Morris Kight was a whirling dervish champion of LGBTQ civil rights. He cut his activist teeth in the labor, civil rights, and anti-war movements, and from 1969 on brought all his passion to bear on catapulting himself and L.A.’s gay liberation efforts onto center stage.To learn more about Morris, have a look at the information, links, photographs, and episode transcript that follow below.Mary Ann Cherry, Morris Kight’s biographer, maintains a website about Morris.  There is also a Morris Kight Facebook page.The LGBT_History Instagram account offered a concise summary of Morris Kight’s life and contributions on November 19, 2017, what would have been Morris’ 98th birthday .Morris Kight’s papers and photographs are housed at the ONE Archives at the USC Libraries.In his Making Gay History interview, Morris talks about the horrific March 1969 beating death at the hands of Los Angeles police, which galvanized local activists.  You can read about the murder here and here.Morris Kight was a co-founder with the Rev. Troy Perry, of the Christopher Street West parade, which was held to mark the one-year anniversary of the Stonewall uprising in New York City.  Read more about the organization that oversees the annual L.A. Pride Parade and Festival here.The fight over an anti-gay sign at Barney’s Beanery, a Los Angeles restaurant, figured prominently as the first major protest organized by the Los Angeles Gay Liberation Front, which was co-founded by Morris Kight (and was a sister organization of the Gay Liberation Front organization founded in New York City immediately after the Stonewall uprising in June 1969).Morris Kight co-founded the Los Angeles Gay and Lesbian Community Services Center in 1969. Today the Los Angeles LGBT Center is the world’s largest.In 1975, Morris co-founded the Stonewall Democratic Club..Morris Kight’s house (where he lived before his Making Gay History interview), is listed as an historic site by the Los Angeles Conservancy.Morris played the grumpy poet in Leather Jacket Love Story (1997), a film about a gay aspiring poet in L.A. He’s also the subject of the short film Live on Tape: The Life & Times of Morris Kight, Liberator (1999).Morris Kight died on January 19, 2003.  His obituary appeared in the  the L.A. Times.