Princeton will celebrate its LGBTQ community in June – which is Pride Month – starting with the annual Pride flag-raising event on May 30.
The Pride flag-raising event is set for noon at Monument Hall. HiTOPS and the Bayard Rustin Center for Social Justice will be on hand. Monument Hall is the former Princeton Borough municipal building on Stockton Street.
The month-long celebration of Princeton’s lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning community will continue on June 6 with “Pride on the Plaza” on Hinds Plaza, next to the Princeton Public Library on Witherspoon Street.
Pride on the Plaza runs from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. It has been billed as a community disco dance party for all ages to mark the 50th anniversary of the disco era that began in 1975, organizers said. Music will be provided by the Einstein Alley Disco Funk Machine.
The event will also feature drag artist Divinity Banks. There will be space inside the Community Room at the Princeton Public Library to connect with other people.
Partnering organizations for Pride on the Plaza include HiTOPS, the Arts Council of Princeton, the Princeton Public Library, McCarter Theater, Princeton University and the Municipality of Princeton.
On June 14, the Bayard Rustin Center for Social Justice is organizing the annual Pride Parade in Princeton. The parade, which begins at 11 a.m., takes marchers through the Witherspoon-Jackson neighborhood on Witherspoon Street. It will end at the Princeton Y on Paul Robeson Place and continue with an after-party.
Pride Month grew out of the Stonewall Inn riots in New York City in 1969. The Stonewall Inn was popular with gay men. It did not have a liquor license but served alcoholic drinks, resulting in raids by the New York Police Department.
The week-long riots in 1969 did not directly lead to the gay liberation movement, but it was a galvanizing force LGBTQ political activism.
In the years after the Stonewall Inn riots, the last Sunday in June was celebrated as Gay Pride Day, according to the Princeton Public Library. Celebrations varied from place to place.
June was formalized as LGBT History Month in the mid-1990s. President Bill Clinton declared June as Gay and Lesbian Pride Month in 1999. President Barack Obama expanded it to include bisexual, transgender and questioning members of the community.
