Twin Cities Pride Parade

Nicollet Avenue, Marquette Avenue, 24th Street W., Lyndale Avenue, and 32nd Street by various routes, (1972-2010)

The Twin Cities Pride Parade began as a 50-strong protest march on the (newly-built) Nicollet Mall in 1972. Downtown shoppers and office workers composed a majority of the event's few spectators, and of these, few had “the foggiest idea what [the marchers] were talking about.” Americans were still fighting in the Vietnam War, and this produced countless protest marches. Gay Pride appeared to be just another slogan on hand-painted pickets; the concept garnered little attention. Gay Pride attracted substantial attention in 1977, when Anita Bryant—an advocate for anti-gay legislation—stirred a backlash in the young LGBT community. Scores of simple floats and walking drag queens accompanied defiant marchers holding hands. The march transformed into a parade sometime in the 1980s, when the HIV/AIDS pandemic inspired changing strategies for greater acceptance. In the late 80s, the Twin Cities Pride Committee made a grave mistake that almost spelled the parade’s doom.

The second Twin Cities Pride March on the Nicollet Mall, 1973. Courtesy of the Jean-Nickolaus Tretter Collection.

In 1987, the Committee chose a route away from Loring Park that stretched from Lake Calhoun to Powderhorn Park along 32nd street. The 2-mile path exhausted participants, bored attendees, and threatened to event’s future. Some even referred to that year's parade as "the death march."

Ashley Rukes on the cover of Gaze Magazine, 1993. Courtesy of the Jean-Nickolaus Tretter Collection.

Hope came in the form of a transgender woman with a penchant for military fashion. Ashley Rukes, who directed the Aquatennial Parade in 1975, first volunteered her expertise in 1992. Rukes initiated communication with Minneapolis Police, established a pioneering lineup system for the parade’s many contingents, and encouraged even the smallest groups to participate. In just one year, from 1992-93, she doubled the number of contingents from 60-127. “This community has been my family, my family of Pride, for several years now,” she explained in 1993. Throughout the 1990s, Rukes' dedication supported the parade and made it one of the most spectacular in the country. Shock and sadness met the Director’s untimely death shortly before pride weekend in 1999. The Pride Committee now names the parade in her honor.

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This page is still under contruction. --SVC

Part of Minneapolis/St. Paul, MN: 100 Queer Places in Minnesota History, (1860-1969), (1969-2010)