Philly to name street for gay rights pioneer

The LGBT rights pioneer will be honored in her hometown when Philadelphia dedicates Barbara Gittings Way. (Washington Blade photo by Leigh Mosley)

PHILADELPHIA — An LGBT rights pioneer will be honored in her hometown when Philadelphia dedicates Barbara Gittings Way on Oct. 1, in the heart of the gay neighborhood at the intersection of Locust and 13th Streets.

Gittings, along with Washington’s Frank Kameny, is considered one of the early key organizers of the LGBT civil rights movement prior to the 1969 Stonewall Riots, working with Kameny to plan marches on Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell in Philadelphia, as well as to pressure the American Psychological Association to remove homosexuality from its list of mental illnesses. The dedication kicks off LGBT History Month for Philadelphia’s LGBT community, a celebration organized nationally by Philadelphia’s Equality Forum.