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The camaraderie was bolstered by the weekly attendance of at least a few members of the nearby Metropolitan Community Church - a local branch of a national church that ministers to gays. The Up Stairs Lounge was a place they could relax. This friendly, neighborhood gay community bar hesitated to live or socialize openly. The evening of June 24, 1973, began like any other Sunday night at the Up Stairs Lounge, at the edge of the French Quarter a couple of blocks from Canal Street. According to New Orleans author and tour guide Frank Perez, the staircase remains charred from the blaze. Today, a brass plaque with the names of the 32 dead is embedded in the sidewalk in front of what used to be the entrance from Iberville Street to the staircase leading to the second-floor lounge. Before police fatally shot him, the gunman had killed 49 Pulse patrons and injured 53.īut the Up Stairs Lounge arson in 1973 occurred before there was a national gay pride day, week or month, and when homosexual activity was a crime.
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and drink as much beer as they want for just a dollar.
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Working class people - including some straight and some female - gather from 5 p.m. A Sunday “beer bust” always marks the week’s end and the close of the day of worship. That’s when, during national Gay Pride week, the death toll was surpassed at Pulse, a gay bar in Orlando, Florida. was a piece of history forgotten on June 12, 2016. The death toll from that June 24, 1973, arson - the deadliest crime against gays in the U.S. But because the Up Stairs Lounge was a gay bar and all but one of the dead were gay men, the police investigation of the arson was casual and incomplete. It had been the worst fire in New Orleans’ history. The smell of burnt flesh was overwhelming.īy the time the flames were extinguished, 32 people were dead. Firefighters found grisly spectacles: a dead man hanging from one window with horror seared on his face and, upstairs, piles of charred bodies, some melted together. Those trapped inside desperately tried to squeeze through the iron bars on the floor-to-ceiling windows. OutLaw is one of Bowen’s 22 registered and active law student organizations.Mississippi Center For Investigative ReportingĪ fireball rushed inside the Up Stairs Lounge and raced through the bar, and the flammable decor and patrons’ polyester clothing. “We have a lot more work to do and look forward to everyone’s help.” “OutLaw would like to thank the Law School and its staff, Student Affairs, our advisor Melody Weigel, the students who participated in our events, and the community for helping us make last year a successful year for OutLaw Legal Society,” said 2019 president Damien Powell. OutLaw will be recognized at the 2021 Bowen Awards, provided circumstances allow a live event. OutLaw was due to receive recognition at the Bowen Awards Ceremony on March 14, but the event was canceled to the COVID-19 pandemic.
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The group’s mission includes promoting diversity, raising awareness of legal issues affecting lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people, and maintaining an open atmosphere of respect, equality, and justice for all. Selection is based on community involvement, on-campus engagement, and volunteerism.īowen’s 2019 Student Organization of the Year is OutLaw Legal Society. Bowen School of Law Student Affairs Office selects a Student Organization of the Year.