FAN FAVORITE: Stonewall | Why Don't You Do Something? | 3

21:34This evening, you've just walked into a small hotel room on a midtown side street. The room is featureless and drab, just like you feel. Glad you could make it. Not like I had much choice in the matter. The man you're here to meet is standing over by the hotel room window. You once thought he was handsome, but now you can't stand the sight of him. I've got some room service coming up in a second. My apologies. I probably didn't order enough for both of us, though. I'm not planning on sticking around. Here, here's your money. That's too bad, but I probably wouldn't want to stick around either if I was in your shoes.

22:05You're not in my shoes. The money's there. Count it if you want. Do whatever it is you do. Then I'm going to leave. I'll count it in a second, but we need to talk about the next payment. No, this is it. This is all I have. You said that last month, and yet here you are with more. I can't get any more. This is it. My bosses aren't going to like that. Maybe you should have thought twice before you picked me up down in Greenwich Village. I didn't know what I was getting into. But now you do. I understand. You don't want your family to find out. Don't you threaten them. I'm not threatening anyone.

22:36I'm simply telling you how it is. And I understand if you can't get more, then maybe you can go back to the Stonewall some night and find yourself a young man, a young man with money like yourself. Bring him back here. Tell him that you're going to need a payment from him. And if he doesn't pay, you'll tell his family. You'll tell his wife. You're disgusting. Maybe. I'm just doing a job. But I'm also giving you another chance. Look, if you can't find the money, and I don't care how you do it, we'll call your wife. We'll tell her where you hang out, who you hang out with, what you are. And that will be the end of it.

23:12Your awful secret will be out. This wasn't what we agreed to. She'll leave you, and she'll take the kids. She'll eat you alive in divorce court. Or you can keep coming here once a month and giving me the money I need. It's up to you. You bring your hands up to your face, rub your eyes. The world goes dark as you press your knuckles against your eye sockets. You made a mistake. Then you made an even bigger mistake by thinking you could buy this man's silence with a few hundred bucks. This is your new reality. Drab, featureless nightmare. And you can't see a way out.

23:49In 1966, the New York Times uncovered a blackmail ring that had swindled almost$2 million from several highly successful men. The victims included a member of Congress, two Army generals, a Princeton professor, and a Navy admiral. The last of these, Admiral William Church, took his own life rather than testify about his sexuality before a grand jury. These stories were shocking, but even more shocking for some Stonewall patrons was that one of the extortionists named in the Times' expose was also the club's doorman. Tipped to the danger, the 1968 New York-Madachine Society newsletter warned its readers that Stonewall's doorman, Ed Murphy, was in fact an ex-felon.

24:29In and out of jail his whole life, Murphy had been charged with larceny, extortion, and impersonating a police officer. Murphy pled guilty under a federal indictment to the extortion charges. But because Murphy had made a deal to provide the state with more evidence, his sentence was reduced to a mere five years probation. With just a slap on the wrist, Murphy had escaped any jail time and was now back on the street. Mattachine's newsletter reported, Murphy has an interest in the Stonewall, along with several other gay clubs in New York. We caution our readers to never use your real name when cruising.

25:02And remember, that trick or hustler you just picked up may be working for the management. But it wasn't just Stonewall's doorman Murphy extorting money. The scheme filtered down to Stonewall waiters and busboys as well. They targeted middle-class gay men who looked like they could afford to pay. Victims who could not pay were pulled further into the scheme and forced to turn around and blackmail other gay men. There was nowhere, it seems, where LGBTQ people could exist without having to look over their shoulders. Not Stonewall's dance floor, not the whole of the village. The extortion rings stretch all the way to Wall Street.

25:37According to one bartender who also worked as a page boy on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, the pickings were all too easy. Between the brokers, married and single, and the exchange employees, there were more gay men on Wall Street than at any gay bar. The New York City Police Department had been willing to turn a blind eye when gay men were being shaken down at a nightclub. But the potential blackmail of Wall Street traders and bankers, even gay ones, was a claim they took very seriously. So seriously that the city police assigned a special team to the case. The leader of this team was a decorated deputy inspector named Seymour Pine.

26:11Just shy of his 50th birthday, Inspector Pine had been transferred to the Morals Division of the NYPD after a career spent fighting the Mafia in Brooklyn. Pine's team was tasked with tracing the source of counterfeit bonds that had been appearing in Europe. It was thought that these forged bonds were coming from the mafia, and that the extortion schemes on Wall Street could be traced right to the LGBTQ bars the mob owned in Greenwich Village. Pine's commanding officer wanted these clubs shut down permanently. So Pine and his team began securing the proper warrants they would need to start raiding gay clubs in the village.

