The Compton's Cafeteria riot occurred in August 1966 in the Tenderloin district of San Francisco. The riot was a response to the violent and constant police harassment of drag queens and trans people, particularly trans women. The incident was one of the first LGBT-related riots in United States history, preceding the more famous 1969 Stonewall riots in New York City. It marked the beginning of transgender activism in San Francisco.
The 1960s was a pivotal period for sexual, gender, and ethnic minorities, as social movements championing civil rights and sexual liberation came to fruition. Additionally, the 1950s created the foundation for the trans rights and gay liberation movements with the earlier Homophile movement. Though Stonewall is often heralded as the beginning of the trans rights movement, it is worth noting both the importance of Compton's Cafeteria Riots and the homophile movement that came first. Social groups helped mobilize and even churches, like Glide Memorial Methodist Church in San Francisco, began reaching out to the transgender community. Nevertheless, many police officers resisted these movements and the increasing visibility of these groups, continuing to harass and abuse transgender people. This simultaneous rise in support for transgender rights on the one side and the unwillingness to accept these new ideas on the other created the strain that fueled the riot at Compton's Cafeteria in the summer of 1966. The incident began when a transgender woman resisted arrest by throwing coffee at a police officer. It was followed by drag queens and transgender women pouring into the streets, fighting back with their high heels and heavy bags.
Background
Increased awareness of transgender identity
The general public was first made aware of transgender identities after the famous medical transition and 1952 sex reassignment surgery of Christine Jorgensen in Denmark. Jorgensen was the first famous and well-known trans woman. In the 1960s following Jorgensen's surgery, the ideas and perceptions of gender and trans people started to shift. Gender norms and expressions were bent. Many feminists stopped wearing bras and makeup, hippies and the members of the Beatles grew their hair long, and gender-neutral fashion such as floral patterns became more popular. In 1966, a few months before the riot, Harry Benjamin, who treated Jorgensen, published his book The Transsexual Phenomenon. In the 1950s and 1960s, Benjamin offered information, hormones, and sex reassignment surgery to trans people, and not long before the riot opened a San Francisco practice located at nearby 450 Sutter Street, which has been described as a contributing factor, as many of the trans women who were a part of Compton's Cafeteria received treatment from Benjamin. Benjamin's book The Transsexual Phenomenon further legitimized the concept of being transgender to not only the public, but also the medical community. The book also popularized the concept of medical transition as a way to treat trans patients. In the following years after the book was published, several universities opened gender clinics. From 1964 to 1967, Reed Erickson, a wealthy trans man, helped establish and fund many of these clinics through the Erickson Educational Foundation. In the mid to late 1960s, the clinic at Johns Hopkins University was making plans to offer medical transition surgeries.
Tenderloin district
The Oxford English Dictionary first definition of "tenderloin" is
"the tenderest or most juicy part of the loin of beef, pork, etc." The second definition listed is for the slang term (in full, "tenderloin district") that means "the police district of New York which includes the great mass of theatres, hotels, and places of amusement; thence extended to similar districts of other American cities." Under the second definition, there is a note that a tenderloin district is "understood to have reference to the large amount of 'graft' said to be got by the police for protecting illegitimate houses in this district, which rendered it the 'juicy part' of the service." In simpler terms, "tenderloin district" refers to a district characterized by corrupt police that will not report illegal activities in exchange for money.