Survivors of Upstairs Lounge Recall Mass Murder of Gays

Yesterday was the 41st anniversary of the largest mass murder of gays in U.S. history.  The fire at the Upstairs Lounge in New Orleans claimed 32 lives and others had their lives and careers ruined in the aftermath.  To date, no one has every been charged for the crime and the New Orleans police at the time seemed indifferent to the murder of gays and lesbians.  Queerty looks at this sad anniversary which should be a reminder that the hate that motivated that crime is still alive and well with many of our opponents.  Here are highlights:

On June 24, 1973, an arsonist set fire to a gay bar in New Orleans called the Up Stairs Lounge, killing 32 gay men and women in what has gone down in history as the largest gay mass murder in U.S. history.

Today is the 41st anniversary of that tragedy, which has been documented by Robert L. Camina in the new film “Upstairs Inferno”. According to the first official teaser trailer below, the horrific event led to even more reprehensible acts in its wake – several bodies from within the club were never claimed by family members, those survivors featured in the news went on to lose their jobs and livelihoods, and the New Orleans police department lagged its feet and attempted to cover up the deadly crime.

To this day, no one has ever been charged with setting fire to the Up Stairs Lounge.

A piece in the Times Picayune recalls the horror of one witness and the aftermath:

Flames shot from the building like "blowtorches" into the night, Lambert said. Men could be seen struggling hopelessly against the security bars on windows, escape impossible. People on the street screamed for help. A sickening smell hung in the air.

The fire was quickly brought under control, the firefighters said, but so much damage and misery had already been caused.

"It was horrible," Gilbert said. "These people, they were literally roasted alive. When your skin is exposed to open flames, you just melt, like candle-wax. It's horrific." 

Gilbert, who had just returned from a tour in Vietnam, was almost in shock.  "I don't think anything could have prepared you for something like that," he said. "No one deserves to die like that."

Once they were able to get inside the charred lounge, a grisly task lay ahead for the firefighters and volunteers helping out at the scene. A pile of bodies lay heaped on the floor near the windows facing Chartres Street.

A week after the fire, after some churches refused to bury the dead, mourners attended a memorial at St. Mark's United Methodist Church in the French Quarter. At the end of the memorial, in what many at the time said marked a major shift for the gay community, mourners had the option of walking through a side door, to avoid being caught by the local media on camera. Instead, most of the 300-plus attendees chose to exit through the front of the church.

Some remember the event as the catalyst that brought the gay community together and helped push the gay rights agenda in the city forward. 

"That was a huge step," Perez said. "In the aftermath of the fire, the gay community in New Orleans was forced to confront itself, finally."

Note how some families refused to accept the bodies of family members and how some churches refused to conduct funerals.  Evil and the "godly folk" are synonymous.