Thank you Harry Bronson, Undated

This collection consists of the papers of Rochester based gay rights activists, Anne Tischer and Bess Watts. The materials date between 1984 and 2013, with a bulk of the materials dated between 2004 and 2013. The materials consist of ephemera, flyers, brochures, news articles, publications, meeting minutes, resource information, correspondence, notes, speeches, Pride at Work reports and minutes, photographs, and signs.

The papers and ephemera in this collection document the fight for marriage equality on a local and national level. It documents the Rochester, New York grassroots campaign for gay rights. The papers also show Anne Tischer and Bess Watts’ growth as activists. Anne Tischer made many annotations about the collection on sticky-notes and directly onto the papers.

The papers in the collection are related to national and local level rally’s, events, and organizations such as the Gay History Fair, the Equality Leadership Conference, Pride at Work, National Equality March, Marriage Equality New York, Human Rights Campaign for NY Marriage, “Light the Way to Justice,” and Equality Rochester.

The signs and posters in the collection wre created by Anne Tischer. Anne created signs for the national and local rally's and events. Anne also created signs for events that were not LGBT related, such as labor pickets. Her signs can be seen in associated press photos nationally.