Honoring Our Heroes: A Film Screening and Panel on Our API LGBT Pioneers

In celebration of LGBT Heritage Month, join us to launch API Equality-LA’s Asian American Lesbian and Gay Pioneers Project.

Our newest initiative is conducting filmed interviews with the earliest Asian American LGBT activists in Los Angeles. Although their stories are not well-known, Asian Americans participated actively in the nascent LGBT civil rights movement in Southern California. We want to ensure that these courageous, outrageous, and sometimes hilarious stories are preserved and shared for generations to come.

On June 17 at 2 p.m., at the One National Gay and Lesbian Archives, API Equality-LA honors two such pioneers with short films featuring Tak Yamamoto andJune Lagmay, who in 1980 were founders of Asian Pacific Lesbians and Gays, the first gay Asian organization in Los Angeles.

Yamamoto also served as President of the San Fernando Valley chapter of the Japanese American Citizens League and was instrumental in getting the national organization to support same-sex marriage in 1994. Lagmay has been active in local politics and Asian community affairs and currently serves as the Clerk of the City of Los Angeles.

A discussion about the early days of love and liberation with these two ground-breaking activists will follow the film screenings.  This free event is open to the public. A reception will follow.