The Illinois Holocaust Museum’s exhibit looks back at Stonewall

In 1970, Gary Chichester printed the flag on his porch for the first Pride Parade in Chicago. He said he had asked to borrow a sewing machine from his neighbor upstairs, which he later learned was a deputy police officer.

Chichester, co-founder of the Chicago Gay Alliance and longtime activist, has carried the flag in the Pride parades he has participated in since then.

“The logo itself was part of the newsletters that Chicago had,” Chichester said. “People do not really know what it is when they first see it because the rainbow flag took over, and now there are variations of over 30 sexual minority flags being used, but it was the first in Chicago.”

Over 50 years later, the flag is an artifact in a new exhibit at the Illinois Holocaust Museum & Education Center in Skokie. “Rise Up: Stonewall and the LGBTQ Rights Movement”, a traveling exhibition in collaboration with the Newseum, looks at the Stonewall Inn uprising in 1969 in New York City as a catalyst for the gay liberation movement.

“It’s a little beaten, it’s been caught in rain showers. But I’m very proud of it,” Chichester said. “We need to remember our story to fight what lies ahead.”

“Rise Up” looks at gay rights movement through the lens of employment, faith, and visibility of LGBTQ Americans in pop culture. The special exhibition shows the wedding rings of Jim Obergefell and his late husband, the couple at the center of the Supreme Court’s case of same-sex marriage; a rainbow flag signed by flag designer Gilbert Baker; and a suit belonging to U.S. Senator Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), the first overtly gay senator.

“Rise Up” breaks from the Holocaust Museum’s permanent exhibitions, which look at persecution of Jews under the Nazi regime. But Leah Rauch, the museum’s director of education, said the Holocaust and the LGBTQ movement have more connections than visitors might initially predict.

The museum uses lessons from the Holocaust to address hatred, bigotry and differences today. Similarly, “Rise Up” looks at how identity-based persecution lives on today, she said.

The evolution of the fight for LGTBQ rights in America is chronicled through 85 objects displayed in the “Rise Up: Stonewell and the LGBTQ Rights Movement” at the Illinois Holocaust Museum.

Brian Rich / Sun-Times

“The mission of our museum is to remember the past and transform the future,” Rauch said. “We do this by addressing other issues such as genocide or human rights issues. LGBTQ rights are human rights.”

Rauch said “Rise Up” is a way for colleges to expand their representation in the history curriculum. And already now educators are taking their students to the exhibition. As of last year, Illinois is one of a handful of states mandating to teach LGBTQ history in schools.

“Had I been exposed to an exhibition like this as a child, it would have meant a lot to me personally,” Rauch said.

Arielle Weininger is chief curator of collections and exhibitions. “Rise Up” centers on the role of the first amendment in the gay liberation movement and how activists used their rights to the first amendment to propel the movement forward, she said. Americans like Chichester, for example, took to the streets. Authors and editors created LGBTQ publications at risk of harassment by government agencies.

“They are taking on really oppressive and unfair legislation and putting themselves and their families at risk of creating positive change in society,” Weininger said. “It’s an incredibly admirable and inspiring story of struggle, and one that continues.”

Weininger hopes that Chicagoland’s visitors will welcome the exhibit with its bright pastel colors and pop-up carvings and be moved to create change in their own communities.

The “Rise Up” exhibit shows photos from the most recent Chicago Pride Parade in 2019.

Brian Rich / Sun-Times

The exhibition is constantly evolving and adding to its collection to reflect new developments. When President Joe Biden overturned a ban on transgender troops from the Trump era, the Newseum hit a plaque about the turnaround.

The Holocaust Museum also made several Chicago additions. Along with the Chichester flag, the Skokie exhibit features photos from the first Pride Parade in Chicago and the most recent Pride Parade in 2019. When visitors walk out, they can also see photos of local residents inducted into the Chicago LGBT Hall of Fame.

A flag used in a protest in Chicago on June 27, 1970, is displayed in the new exhibit called “Rise Up: Stonewell and the LGBTQ Rights Movement” at the Illinois Holocaust Museum.

Brian Rich / Sun-Times

“When I walked in, I realized it was Chicago because I recognized some people who were in the picture,” Chichester said of the 1970s picture. “Who would have thought 50 years ago that we would be on the Holocaust? the museum?

The show runs until May 2022, just in time for Chichester to get its flag back for the next Pride parade: “It’s going to be something of a blowout.”