A chronicle of the 1973 Up Stairs Lounge fire in New Orleans — the largest mass murder of gay people until 2016 — and its role in catalyzing the gay liberation movement.
Drawing on unprecedented access to survivors and archives, Robert W. Fieseler reconstructs the lives of the thirty-one men and one woman killed when an arsonist set fire to a French Quarter bar on June 24, 1973. The book traces the traumatic aftermath — families refusing to claim loved ones, the Catholic Church denying burial rights, and a city indifferent to survivors — and the impassioned activism that emerged in response.
- Robert W. Fieseler, Author
- Paperback; 384 pages
- Published by W. W. Norton
- ISBN: 9781631495953
A chronicle of the 1973 Up Stairs Lounge fire in New Orleans — the largest mass murder of gay people until 2016 — and its role in catalyzing the gay liberation movement.
Drawing on unprecedented access to survivors and archives, Robert W. Fieseler reconstructs the lives of the thirty-one men and one woman killed when an arsonist set fire to a French Quarter bar on June 24, 1973. The book traces the traumatic aftermath — families refusing to claim loved ones, the Catholic Church denying burial rights, and a city indifferent to survivors — and the impassioned activism that emerged in response.
- Robert W. Fieseler, Author
- Paperback; 384 pages
- Published by W. W. Norton
- ISBN: 9781631495953