Bartender Explains Why The First National Gay Rights Monument Should Be At Stonewall

Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell is scheduled to attend a listening session in New York this week to hear activists and local officials make the case for the first national monument to the gay rights movement. The Obama administration is weighing a proposal that would have the monument on a small piece of land across the street from the historic bar, the Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village, which was the site of the 1969 riots that helped catalyze the fight for equality and acceptance of the LGBT community.

Fredd E. Tree, Stonewall’s longtime bartender, was there the night the riots began and says he will be at the public session to support the monument this week. Speaking with Here & Now’s Robin Young, he remembers the demonstrations and the movement that followed.

Guest

• Fredd E. Tree, longtime bartender at the Stonewall Inn. He was at the bar the night the 1969 Stonewall riots began.

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