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In 1966, Marsha P. Johnson moved to Greenwich Village and became a prostitute and drag performer. Marsha enjoyed expressing herself through her appearance. Her lavish outfits were often made from thrift store finds, gifts and items she found. She was often seen wearing flower crowns she’d constructed with discarded flowers from her makeshift dwellings in Manhattan’s Flower District, as well as mixing traditionally masculine and feminine clothing that she collected. Likely, that’s all she had access to at the time. In the flower district she would sleep under the tables, take her last ten dollars and buy the left over flowers and dress up her hair.

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As Marsha’s prominence in the community grew, she also grew herself a fan club. She garnered the nickname “Saint of Christopher Street,” because she was mostly known for her saint-like generosity, especially towards the youth in the LGBTQ community, who she often sought out to help. She was like robin-hood. She would ask for change on the streets and turn around and give it to someone she thought needed it more, telling them to go get something to eat.

Marsha P. Johnson lived a counterculture lifestyle, expressing her womanhood through the dichotomy of strength in activism and gentleness in love. Her actions in the fight for gay and trans rights were not accepted by many, and she endured terrible hardships for living so boldly and authentically. Refusing to accept the cisgender, heteronormative ideals of her society, Marsha began to generate a positive view of her trans identity within her community by demonstrating kindness and generosity to trans people in need (Pay It No Mind 2012).

She quickly became a prominent fixture in the LGBTQ community serving as a “drag mother” by helping homeless and struggling LGBTQ youth and touring the world as a successful drag queen with the Hot Peaches.

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The work done by the HOT PEACHES has been described as "political camp, dominated by drag".
The early work of the company often created their performances around the fashion and outfits its performers wanted to wear. These outfits were often ostentatious, sparkling outfits, which included platform boots and feather boas. The Hot Peaches was a drag theatre company founded in the early 1970s by playwright/lyricist and collector of downtown characters, Jimmy Camicia. The company was known for its farcical romps, outrageous costumes, outrageous personalities, and gay political content.  Jimmy’s shows explored the many issues affecting the LGBTQ+ community (a term that had not been invented yet) with a particular emphasis on the plight of the drag queen.
Johnson sang and performed as a member of J. Camicias’ international, NYC-based, drag performance troupe, Hot Peaches, from the early 70's through to shows in the 1990s. When The Cockettes, a similar drag troupe from San Francisco, formed an East Coast troupe, The Angels of Light, Johnson was also asked to perform with them.

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Marsha P. Johnson State Park is a seven-acre waterfront park located along the East River in the Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn. It offers visitors a stunning view of the Manhattan skyline, a delightful play area, and the green space provides many opportunities for recreation and relaxation.

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In the 1960’s Gay bars were places of refuge where gay men and lesbians and other individuals who were considered sexually suspect could socialize in relative safety from public harassment.

One such well-known gathering place for young gay men, lesbians, and transgender people was the Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village

Marsha P. Johnson was one of the first drag queens to go to the Stonewall Inn after they began allowing women and drag queens inside.  She was also considered one of the significant people in the Stonewall Uprising.

Stonewall soon became a symbol of resistance to social and political discrimination, inspiring solidarity among homosexual groups for decades. The Stonewall riots were considered to have initiated the gay rights movement as such, it did serve as a catalyst for a new generation of political activism.

In 1999 the U.S. National Park Service placed the Stonewall Inn on the National Register of Historic Places and in 2016 Pres. Barack Obama designated the site of the Stonewall uprising a national monument.

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In 1960s America, gays and lesbians were effectively outlaws, living in secrecy and fear. They were labeled insane by doctors, immoral by religious leaders, unemployable by the government, predatory by TV broadcasts, and criminal by the police.

In the early morning hours of June 28, 1969, the Stonewall uprising occurred. It was a series of violent confrontations between police and gay rights activists outside the Stonewall Inn. While the first two nights of rioting were the most intense, the clashes with police would result in a series of spontaneous demonstrations and marches through the gay neighborhoods of Greenwich Village that lasted for several days. The LGBTQ+ community was fed up with being targeted by the police and seeing these public arrests. As the riots progressed, an international gay rights movement was born. Their rage is just not about the police. It was about the oppression and fear they felt every single day. The Stonewall uprising was an awakening and was solidified as a key moment for an entire LGBTQ+ civil rights movement. It electrified the push for gay equality.

