Gays’ Parade Has a Somber Undercurrent

Sunday’s 17th annual Gay Pride Parade in West Hollywood was a celebration set to the music of marching bands and the motion of dancers and baton twirlers, but AIDS was never far out of mind.

Hundreds of spectators released green, white and purple balloons in memory of AIDS victims just before the parade started west on Santa Monica Boulevard at about 12:30 p.m. Names of those who died from acquired immune deficiency syndrome were written on cards that were carried into the sunny sky.

The event was poignant for Mark Pizel, who traveled from Minneapolis, Minn., for a week’s stay centered around the parade. Pizel, who watched from the sidelines with a friend, said he was diagnosed as having AIDS last January. He bemoaned what he called belated efforts to curb the disease, which federal officials say has killed 21,621 people.

“I think they’re doing all they can about it now,” Pizel said. “But it’s seven years too late. It’s too late for me, anyway.”

Despite the somber undercurrents, the procession was a lively celebration of Los Angeles’ diverse gay and lesbian community, said Bob Craig, president of Christopher Street West/Los Angeles, the nonprofit group that sponsored the parade.

More entries than ever--205--moved slowly down the 1 3/4-mile parade route, a stretch of Santa Monica Boulevard from Crescent Heights Boulevard to West Hollywood Park. Craig estimated that more than 2,000 people participated in the parade. In some places spectators were 10 deep, and the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department estimated the crowd at 70,000. There were several arrests on charges of public drunkenness, but no more than usual for a Sunday afternoon, a Sheriff’s Department spokesman said.

Gay and lesbian professional, religious and social groups turned out to proclaim their pride in being homosexual.

Actress Mamie Van Doren, one of the first Hollywood personalities to lend her name to the fight against AIDS, was Grand Marshal.

There also were transvestites and entrants dressed in black leather with studs, but the parade was less flamboyant than a similar event in San Francisco, where 450 lesbian “Dykes on Bikes” riding 300 motorcycles led that city’s 18th annual Lesbian/Gay Freedom Day Parade. San Francisco police estimated that more than 100,000 people watched the parade, billed as the largest in the country.

Similar parades in New York, Chicago and Seattle were expected to draw 100,000, 60,000 and 10,000, respectively.

The parades mark the anniversary of a June, 1965, confrontation in New York’s Greenwich Village between police and gay activists. The incident is considered a turning point in the gay rights movement.

The local parade was held on the second day of the Gay Pride Festival at West Hollywood Park, which features live music, food and booths with gay-oriented themes. The atmosphere was relaxed as couples held hands and embraced. Homosexual couples indicated, however, that they still must win acceptance.

“We like to stick up for our rights,” said 22-year-old Faye Wilson of Palms Springs, who watched the parade with Terry McAllister. “I like to walk down the street and hold her hand. One day out of the year we get to do it.”

FO Grand Marshal Mamie Van Doren riding in Gay Pride Parade and, below, one of the banners displayed by spectators.