Mark Segal: Stonewall Lasted 365 Days

LGBTQ&A

Jeffrey Masters

Society & Culture

4.7 • 703 Ratings

🗓️ 18 June 2024

⏱️ 28 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Mark Segal moved to New York City in May of 1969 and a month later found himself at The Stonewall Inn as the now-infamous police raid began.

"The police came in, pretended that they were doing their duty, got their pay off," he says. "The difference here was they barged in, they threw people up against the wall, they extorted money from some of the older people, they harassed the drag queens. It was pretty violent."

Stonewall sparked Mark Segal's lifelong commitment to activism, which memorably included interrupting Walter Cronkite in the middle of CBS Evening News by yelling and waving a banner that read, "Gays Protest CBS Prejudice".

He joins us on the podcast to look back on the last 50 years of the LGBTQ+ civil rights movement and shares the secret ingredient that underlies all of his activism: a sense of humor.

Click here to listen to our interview with Gay Liberation Front co-founder, Martha Shelley.

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LGBTQ&A is hosted and produced by Jeffrey Masters. ⁠@jeffmasters1

[The was originally recorded in November 2020]

Transcript

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0:00.0	Mark Siegel moved to New York City when he was 18, and one month later, on June 28, 1969,
0:09.0	he found himself at the Stonewall Inn when the now infamous police raid began.
0:15.0	This was a turning point for our movement, but also for Mark personally.
0:19.0	He was a budding activist and immediately started
0:22.5	to organize the community, which at the time was really not a community at all. Now, if you
0:28.4	remember Martha Shelley, who we had on the show a couple of months ago, that is a great
0:32.6	companion interview to this one with Mark. Both Martha Shelley and Mark Siegel were founding members
0:39.2	of the Gay Liberation Front, which was formed in direct response to Stonewall in order to keep
0:45.2	the momentum and energy of that moment going. Mark went on to become one of the most visible
0:51.6	gay activists in the country during that time.
0:59.6	He even famously interrupted Walter Cronkite during a live broadcast of the CBS Evening News.
1:03.0	He stormed on a set and waved a banner that said,
1:06.1	Gay's protest, CBS Prejudice.
1:10.9	And then I think I should note that when this was originally recorded a couple of years ago,
1:16.6	Mitch McConnell was still the majority leader in the Senate. He is not anymore, which I think you know,
1:21.0	but I didn't want to cut that part of the interview out because I think it's important to hear Mark talk about how activists can or should, in his opinion, act in order to force those who empower to change.
1:29.3	So, without further ado, I'm Jeffrey Masters, and this is LGBTQ&A with Stonewall veteran Mark Siegel.
1:47.7	So you moved to New York City in May of 1969.
1:51.0	The Stonewall Inn was the first bar reaper went to.
1:54.2	And then one month later, the Stonewall uprising occurred.
1:55.0	And you were there.
1:59.0	Saying all of that, that is a wild introduction to gay life.
	...

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