Image Credit: NPR Compton’s Cafeteria
Police relations with the trans, drag and gay communities in the Tenderloin reached a boiling point in 1966. Across San Francisco resistance was in the air. Local anti-war protests were gaining momentum. Civil rights activists and religious leaders at a Tenderloin church organized to bring government anti-poverty resources to the neighborhood. A group of radical young queers calling themselves Vanguard started pushing back against discrimination by police and business owners. After Compton’s management started kicking them out of the restaurant, they picketed outside on July 18, 1966.
Read more courtesy of NPR, here.