1. WOW Cafe Theatre

When people think of gay history in New York City, theater and Broadway are generally at the top of their minds. The WOW Cafe Theatre, short for the Women’s One World Cafe Theatre, claims to be “the oldest collectively-run performance space for women and/or trans artists in the known universe.” The theater began as an International Women’s Theater Festival featuring eight countries and over thirty shows that performed for New York City’s lesbian scene. The festival was such a hit that the group found a permanent space on 11th Street where women and transgendered people performed during the whole year.

The theater moved once more to 4th Street, where it resides in East Village today and serves as one of the most prominent lesbian theaters in the city. Notable women that have been involved with the theater include Peggy Shaw, Lois Weaver, Deb Margolin, and Carmelita Tropicana. The theater aims to combat oppression and opens up performers with different sexual orientations, races, religions, ages, sizes, and disabilities.

In a city so filled with LGBT history, the number of sites related to the LGBT movement is almost unending and continues to be added to with each new historic revelation that is found. The culture of the LGBT community can be felt in hundreds, if not thousands of buildings in New York City and the New York City LGBT Historic Sites Project aims to keep uncovering LGBT history and making it available for the community to visit.

Next, check out 10 Influential Figures of NYC’s LGBTQ Rights Movement and 10 Notable LGBT Landmarks and sites in NYC. Get in touch with the author @LitByLiterature.