil Rights Movement. He spent the bulk of his adult life living in Building 7 of the Penn South apartment complex in Manhattan, which was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 2016 to honor Rustin’s significance in Black, LGBTQ+, and American history.
3. The ClubHouse
Pride Month may have first launched in New York City, but the first Black Pride event was held in Washington, D.C. in 1979. In 1975, co-founders John Eddy, Aundrea and Paulette Scott, Morrell Chasten, and Rainey Cheeks opened a gay bar and dancehall called the ClubHouse in northwest Washington DC. The venue was known for holding an annual event called the Children’s Hour Party, with “children” referring to a Black LGBTQ+ euphemism for one another. The Children’s Hours and their themed costume balls established it as an important hub for the city’s Black queer community until the Clubhouse closed in 1990.
4. Azurest South
Azurest South is the home and studio of renowned architect and educator Amaza Lee Meredith. Born on August 14, 1895 in Lynchburg, Virginia, Meredith first developed a love of architecture through her father who was a carpenter. However, due to prejudices against women joining the profession, she earned her teaching credentials at Virginia Normal and Industrial Institute instead. There she met Dr. Edna Meade Colson, who became Meredith’s life partner.
After receiving her bachelor's in fine arts from Columbia University in 1930, Meredith began teaching at Virginia State University, where she founded their Fine Arts Department, and in 1939 she designed and built herself and Dr. Colson a modernist-style home on campus called Azurest South. In 2024, the VSU Alumni Association received a Conserving Black Modernism grant from the African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund to support the home's restoration.
Throughout her career, Meredith also worked with her sister Maude Terry on a real estate development project that led to the creation of Azurest Syndicate Inc. and Azurest North, a Black vacation community in Sag Harbor, New York. Meredith also produced designs for several homes there, and it quickly became a sanctuary for Black homeowners at a time when real estate was heavily segregated.
5. The Pauli Murray Center for History and Social Justice
Reverend Dr. Pauli Murray, one of Bayard Rustin’s contemporaries in the Civil Rights Movement, was another openly queer icon at this pivotal moment in history. Born in Baltimore, Maryland in 1910 as one of six children, Murray was sent to live with their aunt in Durham, North Carolina at a young age.
Murray led an extraordinary career in academia and activism. After receiving a degree in English Literature from Hunter College in 1933, their civil rights activism led them to become the first Black person to earn a Doctorate of the Science of Law from Yale Law School, and they later became an Episcopal priest. Throughout it all, they questioned their gender identity, asking their doctors about gender-affirming medical care that they were unfortunately denied.
Murray’s childhood home was saved from demolition and is now the Pauli Murray Center for History and Social Justice, which as received grant support from the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund.
6. GLIDE Memorial Church
The historic GLIDE Memorial Church was founded in San Francisco’s Tenderloin district in 1929. In 1963, Rev. Cecil Williams transformed GLIDE from a declining church to a hub of radical change rooted in love, social justice, and LGBTQ+ pride in one of the city’s poorest neighborhoods, and renowned leaders such as Mayor London Breed, Shirley Chisholm, Angela Davis, Desmond Tutu, and Oprah Winfrey have turned to the institution as a platform to advocate for progress.
In 2025, the church received a Preserving Black Churches grant from the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund to support urgent repairs to the church's stained-glass windows, mitigating water damage, and restoring its hand-stenciled ceiling beams.
