The History of Seattle’s Pride Parade

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City Clerk
May 31, 2012January 6, 2023By City Clerk

Seattle Municipal Archives Feature

Seattle celebrated its first Gay Pride Week June 24-30, 1974, with a variety of activities at private and public venues around the city. Mayor Uhlman gave the event official endorsement in 1977, declaring June 25 to July 1 to be Gay Pride Week in the City of Seattle. Keith Luttenbacher, in his July 5, 1977 letter, was one of many who wrote thanking Mayor Uhlman for his support, “especially after the negative press due to Ms. [Anita] Bryant.” Local opponents of gay rights were incensed by the mayor’s proclamation, and reactions ranged from letter-writing campaigns to published threats of recall to picketing outside City Hall. Ultimately, Mayor Uhlman’s endorsement of Gay Pride Week gave added significance to the city’s first Gay Pride March, held in 1977.

This year’s Seattle Pride Parade will be held in downtown Seattle on Sunday, June 24. The theme is “The Many Faces of Pride.”
  		letterLetter from Keith Luttenbacher to Mayor Uhlman, July 5, 1977. Box 61 folder 8, Mayor Uhlman Subject Files, Records Series 4287-02, Seattle Municipal Archives.
Pride Parade 1993 Pride Parade 1993 Pride Parade 1993
Pride Parade Photographs, 1993. Box 3 Folder 9, Seattle Office of Human Rights Commission for Lesbians and Gays Subject Files, Record Series 8405-04, Seattle Municipal Archives
 
Pride Parade 2002
Gay Pride Parade, 2002
Item 130661, Seattle Municipal Archives		 Pride Parade 2011
Pride Parade, 2011
Seattle City Council Flickr site

 
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