26:44The warrants would help them legally search the private clubs, and the other officers would train undercover. cover. By the summer of 1969, Pine and his team had raided several bars but turned up nothing. Then, late in the evening on Friday night, June 27th, Pine and a small team of plainclothes police officers gathered in Christopher Park across the street from the Stonewall. Even though Pine had already orchestrated a raid on Stonewall just three days before, he decided to return. This time, his team would move in during prime time, after midnight on a Friday when the club was at its busiest.

27:18A Friday night raid would be a surprise to just about everyone, and perhaps his team could finally dig up something useful. But now Pine was nervous. He'd sent two female undercover officers inside around midnight. When they emerged from the bar, it would be a signal for the raid to start. That was well over half an hour ago, and they were nowhere to be seen. By 1.20 in the morning, Pine felt he had waited long enough. He and four officers strode across Christopher Street to the front doors of the Stonewall Inn, and they demanded to be let inside.

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28:34He thinks he's found a way to rig the system until an unrelated FBI investigation inadvertently exposes the largest college admissions fraud in American history. Follow American Scandal wherever you get your podcasts. Audible subscribers can binge all episodes of American Scandal early and ad-free right now. Join Audible and the Audible app or by subscribing on Apple Podcasts. Imagine you're reading Pride and Prejudice, except you're not reading it. Harris Dickinson and Marissa Abella are reading it to you on Audible. Her barbs sting you. His coldness sends a shiver up your spine. Your heart aches.

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29:31Friday, June 27th, was Yvonne Ritter's 18th birthday. She could think of no better way to celebrate it than with her friends at the Stonewall Inn. Ritter now identifies as a transgender woman, but at the time, she was still keeping her identity a secret from her parents. She'd taken to borrowing her mother's dresses. She'd begun saving up for gender confirmation surgery. That night in June 1969, she'd selected an elegant black-and-white striped cocktail dress from her mother's closet. But wearing women's clothes in public still made her nervous. Ritter knew that transgender people were often physically assaulted, but she tried not to dwell on it.

30:07She recalled later in an interview, I was a big girl, so people didn't bother me that much. Still, leaving for the bar that evening, she kept a change of clothes with her in a bag, just in case. That night on the stonewall dance floor, Yvonne lost all her nervousness. She could drink legally, and she was about to graduate from high school in three days. She was elated. She recalled, I felt like I had finally come of age, that I was growing up. I was going to be able to finally live the life I wanted to live. By 1.20 in the morning, Yvonne Ritter was fully immersed on the dance floor as the rolling stones blasted from the jukebox.

30:42Then, all of a sudden, white lights flooded the room. Confused, Ritter at first didn't realize it was a raid. Near the club's front door, Inspector Pine and a team of about a dozen officers shut off the music and instructed everyone to line up against the wall and produce identification. There were around 200 people in the bar. Ritter made a dash for the bathroom, where she knew there might be a way out through a window. She recalled, When I stood on the toilet to get out, a policeman grabbed me by the leg. He told me I wasn't going anywhere. They pushed me up against the wall with the other people.

31:14Then we were herded to the front of the bar, along the wall that led to the exit door. I was frightened. I was young. I was scared. Pine and his officers quickly began checking IDs. Several Stonewall employees were immediately cuffed. Anyone who couldn't produce an ID, anyone looking under 18, and anyone who stood out because of their clothing were also taken into custody. Yvonne Ritter recalls, I was up against the wall with other transgender people and drag queens. We were taken aside from some of the other people and grouped together because we were not in the appropriate attire. Ritter was terrified that she would be arrested, and she was doubly terrified that a picture of her wearing her mother's dress might appear in the paper or on TV where her parents would see it.

31:56As an officer led Ritter outside to the police wagon, she was thankful that, at least, she hadn't been handcuffed. She noticed that the air was just as hot and stifling outside as it had been in the club. She also noticed something strange. Lots of other people had not been arrested. They were free to leave. But it didn't look like they were going anywhere. As Ritter waited for the police van to arrive, the crowd grew larger. People in the crowd were loudly complaining about their treatment at the hands of the police. Many were discussing the unjustness of the raids themselves. Others were striking campy poses as a demonstration for a growing audience of onlookers.

32:32The mood was shifting quickly from anger to theatrics, then back to anger. But still, no one was leaving. Inside the stone wall, Pine noticed the same thing. So far, everyone had cooperated. Typically, the patrons of places like this would vanish into the streets as soon as they were released. But Pine noticed small acts of resistance bubbling up. One of his officers shoved a woman. Then she almost struck the officer back. He could hear voices in the crowd complaining loudly. One saying, Why do we have to take this? Outside, a police van had pulled up. But the crowd was still not dispersing. First, the police escorted the mafia employees into the back of the van.

