Stonewall Inn, birthplace of LGBT rights movement, named landmark
NEW YORK -- New York City's landmarks commission has voted to grant official status to the Stonewall Inn, the Greenwich Village bar where resistance to a police raid sparked the modern gay rights movement.
The unanimous vote Tuesday marks the first time a site has been designated as a landmark in the city because of its significance to LGBT history.
A 1969 raid at the tavern became a key moment for the gay rights movement. Patrons clashed with officers, and several days of protests followed.
Dr. Gil Horowitz was at the Stonewall Inn those fateful nights in June 1969 and told CBS New York they never planned for the bar to become the birthplace of the LGBT civil rights movement.
"We just happened to be there, our destiny with history," said Horowitz, who was arrested during the struggle.
The uprising is commemorated in gay pride events every year in New York and around the world.
The commission's chairwoman, Meenakshi Srinivasan, says the Stonewall events were a turning point in the LGBT rights movement and in the nation's history.
"Recognizing and protecting the tremendous historic significance of the Stonewall Inn is incredibly important, long overdue and more than worth the struggle it took to achieve," Andrew Berman, executive director of the Greenwich Village Society of Historic Preservation, which pushed for the move, told CBS New York.
"This site is internationally recognized for its connection to the birth of the modern LGBT rights movement, and to the fight for equality, fairness, and a more just society."