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HIS 100 - Perspectives in History

Tulsa Massacre, Wounded Knee Occupation, Stonewall Rebellion, Haitian Independence, Philippine Revolution, Iranian Revolution, The Great London Smog, Creation of Earth Day, Chernobyl, Creation of the UN, Act Prohibiting Slavery, Founding of NATO

Stonewall Rebellion

The Stonewall Rebellion was a landmark event for the LGBTQ+ community.  History.com provides a helpful summary of the event (Please note, tertiary sources should NOT be cited in your assignment. Scroll down for primary and secondary sources).:

The Stonewall Riots, also called the Stonewall Uprising, began in the early hours of June 28, 1969 when New York City police raided the Stonewall Inn, a gay club located in Greenwich Village in New York City. The raid sparked a riot among bar patrons and neighborhood residents as police roughly hauled employees and patrons out of the bar, leading to six days of protests and violent clashes with law enforcement outside the bar on Christopher Street, in neighboring streets and in nearby Christopher Park. The Stonewall Riots served as a catalyst for the gay rights movement in the United States and around the world.

Primary Sources

Note: For help with citing primary sources properly, check out this FAQ and be sure to reach out to your instructor with any questions you may have. For help citing interviews such as Martin Duberman's (below), click here. 

This article from Gale includes an excerpt from Martin Duberman's novel Stonewall, first published in 1993, which is a retelling of the Stonewall Rebellion using the accounts of six individuals who witnessed the events. Those accounts within this article are primary sources since they are from people who were at Stonewall when the events happened. 

This newspaper article published in the New York Times reports on the raid at the Stonewall Inn and the ensuing conflict between police and organizers. Since it was published in the days following the incident in 1969, this is an example of a primary source. 

Secondary Sources

In this article, the authors examine how the events of Stonewall have been memorialized and how the riots fit into LGBTQIA history and the larger human rights movement. The article uses both primary sources and secondary sources from various historical perspectives to reflect on the past 50 years of LGBTQIA individuals in the United States. 

Marc Stein, a history professor at San Francisco State and author of several books on LGBTQIA history, discusses the culture and historical context that led to the Stonewall Rebellion. He also examines the circumstances that cause rebellions and social movements in general, and how the Stonewall Rebellion connects to those themes.