The Stonewall Inn Monument gets a slick new visitor center

As it offers a glimpse of LGBTQ+ activism through the lens of art, photography, and tech, the center’s very existence poses the question: Who gets to be the steward of queer history?

On June 28, 1969, rebellious queer bar patrons fought back against a police raid of the Stonewall Inn, a gay bar in New York City’s West Village. The uprising wasn’t the first step in the movement toward queer liberation, but it certainly ignited the flame. The bar went out of business shortly after the riots, and the property was divided in two. In the 1990s, the 53 Christopher Street side of the bar was rebooted as a new Stonewall Inn; but the 51 Christopher Street side had seen a varied evolution. It was a bagel shop, a nail salon, a clothing store, and a gay bar. Now it has been reenvisioned as a visitor center that sits across the street from the Stonewall National Monument.