Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera, two pioneering transgender activists from the Stonewall era and figures in the uprising seen as the birth of the LGBTQ rights movement in Greenwich Village, are to be honored in a monument near the Stonewall Inn, where riots against police persecution of queer people took place in 1969.
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The NYT reports: ‘The planned monument will be publicly announced on Thursday in commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the uprising, which was a seminal moment for gay rights. It is also part of the city’s effort to fix a glaring gender gap in public art. Statues of L.G.B.T.Q. individuals are virtually nonexistent among the city’s monuments, and the city says the dedication to Johnson and Rivera will be one of the world’s first for transgender people. The monument is proposed for Ruth Wittenberg Triangle, a short walk from Stonewall.’
