Atlanta Since Stonewall, 1969-2009: A Local History brings to life a segment of the city’s LGBTQ past, highlighting nationally recognized and little-known personalities, places, and events. Through photographs, printed materials, ephemera, and links to digital content, it presents diverse narratives of a marginalized people's lived experiences in the South’s gay epicenter. Animated by visual elements, these stories -- of adversity and triumph, struggle and pride, and loss and hope -- are inseparable from the history of the city itself and highlight the ways LGBTQ Atlantans found a political voice and personal fulfillment and dignity.
Atlanta Since Stonewall, 1969-2009: A Local History is a collaborative project between the Atlanta History Center and the Auburn Avenue Research Library on African American Culture and History. Located in the Buckhead area, the Atlanta History Center includes one of the largest history museums in the Southeast, a research library and archives, historic homes, gardens, and a nature trail. Anchoring the west end of the Sweet Auburn historic district, the Auburn Avenue Research Library is the first public library in the Southeast to offer specialized reference and archival collections dedicated to the study and research of African American culture and history and of other peoples of African descent.
The years from 1607 to 1783 constitute the founding era of what became the United States. In the early years of this era, in these American colonies, the penalty for sodomy was death, and a number of executions are documented. Sodomy was usually conceived of then as anal intercourse between men. But why was sodomy thought of as treason against the state and punished so harshly? And what do we know of sexual and intimate relationships between women in these years, and the laws and responses to such intimacies? This feature presents or references the original documents that Jonathan Ned Katz collected in his books Gay American History (1976) and Gay/Lesbian Almanac (1983), along with evidence that others subsequently discovered. Published originally on OutHistory in 2012.