Although the Stonewall riots (also called the Stonewall uprising) on June 28, 1969, are generally considered the impetus of the modern gay liberation movement, a number of demonstrations of civil resistance took place prior to that date. These actions, often organized by local homophile organizations but sometimes spontaneous, addressed concerns ranging from anti-gay discrimination in employment and public accommodations to the exclusion of homosexuals from the United States military to police harassment to the treatment of homosexuals in revolutionary Cuba. The early actions have been credited with preparing the gay community for Stonewall and contributing to the riots' symbolic power.

A common technique of early activists was the picket line, especially for those actions organized by such Eastern groups as the Mattachine Society of New York, the Mattachine Society of Washington, Philadelphia's Janus Society, and the New York chapter of Daughters of Bilitis; these groups acted under the collective name East Coast Homophile Organizations (ECHO). Organized pickets tended to be in large urban population centers because these centers were where the largest concentration of homophile activists were located. Picketers at ECHO-organized events were required to follow strict dress codes: men wore ties, preferably with a jacket, and women wore skirts. Because a common focus of was employment discrimination, Mattachine Society of Washington founder Frank Kameny wanted to portray homosexuals as "presentable and 'employable'". Many of the participants in these early actions went on to become deeply involved in the gay liberation movement.

Date	Location	Reason	Description
October 1955	Baltimore	To protest police harassment	In 1955, 162 gay men and lesbians were arrested on charges of disorderly conduct after a police raid at the Pepper Hill Club on North Gay Street. Newspapers report that 26 year old Dorothy U. Killman was fined on two charges of assaulting policemen who, "...tried to load her into a paddy wagon."
May 1959	Los Angeles	To protest police harassment	Transgender women, drag queens, lesbians, and gay men clashed with police at Cooper Do-nuts, a hang-out for them and street hustlers who were frequently harassed by the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD). Police arrested three people, including John Rechy, but other patrons began pelting the police with donuts and coffee cups. The LAPD called for back-up and arrested a number of rioters. Rechy and the other two original detainees were able to escape.
August 5, 1961	Milwaukee	To fight back against Navy gay-bashers when police could not be trusted to help	When four Navy servicemen jumped the bouncer at Milwaukee's Black Nite gay bar, drag performer Josie Carter used beer bottles to fight off the men attacking her husband, sending two to the hospital. The remaining Navy servicemen left to round up additional servicemen and returned to the bar for revenge. They were met with a counterattack of more than 70 LGBTQ patrons who fought back in what became known as the Black Nite Brawl. The interior of the bar was largely destroyed and three people were hospitalized. Milwaukee police, who had beaten a gay man to death during a park raid only a year earlier, arrested the attackers and did not arrest bar patrons.
September 19, 1964	New York City	To protest the US military's treatment of gay people	Organized by activist Randy Wicker, a small group picketed the Whitehall Street Induction Center after the confidentiality of gay men's draft records was violated. This action has been identified as the first gay rights demonstration in the United States.
December 2, 1964	New York City	To protest the disease model of homosexuality	Four gay men and lesbians picketed a lecture by a psychoanalyst espousing the model of homosexuality as a mental illness. The demonstrators were given ten minutes to make a rebuttal.
January 1, 1965	San Francisco	To protest police action	The Council on Religion and the Homosexual held a costume party at California Hall on Polk Street in San Francisco to raise money for the new organization. When the ministers informed the San Francisco Police Department of the event, the SFPD attempted to force the rented hall's owners to cancel it. At the event itself, some of the ministers and ticket takers were arrested, creating a brief riot.
April 17, and April 18, 1965	Washington, D.C., New York City	To protest Cuba and the United States' policies on homosexuality	Homophile activists picketed the White House on April 17 and the United Nations on the 18th after learning that Cuba was placing homosexuals in forced labor camps.
April 25, 1965	Philadelphia	To protest a restaurant's gay-exclusionary service policy	An estimated 150 people participated in a sit-in when the manager of Dewey's restaurant refused service to "a large number of homosexuals and people wearing non-conformist clothing." Four people were arrested, including homophile rights leader Clark Polak of Philadelphia's Janus Society. All four were convicted of disorderly conduct. Members of the society also leafleted outside the restaurant the following week and negotiated with the owners to bring an end to the denial of service. Three people staged another sit-in on May 5, occupying a table for a few hours. The police were also called for this sit-in, but left after taking no action, Polak was quoted saying, "we could stay in there as long as we wanted as the police had no authority to ask us to leave."
May 29, 1965	Washington, D.C.	In support of gay rights	Organized by ECHO, seven men and three women picketed the White House. The first of a series of pickets held throughout the summer, which also targeted the Civil Service Commission, the State Department and The Pentagon.
July 4, 1965	Philadelphia	General informational picket	Organized by ECHO, demonstrators picketed at Independence Hall. Picketers returned each year through 1969 for what came to be known as the Annual Reminder beginning a new era in Philadelphia LGBT culture as a presence in the community.
September 26, 1965	San Francisco	In support of a pro-gay clergyman	Thirty people picketed Grace Cathedral to protest punitive actions taken against Rev. Canon Robert Cromey for his involvement in the Council on Religion and the Homosexual, an alliance between LGBT people and religious leaders.
October 23, 1965	Washington, D.C.	In support of gay rights	The last White House picket. Demonstrators felt, with this event, that picketing the White House had lost its effectiveness as a tactic.
April 21, 1966	New York City	To challenge the state's prohibition against serving alcohol to known homosexuals	Activists Dick Leitsch, Craig Rodwell and John Timmons were seeking a test case to challenge New York's regulation barring known homosexuals from being served alcohol in bars and restaurants. They invited reporters to follow the "sip-in" as they sought refusal of service. After being served in three bars despite announcing their homosexuality, the group was finally refused service at Julius', a gay bar that had been raided ten days prior. Although Leitsch's complaint to the State Liquor Authority resulted in no action, the city's human rights commission declared that such discrimination could not continue.
May 21, 1966	Los Angeles, New York City, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Washington, D.C.	To protest the exclusion of homosexuals from the United States armed forces	A coalition of homophile organizations across the country organized simultaneous demonstrations for Armed Forces Day. The Los Angeles group held a 15-car motorcade (which has been identified as the nation's first gay pride parade) and activists held pickets in the other cities. The protest grew out of the first meeting of the organization that would become the North American Conference of Homophile Organizations.
July 18, 1966	San Francisco	To protest a restaurant's harassment and denial of service	Around 25 people picketed Compton's Cafeteria when new management began using Pinkerton agents and police to harass gay and transgender customers.
August 1966	San Francisco	To protest continued harassment	Gay and transgender customers rioted at Compton's in response to continued police harassment. The restaurant and the surrounding neighborhood sustained heavy damage. The following night demonstrators threw up another picket line, which quickly descended into new violence and damage to the restaurant.
September 1966	Chicago	To protest being ignored by the press	Mattachine Midwest picketed the Chicago Tribune and the Chicago Sun-Times for routinely ignoring press material and refusing advertising from the organization. Sun-Times columnist Irv Kupcinet mentioned the pickets in his column but neglected to mention that his paper was one of the targets. The Tribune gave the event no coverage.
January 1, 1967	Los Angeles	To protest police raids on gay bars	The LAPD raided the New Year's Eve parties at two gay bars, the Black Cat Tavern and New Faces. Several patrons were injured and a bartender was hospitalized with a fractured skull. Several hundred people spontaneously demonstrated on Sunset Boulevard and picketed outside the Black Cat.
February 11, 1967	Los Angeles	In solidarity with other minority groups in the city	Organized by the owner of gay bar Pandora's Box and built on the Black Cat protests of weeks earlier, about 200 LGBT people watched as around 40 picketers demonstrated in front of the Black Cat in coordination with hippies and other counterculture groups who had been targeted by police for harassment and violence.
March 17, 1968	Los Angeles	To protest entrapment and harassment by the LAPD	Two drag queens known as "The Princess" and "The Duchess" held a St. Patrick's Day party at Griffith Park, a popular cruising spot and a frequent target of police activity. More than 200 gay men socialized through the day.
April 23, 1968	New York City	To protest the classification of homosexuality as a mental illness	The Student Homophile League of Columbia University picketed and disrupted a panel of psychiatrists discussing homosexuality.
May 9, 1968	Newtown, Pennsylvania	To protest the cancellation of a talk on homosexuality	A talk at Bucks County Community College by Richard Leitsch, president of the Mattachine Society of New York, was cancelled by BCCC president Charles E. Rollins. Approximately two hundred students discussed and protested the cancellation.
May 30, 1968	Los Angeles	General gathering	Homophile groups organized a "gay-in" in Griffith Park.
August 1968	Los Angeles	To protest a police raid on The Patch, a gay bar	Following the arrest of two patrons, The Patch owner Lee Glaze organized the other patrons to move on the police station. After buying out a nearby flower shop, the demonstrators caravanned to the station, festooned it with the flowers and bailed out the arrested men.
April 1969	San Francisco	To protest the firing of a gay activist	When gay activist and journalist Gale Whittington was fired by the States Steamship Company after coming out in print, a small group of activists operating under the name "Committee for Homosexual Freedom" (CHF) picketed the company's San Francisco offices every workday between noon and 1:00 for several weeks.
May 1969	San Francisco	To protest the firing of an employee suspected of being gay	Tower Records fired Frank Denaro, believing him to be gay. The Committee for Homosexual Freedom picketed the store for several weeks until Denaro was reinstated. The CHF ran similar pickets of Safeway stores, Macy's and the Federal Building.

