VIDEO: NYC Pride Grand Marshal reflects on being one of nation’s first gay rights activists

NEW YORK – For so many members of the LGBTQ+ community— especially those of a certain generation— a gay bar was the only place you could go where you weren’t compelled to lie about who you were.

“They had nowhere else to meet—publicly,” said Ken Ludstbader is co-founder of the NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project. “People could lose their jobs, people could lose their families, employment, and religious associations. So bars became really safe spaces.”

But the gay bar of the past was much different than the one we think of today, every inch covered in rainbow flags.

“In many cases, they were private clubs where there was a bouncer at the door, they were bottle clubs, you had a sign, a fictitious name in many cases,” Ludstbader said.

Watch the video and read the full story at Fox5 New York.