HISTORY OF JAXRCPRIDE

The year was 1978, nine years after the Stonewall riots that gave birth to the gay rights movement. Jacksonville celebrated its’ first Gay Pride Festival with a large picnic at Willow Branch Park, thus becoming yet another city nationwide to be out and proud. The Lesbian & Gay Community Center of Jacksonville (LGCAJ) was subsequently established, receiving its’ 501 (c) (3) status in November of 1989.

In the years that followed, LGCAJ became an umbrella organization for many community service projects and the stepping stone for other non-profit startups in Jacksonville, such as Out & About, Jacksonville Gay Pride, Unity Leadership, Safe School Coalition, The Lesbian Breast Cancer Outreach Project, and First Coast Chorus.

In 1999, the future of LGCAJ began to look bleak as many of the board members had left to pursue other endeavors/careers, and some had become victims of the AIDS epidemic. With the organization in limbo, attorney Kim Blankenship stepped forward to reinstate the organization and the Jacksonville Gay Pride Committee. The organization was then re-named Community Rainbows, Inc.

Two years later, at the end of 2001, the Jacksonville Gay Pride Committee became First Coast Pride, Inc., acquiring the umbrella organization and re-established the Out & About newspaper as Out In The City. After many years, 2001 also marked the last year the annual Pride Festival was held at the fairgrounds, and in 2002, FCP moved the festival to the Sea Walk Pavilion in Jacksonville Beach. 2008 First Coast Pride, Inc. changed to Merge, Inc., with the festival moving to Riverside Park. At one time before 2008, the following organizations were housed under the 501 (c) (3) umbrella of Community Rainbows, Inc.: First Coast Pride, Out in the City, the NEFL Names Project, the FCP HIV Testing Project, the Ray Castro Foundation of the Arts, MyOITC.com community portal and Steppin Out Networking Socials.

Despite the largest crowd in its 30-year history for the parade, block party, and a successful scaled-back festival, low revenue would mark 2008 as the final year in Jacksonville's long history of pride celebrations. The year would also end the newspaper Out in the City due to dwindling ad revenue sources and the inability to secure an editor-in-chief.

First Coast Pride/Merge Inc. was disassembled in 2009. Most board members had resigned for various personal reasons, and funding was non-existent due to a lack of leadership in sponsorship efforts. While there were attempts to resuscitate the organization, unsubstantiated rumors/claims/accusations of large indebtedness and funding issues took their toll on all who were trying to put the organization back together, and all pride activities were canceled.

In 2010, Jerry Rosenberg compiled a group of people interested in bringing back a pride organization to Jacksonville, and River City Pride was born. Starting with zero dollars, the LGBT community re-established a Pride Parade and Pride Festival in October 2010 to coincide with Coming Out Day. The River City Pride Organization raised enough dollars to finance the 2010 events and allowed them to continue them in 2011.

In 2017, River City Pride began operating under our 501(c)(3).

2019 was an iconic and historic year for the LGBT community as it marked the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall uprising, known as the birth of the modern LGBT movement. LGBT elders fought for years for LGBT acceptance before 1969, but Stonewall incited a cultural shift. Although progress has been made for LGBT equality, LGBT elders—the very ones who started the movement and led it through the AIDS crisis and the battle for marriage equality—are still fighting for their right to live their lives openly and with dignity and respect as they age. River City Pride honored Stonewall’s 50th anniversary. We celebrated that the milestones achieved in the LGBT movement were only possible because of the trailblazers who first stood up for their rights. 2019 was the largest attendance for the parade, block party, festival, and cabaret. The 2019 River City Pride Parade, presented by Bank of America, achieved a historic milestone with over 100 Parade entries from corporate sponsors, local vendors, bars, sporting groups, marching bands, churches, and 2020 Democratic nominees. River City Pride Block Party, presented by CAN Community HealthCare, had a record day starting at 2 PM with people dancing in the streets until 10 PM. The River City Pride Festival & Cabaret presented by Winn Dixie was the best to date that included a star-studded new Cabaret Show with special performances by Chad Michaels #1 Cher Impersonator and winner of RuPaul’s Drag Race All-Stars, OneUp Duo from NBC “The Voice,” Alexis Mateo and Kennedy Davenport from RuPaul’s Drag Race & All-Stars, Judas Joe Manson #1 Lady Gaga Impersonator, Spikey Van Dykey, Dana Douglas, Karrissa Wade, and Chasity Ross Boen.

In 2020, the entire world experienced together the COVID-19 pandemic. With the number of cases and deaths rising, the 2020 River City Pride Festival/Cabaret, Parade, Block Party, Mr. and Miss River City Pride Pageant, and other fundraising events were canceled/postponed for the safety of our community.

In 2021, after the vaccine is available to the community, River City Pride has been in talks with the city on ways to put on a safe event. The submission of the 2021 River City Pride event has been sent to the city review board. Due to the uncertainty resulting from the pandemic, we have proposed that all scheduled events be held on the same day in October 2021.