33:12The crowd on the sidewalk began to cheer or jeer as the Stonewall management and workers ducked and climbed inside. But once the cops began to bring out Stonewall customers who'd been arrested, the crowd began to boo loudly. The cops had targeted mostly transgender people. Following at the end of the line, Ritter watched as some of the arrested patrons struck poses of their own on their way to the police van. Even on their way to jail, they were resisting, and the crowd was feeding off of it. Soon, pennies began to ricochet off the side of the police van, thrown by people in the crowd. Others were yelling squarely at the cops, calling them pigs, while still others had gotten on one side of the police van and started to rocket back and forth.

33:53Some people began chanting, For Ritter, it was at this moment that something miraculous happened. As she was stepping into the police van, the police officer turned away. The van was already getting full, and the cops were distracted. Ritter quickly stepped back down onto the pavement and began to walk towards the crowd. She later recalled, I was walking away, and the cop who put me in saw me. He said, Hey, you, come over here. He was a young guy, and I begged him, Please, it's my birthday, I'm 18, and my mother's going to kill me. I was crying, and my makeup was going. The cop almost looked the other way, kind of gave me the hand motion, and I kept walking.

34:30I thought, if he comes after me and grabs me by the scruff of the neck, He's going to arrest me again. But he didn't. By the time Ritter got to the edge of the crowd, she couldn't believe it. She'd managed to escape. Outside, tension was building. As one of the police officers pushed a woman into the back of the police van, she turned around and hit him with her purse. The officer, in turn, hit her with his nightstick. At that moment, a voice rang out. The bystanders would later disagree whether it belonged to the woman resisting arrest or someone else. Why don't you guys do something? The question was a call to action that lingered in the tense air.

35:06And then soon, people in the crowd began to act as one, rushing the police van as it drove away. Then they rushed Pine and his officers, who remained on the sidewalk. The simmering anger had boiled over. Pine suddenly faced a very real problem. With the police van gone, he and his men were hopelessly outnumbered, pinned against the building, encircled by the crowd. Objects were being thrown. Someone had found a pile of bricks. So the cops retreated back inside the Stonewall Inn, barricading the doors behind them.

35:41Imagine it's early Saturday morning, June 1969. You entered the doors of the Stonewall a few hours ago, looking for a drink and a fun night out. Now you're in handcuffs on the floor. Even though you showed ID, the police still cuffed you. But you put up a struggle, and they never got you into the police wagon before it left. Now you can hear chanting from outside, and the sound of people beating on the front windows. But inside, the feeling is even more desperate. You can't see much, but you can hear cops talking to themselves. They sound panicked. From your position on the floor, you turn over to try and get a look at what's going on.

36:15There's a few other people like you, handcuffed and laying on the ground, or propped up on a couch. Only the cops are in motion. The very cops that just busted the bar, the cops that sent your friends off to jail, Those cops are now stuck here inside with you. Hey, get me out of these cuffs, officer. The police have barricaded the front door with tables and chairs, but it doesn't look like that's going to hold out for long. Officer, can you take these off? It's not like I've got anywhere to run. A nearby officer glances back. Stay where you are. We're trying to get this situation under control.

36:49Yeah, good luck with that. Suddenly, the officer is in your face. Listen, those are your people out there. That's a mob outside, and they want to tear this place apart. A mob? You guys are the one busting up the place. We weren't hurting anyone. We're just fed up with being hassled all the time. We've had enough. Your argument is interrupted by the sound of smashing glass, and you see a glint of flame out of the corner of your eye. Are they throwing firebombs through the broken window? Just an hour ago, the people outside were dancing to music. They were flirting. It was Friday night, and anything was possible with one more drink.

37:24Now everything's changed. It's no longer just a party. It's something different. A resistance.

37:34The New York City Fire Department arrived before Pine's reinforcements could. When Pine and the police retreated into the stonewall, the assembled crowd began to pelt the building's facade with bottles, bricks, cobblestones, and makeshift Molotov cocktails. 200 people directed all of their fury and frustration against the police barricaded inside. A Stonewall regular, Michael Fader, later recalled, It was like the last straw. It was time to reclaim something that had always been taken from us. It was something that just happened. All kinds of people, all kinds of different reasons, but mostly it was total outrage.

38:09Anger, sorrow, everything combined. We felt like we'd been booted out of our home for no reason. The crowd tried to break back into the Stonewall, and in doing so, managed to dislodge a parking meter and use it as a battering ram against the windows of the club. Someone began throwing firebombs through the broken windows, prompting a call to the fire department. Stonewall patron Raymond Castro recalled being inside the club during the melee. It was like everything was in slow motion. You're not getting any answers. You're not sure what's going to happen next. Time did not move. You could hear screaming outside from the protesters.