• List of LGBT rights organizations
• Timeline of LGBT history

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• Miller, Neil (1995). Out of the Past: Gay and Lesbian History from 1869 to the Present. New York, Vintage Books. ISBN 0-09-957691-0.
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• Stryker, Susan and Jim Van Buskirk, with foreword by Armisted Maupin (1996). Gay by the Bay: A History of Queer Culture in the San Francisco Bay Area. San Francisco, Chronicle Press. ISBN 0-8118-1187-5.
• Teal, Donn (1971, reissued 1995). The Gay Militants: How Gay Liberation Began in America, 1969–1971. New York, St. Martin's Press. ISBN 0-312-11279-3 (1995 edition).
• Timmons, Stuart (1990). The Trouble With Harry Hay. Boston, Alyson Publications. ISBN 1-55583-175-3.
• Tobin, Kay and Randy Wicker (1972). The Gay Crusaders. New York, Paperback Library, a division of Coronet Communications. ISBN 0-446-66691-2.
• Witt, Lynn, Sherry Thomas and Eric Marcus (eds.) (1995). Out in All Directions: The Almanac of Gay and Lesbian America. New York, Warner Books. ISBN 0-446-67237-8.

• Resources on Regional Homophile/LGBT Organizations in the 1960s
• Political correspondence Archived 2011-07-26 at the Wayback Machine from the papers of Frank Kameny