Many eyewitnesses have identified Marsha P. Johnson as one of the main instigators of the uprising and thus, some have recognized her as the vanguard of the gay liberation movement in the United States.

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In the early 1970s, Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera founded the housing collective, Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries (STAR) House. Johnson and Rivera were inspired by an occupation by students in an NYU residence building protesting LGBTQ+ discrimination at NYU, which was eventually shut down by police. Johnson and Rivera created STAR House as a permanent home for the queer liberation movement that would provide food, shelter, clothes, and legal support to trans and queer unhoused sex workers and youth. STAR House began as a parked trailer truck until Johnson and Rivera found a building in New York City's East Village. On the top floor of the building, Johnson and Rivera wanted to teach youth how to read and write. Johnson and Rivera did sex work to pay the rent for STAR House, but when they could no longer afford the rent, STAR House tenants were evicted and the building was demolished.

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Communication File from NYPD's Intelligence Division

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Communication File from NYPD's Intelligence Division

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The image is a communication file from the New York Police Department documenting the groups present at a gay liberation protest, including the Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries, who demanded that the state free all political prisoners. Marsha P. Johnson was arrested over 100 times during her life as she was frequently criminalized for protesting, being a sex worker, and expressing her gender identity. In an interview she did in 1970, she shared that during the Stonewall uprisings, she was not afraid of being arrested since she had been going to jail for the past ten years for "hustling" and "wearing a little bit of makeup down 42nd street". According to a close friend, Johnson was sentenced to 90 days in prison for resisting arrest and hitting an officer with a purse full of bricks and was eventually moved to a psychiatric hospital. Johnson's experiences with being incarcerated and institutionalized shaped her activism and community work, with one example being her presence at a protest against Bellevue Hospital's detainment of gay and trans people and its use of electric shock.

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In a 1990 drag theatre production, Marsha P. Johnson wore a pin similar to this one on stage. The "Silence=Death" pink triangle graphic on this pin was created by Avram Finkelstein in 1986 to protest the US government's failure to develop HIV/AIDS treatment and address the spread of HIV/AIDS in the LGBTQ+ community. "Silence=death" became a popular slogan within AIDS activism in the 1980s and 1990s, which Marsha P. Johnson was extremely involved in until the end of her life in 1992. Johnson was HIV positive and a member of the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP), attending several of their demonstrations. Johnson did community work around AIDS in private spaces as well and was a caregiver to a close friend with AIDS. Up until the end of her life, Johnson spent lots of time in the hospital being around those who were sick or dying from AIDs.

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Although Marsha P. Johnson was nicknamed "the Saint of Christopher Street" for her kindness, she was a complex individual who spent much of her life homeless, in jail or in psychiatric hospitals, and working as a sex worker. Why is it important to remember and honour community workers in their entirety, not erasing their complex identities to uphold a respectable or saint-like image of them?

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Marsha P. Johnson & Randy Wicker. Making Gay History. (2023, February 27). https://makinggayhistory.com/podcast/episode-11-johnson-wicker/

Marsha P. Johnson pickets bellevue hospital to protest treatment of street people and Gays. NYPL Digital Collections. (n.d.). https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/510d47e3-5fa9-a3d9-e040-e00a18064a99

Marsha P. Johnson’s Place(s) in NYC’s LGBT history. NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project. (2017, October 6). https://www.nyclgbtsites.org/2017/10/06/marsha-p-johnsons-places-in-nycs-lgbt-history/

Marsha’s Poem - Soul. Marsha P. Johnson State Park. (n.d.). http://marshapjohnson.moeyinc.com/about/09.html

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Tourmaline. (2019, June 29). Honoring Sylvia Rivera and Marsha P. Johnson. Vogue. https://www.vogue.com/article/tourmaline-trans-day-of-action-op-ed

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