Following the demolition of the Gateway District, by the mid-60s new spaces accepting of LGBTQ+ customers emerged along Hennepin and First Avenues in the city's Warehouse District and in the counter-culture center of the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood.

Inspired by the growing homophile movements in places like San Francisco, Minneapolis activists Koreen Phelps and Stephen Ihrig would meet in these safe spaces and in May 1969, one month before the Stonewall Riots in New York, established an informal course for the University of Minnesota called the Homosexual Revolution.

The class quickly evolved to become the student group Fight Repression of Erotic Expression (FREE), which became one of the earliest and largest LGBTQ+ student groups in the country, and the birthplace for a generation of Minnesota LGBTQ+ activists.

Excerpt from Out North

Fight Repression of Erotic Expression (FREE)
Queer Student Cultural Center

QUEER STUDENT CULTURAL CENTER

The Queer Student Cultural Center (QSCC)  aims to celebrate the diversity and culture of the queer community; educate the University of Minnesota community on issues pertinent to the lives of queer students; advocate for inclusion and equality of all individuals regardless of gender identity and sexual/romantic orientation; provide a safe space for queer students to meet and form a sense of community; and empower queer individuals, groups, and organizations. 

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