Rise Up: Stonewall and the LGBTQ+ Movement

Rise Up: Stonewall and the LGBTQ Rights Movement is a national traveling exhibit created by the Newseum in Washington, D.C. that explores how the police raid of the Stonewall Inn in New York’s Greenwich Village in June 1969 became the spark that ignited the modern gay rights movement in the United States.

It uses artifacts and images to shed light on important milestones of gay rights history, from the 1978 assassination of Harvey Milk, one of the country’s first openly gay elected officials to the AIDS crisis. It covers hate crime legislation and the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, as well as the fight for marriage equality.

Rise Up also examines pop culture’s role in influencing attitudes about the LGBTQ community through film, television and sports, and examines how the gay rights movement has appropriated the power of public protest and demonstration to get laws changed and shatter stereotypes.