Iconic West Village Bar Honored For Historic 'Sip-In' LGBTQ Activism

WEST VILLAGE, NY — New York City paid homage Thursday to a group of activists who, 56 years ago, stepped into a West Village bar, announced they were homosexuals and were denied service because of it.

A new plaque now stands outside Julius' at 159 W. 10th St., detailing the April 21, 1966 "Sip-in" that challenged regulations banning serving LGBTQ people in New York City.

"It was one point during the all early struggles where I was able to actually make a footprint in history," sip-in participant Randy Wicker said at Thursday's ceremony.

“Julius’ will always be special in my mind."

The plaque honoring Julius' Bar, the oldest continuously running gay bar in the city, was presented by the NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project in collaboration with Village Preservation.

On the historic day, activists from The Mattachine Society — inspired by the Civil Rights nonviolent activism in the south — invited press along for their act of protest.

The group hoped to raise the alarm over New York State Liquor Authority regulations prohibiting bars from serving drinks to gay men or lesbians.

The bar refused to serve them and the story appeared in most major New York City newspapers the next day.

The "Sip-In" took place three years before the nearby Stonewall Riots, which is generally considered to be the beginning of a new wave of LGBTQ activism.

But Walker said he believed his activism made that historic event possible.

“Everyone has a dream that everything started with Stonewall," Walker said. "Well I started in 1958, and that was 11 years before Stonewall.”

Walker's historic act was honored 50 years later when Julius' was put in the state and national Registers of Historic Places for LGBTQ history in 2016.

The plaque at Julius' is the 19th that Village Preservation has placed in Greenwich Village, East Village, and Noho.

Among attendees at Thursday's ceremony was Broadway actor John Cameron Mitchell — better known as the writer and star of the film "Hedwig and the Angry Inch"— State Senator Brad Hoylman, Julius' Bar owner Helen Buford, Village Preservation Executive Director Andrew Berman and NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project's Ken Lustbader.

But it was Walker who captured the spirit the new plaque on West 10th Street is meant to honor.

"We cracked the chains that held the Village and the gay community in this country locked in the hands of the criminal underground who owned the gay bars,” Walker said.

"It is sort of amazing to be here today."