On Veterans Day 1950, a handful of gay men hiked up a hillside in Los Angeles, in a neighborhood then called Eden Dale. Meeting in secret was risky. Being discovered could mean arrest, entrapment, a lost job, or a beating.

Yet these men—led by the visionary activist Harry Hay—came together with a radical idea: what if queer people could see themselves as a community with rights, dignity, and solidarity?

From that quiet circle grew The Mattachine Society, a groundbreaking group that helped launch the modern gay rights movement in the US. The spark they lit would ripple into generations of activism, law, culture, and community.

It’s hard to imagine Harvey Milk, the White Night Riots, the Castro, or the rainbow flags flying on Market Street without that first ignition.

Now, 75 years later

See Full Page