38:43It was a good sound to know that you had a lot of people out there pulling for you. City firetrucks wailing their way up Christopher Street prevented what could have been a bloodbath by police had the crowd actually forced their way back inside the stonewall. But the crowd did not break in. Craig Rodwell, from his position on a stoop next door, watched as the scene unfolded. Soon after the fire trucks arrived, more police vans pulled up. These were tactical police units, wearing riot gear and helmets. They came up Christopher Street towards 7th Avenue in a V formation and managed to disperse the crowd from the front door.

39:18Rodwell got off his stoop and joined the melee. It was like a tug-of-war that went on for a few hours. They would just chase us down the street, and we'd go around the block and come back and chant things and throw bottles. Some of the crowd taunted the tactical police by linking arms like raquettes' dancers to mimic the cops' advances in formation, singing, We are the village girls. We wear our hair and curls. We wear our sweaters tight. we give the guys a fright. Danny Garvin, who was part of the crowd that night, recalls the police reaction to this theatrical protest. Cops just charged with the nightsticks and started smacking them in the heads, hitting people, pulling them into cars.

39:56I just can't ever get that one sight out of my mind. That kick line, which was a spoof on the cops' machismo, making fun of their authority. People were getting smashed with bats. And for what? A kick line? Fire trucks turned their hoses on the protesters, but the kick lines would form again and again. The two lines would advance on each other, disperse, then advance again. During the melee, Raymond Castro tried to resist arrest. As two policemen forced him inside the back of a police wagon, a handcuffed Castro managed to put one foot on each side of the open doors. Kicking back, he knocked the two policemen to the ground.

40:31Still, he was eventually subdued and dragged back into the police wagon. Miraculously that night, no shots were fired. In total, 13 people were arrested, including Raymond Castro. But because he was not read his Miranda rights, his case was later dismissed. Craig Rodwell and Yvonne Ritter both escaped injury, but others were not so lucky. Many suffered minor wounds, but some were hospitalized. By around four in the morning, the crowd had dissipated, vanishing into the surrounding streets. Mattachine head Dick Leisch, who had been alerted by a very early morning phone call, described the scene.

41:07I remember the street being so empty, except for the cops, and seeing very few civilians anywhere around. Then I remember the sky being very dark, there being a terrific moon, and the village being eerily quiet. Leisch couldn't help feel that something enormous had just happened. An oppressed and harassed underclass had refused to do what they were told. It was like the moment after a battle. There had been an uprising on Christopher Street. But the uprising didn't end Saturday morning. It would continue for the next six days as people gathered night after night in front of the Stonewall. Something entirely new was beginning.

41:43The gay rights movement had changed. The gay rights movement was out and proud. On the next episode of American History Tellers, the fight for gay rights moves on from its trial by fire at Stonewall with a promise of greater influence and growing visibility. But soon divisions emerge on how radical the movement should become and which voices the movement will ultimately serve.

42:10American History Tellers is only possible because of listeners like you. So thank you. And don't miss an episode. Be sure to follow American History Tellers on Audible or wherever you get your podcasts. Audible subscribers can binge new seasons of American History Tellers early and ad-free right now. Join Audible in the Audible app or by subscribing on Apple Podcasts. And to find out more about me, including my other podcasts, my live show, the history tours I'm arranging, and all sorts of other things, go to HistoryIsHuman.com. That's HistoryIsHuman.com. From Audible Originals, this is Episode 3 of Stonewall for American History Tellers.

42:50For more information on the Stonewall riots, we recommend Stonewall, The Riots That Sparked a Gay Revolution by David Carter, and Stonewall by Martin Duberman. American History Tellers is hosted, edited, and produced by me, Lindsey Graham for Airship. Audio editing by Molly Bach. Sound design by Derek Behrens. This episode is written by George Ducker. Edited by Dorian Marina. Special thanks to Sylveon Consulting for serving as an advisor on this series. Executive producer for Audible, Jenny Lauer Beckman. Head of Creative Development at Audible, Kate Navin. Head of Audible Originals North America, Marshall Louis.

43:25Chief Content Officer, Rachel Guianza. Copyright 2026 by Audible Originals, LLC. Sound recording copyright 2026 by Audible Originals, LLC.

43:55The Roomba became a billion-dollar product, not by being the smartest robot, but by being the dumbest. And then, the company that made it ended up nearly losing everything. Hey, I'm David Brown, the host of the podcast Business Wars. Every season, we bring you the true stories behind the companies that shape our world, their rivalries, their reinventions, and their spectacular rises and falls. In our new season, we tell the story of iRobot and Roomba, the little vacuum that swept into 50 million homes and brought in billions in revenue. But the Roomba couldn't hold its lead forever. When Chinese competitors figured out how to give customers more for less, the company that created the category faced an existential threat for survival.

44:41Follow Business Wars wherever you get your podcasts. Audible subscribers can binge all episodes of Business Wars early and ad-free right now. Join Audible in the Audible app or by subscribing on Apple Podcasts.