“Homosexuals Are Different”: Mattachine Society & LGBTQ Rights in the 1950s

Did you know that America’s first effective LGBTQ rights movement began nearly 20 years before Stonewall with the founding of the Mattachine Society in 1951? Following World War II, the United States government targeted American citizens, including LGBTQ people, that it considered threats to national security. Organized religion, the psychiatric profession, police oppression, and the absence of positive LGBTQ representation in any facet of daily life, also shaped widespread homophobia in American society. Yet, even in this highly hostile climate, LGBTQ Americans laid the groundwork to advocate collectively for their civil rights and fight against invisibility and erasure.

In this program, Adrian Scott Fine, President and CEO of the Los Angeles Conservancy, will trace Mattachine’s beginnings on the West Coast. Jay Shockley, co-director and co-founder of the NYC LGBTQ Historic Sites Project, will highlight places in New York City that illustrate Mattachine’s transformation from a social group to one that actively demonstrated for gay rights in the 1960s. Blake McDonald, coordinator of the LGBTQ+ Heritage Initiative at the Virginia Department of Historic Resources, will expand the conversation beyond major coastal cities by discussing queer life in Richmond, Virginia, where an attempt to form a Mattachine chapter was made in the early 1960s.

Jon Maran, playwright of the 2009 Drama Desk Award-winning play The Temperamentals, about the founding of Mattachine, will give introductory remarks.

Special Closing Guests:

Following the Q&A, we’ll share a brief announcement about Sites of Queer Dying in NYC During the AIDS Epidemic, a collaboration between Pratt Institute and the NYC LGBTQ Historic Sites Project. Supported by the Taconic Fellowship program of the Pratt Center for Community Development, this project, led by Dr. Harriet Harriss, Caroline Hibbert, Fabio Lima, and Teal Nottage, explores how LGBTQ+ communities navigated death and memorialization during the HIV/AIDS crisis, prompting a reevaluation of traditional approaches to public memorialization. At this December 10th virtual event, the Taconic fellows will both launch an online survey inviting public reflections on queer experiences of death and dying and announce an in-person workshop on Sites of Queer Dying, to be held in February 2026.

This free public program is hosted by the NYC LGBTQ Historic Sites Project. Optional donations go toward supporting the Project’s efforts to document NYC’s LGBTQ cultural heritage.

About the Speakers

ADRIAN SCOTT FINE, as President and CEO for the Los Angeles Conservancy, oversees the organization’s overall leadership within the greater Los Angeles region (serving 88 cities and unincorporated L.A. County, encompassing more than 4,000 sq. miles). Prior to joining the Conservancy in 2010, Mr. Fine was with the National Trust for Historic Preservation in Philadelphia and D.C., and previously with Indiana Landmarks.

BLAKE MCDONALD is a native of Albemarle County, Virginia, now residing in Richmond. He studied architectural history at Connecticut College and the University of Virginia. As the Survey and Grants Specialist for the Virginia Department of Historic Resources, he travels throughout the Commonwealth supporting the stewardship of Virginia's diverse past. Prior to his current role, Blake worked in cultural resource management, historic preservation advocacy, and museum education.

JAY SHOCKLEY is co-director and co-founder of the NYC LGBTQ Historic Sites Project. He retired as senior historian at the NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission in 2015. Since 1979, he wrote over 100 designation reports covering all aspects of the city’s architectural and cultural history, including the first-ever to acknowledge LGBTQ history, in 1993. A year later, he co-authored a first-of-its-kind map honoring gay and lesbian historic sites for the short-lived Organization of Lesbian and Gay Architects + Designers (OLGAD). Jay also co-authored the 1999 National Register of Historic Places nomination for the Stonewall Inn, making it the first site to be listed for LGBTQ significance.

Image: Mattachine Society of New York ad, c. 1959-1968.

About the NYC LGBTQ Historic Site Project

The NYC LGBTQ Historic Sites Project is a nonprofit cultural initiative and educational resource that is making an invisible history visible by documenting extant historic and cultural sites associated with the LGBT community throughout New York City. For more, visit www.nyclgbtsites.org, or follow on Instagram, Facebook, or Twitter.

This free program is hosted by the NYC LGBTQ Historic Sites Project. Optional donations go toward supporting the Project’s efforts to document NYC’s LGBTQ cultural heritage.