A project of the SCLGBTQ Network

South Coast
LGBTQ+
Museum

The history they tried to lose,
kept on purpose.

12 Exhibits 993 Records A Living Archive

Now on view

The Exhibition Halls

General Order No. 3, the June 1865 order that announced emancipation in Texas

Emancipation · Black Queer America Freedom, Delivered Late Juneteenth marked freedom that arrived late, and that freedom made the first documented Black queer lives in America possible. From William Dorsey Swann, born enslaved and crowned a queen, to the Combahee River Collective that named itself after Harriet Tubman's emancipation raid. The museum's most deeply sourced exhibit, anchored at home in New Bedford, a freedom city. Enter the exhibit →

Wing I Memorials & Place

No. XI In memoriam · Ten years

Candlelight vigil after the 2016 Pulse nightclub shooting

Memorial · The Forty-Nine We Will Not Let Hate Win Ten years on, a memorial to the 49 people killed at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando on June 12, 2016. Each life named and remembered. The gay bar as sanctuary, and as target, from New Bedford to Orlando. Enter the memorial →

No. I Now showing

Memorial · Resilience Puzzles, 2006 A wound and an awakening. The 2006 attack on a New Bedford gay bar, a memorial to those harmed and to the officer killed, and the community it forged. Our deepest exhibit. Enter the memorial →

No. II Now showing

A New Bedford street on a foggy night, 1940

Place · Sanctuary 20 Kenyon Street Forty years of a safe place: New Bedford's enduring gay bar, the people who built it, the dances that outlasted the danger, and The Gallery Bar that keeps the doors open today. Open exhibit →

No. V Now showing

The AIDS Memorial Quilt displayed on the National Mall

Memorial · Care AIDS on the South Coast The losses, and the lifelines. How a region answered an epidemic, the care it built, and the people we cannot yet name. Enter the memorial →

Wing II History & Culture

No. III Now showing

Politics · Power Sent to Washington Gerry Studds and Barney Frank: two openly gay congressmen who represented the South Coast, and the country they helped change. Open exhibit →

No. IV Now showing

John Sloan's painting The City from Greenwich Village

Arts · Culture The Local Kids Who Changed Art From Acushnet and New Bedford to the center of the art world: Rene Ricard, David Boyce, and the queer creativity that travelled. Open exhibit →

No. VI Now showing

Culture · Music The Queer Century in Sound From a censored composer's diaries to the gayest No. 1 in chart history: LGBTQ+ music across classical, blues, jazz, disco, rock, pop, and hip-hop. Open exhibit →

No. VII Now showing

Culture · Sport Out on the Field From a banned "Gay Olympics" to a record 182 out athletes at one Games: the Gay Games, the athletes who came out at the top, and the fight over trans inclusion. Open exhibit →

Wing III Art & Stage

No. VIII Now showing

Culture · Visual Art The Image and the Closet From a Cupid in a Roman studio to a spill of candy that is a portrait of a dying man: queer art from the Renaissance to the AIDS era and today. Open exhibit →

No. IX Now showing

The Apollo Theatre on West 42nd Street, New York

Culture · Theater From Subtext to Center Stage A law once banned queerness from the stage; a century later it won the Pulitzer. Coded works, the AIDS plays, ballroom onstage, and today's award winners. Open exhibit →

No. X Pride · A Living Exhibit

Identity · Rights · The Spectrum PRISM A living Pride exhibit: an interactive journey across the spectrum of LGBTQ+ identities and the state of rights around the world. The Network's Pride centerpiece, now part of the museum. Enter PRISM →

The Collections Research & Exploration

The Archive Browse hundreds of sourced, confidence-tagged records across LGBTQ+ history. Enter the archive → Hall of Pioneers A growing gallery of documented LGBTQ+ figures from the 7th century BCE to today. Meet the pioneers → Search Search every exhibit, wing, and sourced milestone across LGBTQ+ history in one place. Search the museum → The Atlas A world map of LGBTQ+ history, colored by how completely we can yet document each region. Explore the world → World Timeline Around 95 sourced milestones from antiquity to now, each confidence-tagged. Walk the centuries → Coverage & Gaps What we hold, and what we are still missing. The honest map of the work ahead. See the whole picture →

More Additional Wings

South Coast Timeline The verified, filterable chronology connecting every flagship exhibit. Walk the timeline → The Places A map of the South Coast's verified LGBTQ+ sites and the rooms we can't yet pin. Open the map → Teach the History Primary-source paths, discussion questions, lesson units for South Coast classrooms. Enter the classroom → Help Us Recover Whole chapters are still missing. If you remember, you are part of this museum. Add to the record → Voices The South Coast in its own voice: oral histories shared only with the narrator's consent. Enter the listening room → Languages Spanish, Portuguese, Cape Verdean Kriolu, K'iche': the museum's multilingual plan. Read in your language →

II · Why you can trust this museum

Every claim is sourced, or it is flagged.

Most local LGBTQ+ history survives as rumor and reminiscence. We treat memory with respect, but we never quietly promote it to fact. Every load-bearing claim carries a confidence tag and a source. When we do not know, we say so.

Verified Corroborated Oral / Unverified Unknown

From our charter

"A single fabricated date, invented name, or made-up quote turns the whole institution into a liability and an insult to the people whose lives we claim to honor. If a fact is not in the verified record, we leave it out or flag it."

Read our full method

III · A rescue mission with a clock on it

The people who lived this history are still here. For now.

Bars close and are forgotten. Newsletters rot in attics. Names go unspoken because of what being named once cost. The witnesses to the 1960s, 70s, and 80s are aging out, and their memories are not yet anywhere safe. This museum collects while there is still time.

Share a memory, a photo, or a name

South CoastLGBTQ+Museum

The Exhibition Halls

Every claim is sourced, or it is flagged.

The people who lived this history are still here. For now.

South Coast
LGBTQ+
Museum