What Orgaizations Led the Homophile Movement? What Was The Message? Who were the spokespersons?

1. SAGE Presentations
Homophile Movement
Part 3 of a 5 Part Series
Presented By
Shoulders to Stand On
A Program of the Out Alliance

2. SAGE Presentation
Homophile Movement 3
- What organizations lead the homophile movement?
- What was the message?
- Who were the spokespersons?

3. REMEMBER
Red Scare and Lavender Scare
Foundation of Communism and Homosexuality being yoked.

4. RESULT
Executive Order 10450
• Anti-communism and anti-homosexuality become codified, in a legal or
public policy sense, when Dwight Eisenhower signs
an executive order, 10450, in 1953.
This was the mandate that
the federal government
would preside over the
purging of homosexuals
in the military and
in federal employment.

5. “Enemies from Within”: Senator Joseph R. McCarthy’s Accusations of Disloyalty
By 1954 - US government dismissing
as many as 60 people from civilian
government positions per month
for suspected homosexual activity.
Mc Carthy trials ended in 1956
McCarthy Era

6. Mattachine Society one of first gay organizations in 1950
First gay organization in US was Chicago's Society for Human Rights.
• Conceived in 1948 by Henry “Harry” Hay as "Bachelors for Wallace” –
support organization of gay men for Presidential candidate Gov. Henry Wallace running
against Harry Truman.
• Hay wrote organizing principles referred to as "The Call".
• Over the next 2 years Hay refined his Idea
to call the new organization –
Bachelors Anonymous - served a similar
function and purpose as Alcoholics Anonymous
but for gay men
Homophile Movement - Beginning
Emergence of Gay Rights Organizations

7. • November 11, 1950 first meeting of the Mattachine Society in Los
Angeles, under the name Society of Fools
• April 1951 changed its name to Mattachine Society
• December 1951 First Mattachine Christmas party
From left to right:
• Konrad Stevens (back of head),
• Dale Jennings (in profile),
• Harry Hay,
• Rudi Gernreich, Stan Witt,
• Bob Hull, Chuck Rowland, and Paul Bernhard.
Credit: ©John Gruber.
Mattachine Society

8. Nov. 1950 – called themselves - Society of Fools
Mattachines were court jesters of the 13th Century. They wore funny masks
and they camped around a lot and acted silly but underneath the silliness
they spoke truth to the King and sometimes they were the only people in
the Kingdom who could get away with it.”
April 1951 changed to Mattachine Society –
named after Medieval French secret societies
of life long secret fraternities of unmarried
masked townsmen who, through their anonymity,
were empowered to criticize ruling monarchs
with impunity
The Name: Mattachine Society

9. The Name: Mattachine Society
They took the name Mattachine
because they felt that 1950s Gays
were also a masked people,
unknown and anonymous, who
might become engaged in morale
building and helping ourselves
and others, through struggle, to
move toward total redress and
change.

10. Henry "Harry" Hay Jr.
Henry "Harry" Hay Jr. was a prominent
American gay rights activist,
communist, and labor advocate. He
was a founder of the Mattachine
Society, the first sustained gay rights
group in the United States, as well as
the Radical Faeries, a loosely affiliated
gay spiritual movement.
Hay married in 1938, adopted a
daughter in 1943, and divorced in
1951.

11. Mattachine Society
The primary goals of the society were to
• "Unify homosexuals isolated from their
own kind";
• "Educate homosexuals and
heterosexuals toward an ethical
homosexual culture paralleling the
cultures of the Negro, Mexican and
Jewish peoples";
• "Lead the more socially conscious
homosexual to provide leadership to
the whole mass of social variants"; and
• "Assist gays who are victimized daily as
a result of oppression"

12. Mattachine Society Organization
Similar structure to the Communist
Party:
• Cells
• Oaths of secrecy
• Five different levels of
membership, each required greater
levels of involvement and
commitment.
Founding members constituted the
so-called "Fifth Order" and from the
outset remained anonymous.
The first step in building a
minority consciousness
and social movement was
to initiate small
"discussion groups" in
which male and female
homosexuals could gather
to talk about issues both
personal and political.

13. • A fifth column is any group of
people who undermine a larger
group from within, usually in
favor of an enemy group or
nation. The activities of a fifth
column can be overt or
clandestine. Forces gathered in
secret can mobilize openly to
assist an external attack.
Mattachine Society Organization

15. Harry Hay Remebered
• The Mattachine Steps in Silver
Lake, Los Angeles. The sign reads,
"Harry Hay founded the
Mattachine Society on this hillside
on November 11, 1950“
• Right along this stairway is a small
house where the courageous Harry
Hay once resided during his long
fight against homophobia in Los
Angeles and beyond.

16. Independent Mattachine Society Groups
• Mattachine Society of Washington, 1961 – Washington. D.C.
Frank Kameny
• Mattachine Midwest, 1965 – Chicago
• Mattachine Society of the Niagara Frontier, 1970 – Buffalo
Madeline Davis

17. CONNECTION
• October 3, 1970
• Bob Osborne & Larry Fine held
the First meeting of the
Rochester Gay Liberation Front
at Todd Union on U of R campus.
• Members of the Mattachine
Society of the Niagara Frontier
and the Cornell GLF spoke.