40 Years of Pride – Part 13

Participants in Kansas City’s 1993 Pride Celebration had reason to revel.  In April of that year, the March on Washington for Lesbian, Gay, and Bi Equal Rights and Liberation was held, drawing 1,000,000 marchers, including a Kansas City contingent.  Locally, the Kansas City Council passed the ordinance prohibiting discrimination against gays and lesbians in housing and employment in June – fittingly, Pride Month. Spirits were high that summer.

The Celebration itself was moved to Roanoke Park in order to accommodate growing crowds.  Indeed, owing to the non-discrimination ordinance passage, attendance at the 1993 Pride Celebration broke all records.

1993 Pride Program

1993 Pride Program

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

That year’s parade was rather extensive, assembling at Mill Creek Park and marching north along Nichols Parkway/Broadway through Westport to Valentine Road and on to Roanoke Park.  Note the instructions for the parade cautioned larger floats to integrate after the parade passed beneath the former streetcar overpass at 43rd. Street.

1993 Parade route

1993 Parade route

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This appears to have been the last Pride Celebration organized by Gay and Lesbian Awareness.  Evidence shows that subsequent Celebrations continued to be organized by GLSN, the Gay and Lesbian Services Network, the umbrella organization of GALA and several other initiatives, but, after five years of increasingly successful Pride Celebrations, GALA was no more.