About LGBTQ+ San Francisco
Harvey Milk was elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in November 1977, becoming the first openly gay person elected to public office in California. He was assassinated alongside Mayor George Moscone in November 1978. The rainbow flag was designed by Gilbert Baker in San Francisco in 1978 and first flown at the city's Gay Freedom Day Parade that year.
The Castro is the historic gay neighborhood, centered on the intersection of Castro Street and Market Street. The Castro Theatre, opened in 1922, has been a longtime queer cinema and cultural venue. The GLBT Historical Society Museum at 4127 18th Street holds one of the largest collections of LGBTQ+ historical material in the United States.
South of Market (SoMa) is the city's leather and kink district. Folsom Street, running between approximately 7th and 11th Streets, hosts many of the city's leather bars and kink venues. The Mission District has historically held queer-Latinx and lesbian-feminist nightlife. Bernal Heights has been associated with a lesbian community since the 1970s.
The Folsom Street Fair, held the last Sunday of September, is widely considered the largest leather and kink event in the world by attendance. Up Your Alley (also known as Dore Alley Fair), held in late July, is the smaller summer event organized by the same nonprofit (Folsom Street Events).
San Francisco Pride takes place the last weekend of June, with a parade Sunday and the festival in Civic Center Plaza. The Trans March (Friday) and Dyke March (Saturday) run as separate events that weekend.
Frameline, the San Francisco International LGBTQ+ Film Festival, runs each June and was founded in 1977. It is the longest-running LGBTQ+ film festival in the world.
The first AIDS Quilt was first displayed on the National Mall in October 1987; the NAMES Project Foundation, which created the quilt, was founded in San Francisco in 1987.
California legalized same-sex marriage in 2008, with the right briefly rescinded by Proposition 8 and then reinstated by federal court ruling. Same-sex marriage became permanently legal in California in 2013. Gender identity is protected under state nondiscrimination law.
BART and Muni provide the main transit. BART runs until approximately midnight on weekdays. Muni's night-owl buses cover the gap.