March 6, 1952: 69 years ago, Mar 6 1952, supporters of a Black family called the Garys, [...]

69 years ago, Mar 6 1952, supporters of a Black family called the Garys, organized by the Communist Party’s East Bay Civil Rights Congress, faced off with a racist mob in Rollingwood, Contra Costa County

Wilbur Gary, Vice-Commander of the local American Legion, had moved his family into a house in the all-white Rollingwood area near Richmond. On the night of Mar 3, a cross was burned on the Garys’ front lawn. The windows of the realtor who negotiated the sale were also smashed

The Garys refused to move. On Mar 6, a white mob assembled in front of the Garys’ home, demanding they leave the neighborhood. EBCRC organizers Buddy Green and Jessica Mitford, both CP members, raced to Rollingwood, where they joined the Garys in their barricaded house

As the mob hurled stones at the windows, Green and Mitford organized “a dozen car loads of black and white volunteers” to protect the house. Over the following days some 800 volunteers guarded the family from their racist neighbors

They advocated for an alliance between gay people and other revolutionary struggles and groups, particularly the Black Panthers and anti-war group The Resistance. In late 1969 they became a chapter of the Gay Liberation Front, a similar group founded in New York after Stonewall