We've been celebrating this year's Pride Month with an A-Z tour of LGBTQ+ London on our social media.

Delving into our LGBTQ+ Archives, we've been looking at the queer activism the city’s been a backdrop to and highlighting the places, organisations, and individuals who have all played a part in the LGBTQ+ history of the capital. Explore all of the places and people featured in the A-Z below:

The history of Pride marches

On 1 July 1972, the Gay Liberation Front (GLF) held the UK’s first-ever Pride march in London. This date was chosen as it was the nearest Saturday to the anniversary of the Stonewall riot of 1969.

Inspired by movements in the US, two British activists Aubrey Walter and Bob Mellors came back to Britain and formed the London branch of the GLF in a basement room of the London School of Economics in June 1970.

Members of the Gay Liberation Front also founded the fortnightly newspaper Gay News in June 1972, just prior to the first Pride march, along with members of the Campaign for Homosexual Equality. We hold the full run of Gay News, the GLF’s Come Together, and many other journals from this period in our LGBTQ+ Collections.

We also recently uncovered images in our archives from the second ever Pride in 1972, and you can watch LGBTQ+ activist Peter Tatchell and our Special Collections & Archives Manager Stef chat about these photos to Student Pride below.

Football's coming home (to our LGBTQ+ archives!)

You can continue the Pride celebrations by coming along to the free archive launch of LGBTQ+ football club Stonewall FC, who were the "S" in our A-Z of LGBTQ+ London.

We'll be joined by the current Chair of Stonewall FC, Alex Baker, and the Manager of their first Women and Non-Binary team, Betty Mayeya. Other members of Stonewall FC will also be a part of this panel discussion, which will focus on the club's 30 year history and how they've tackled homophobia in the sport.

You can join us in-person or tune in online on Wednesday 30 June.

Want to discover more LGBTQ+ history?