Compton’s: Three Years Before Stonewall, Trans Women Fought Back

Compton’s Cafeteria was a greasy spoon, hole-in-the-wall diner in San Francisco. Decades ago, when transgender women were still called “transsexuals,” “cross-dressers,” or “Queens,” Compton’s was their hangout.

Compton’s stood in the heart of the Tenderloin, San Francisco’s skid row district. A neighborhood filled with cheap hotels and cheap bars, it was the one part of town where the city’s trans community of a half century ago could live openly as themselves.

“A lot of people thought we were sick, mental trash,” said Felicia Elizondo, who underwent gender reassignment surgery in 1974. “Nobody cared whether we lived or died. Our own families abandoned us and we had nowhere to go.”

Elizondo is the only trans survivor who was interviewed for the 2005 documentary Screaming Queens: The Riot at Compton’s Cafeteria.

There’s no question that the Stonewall Riots were a pivotal moment in Queer history. Stonewall kicked open the doors to LGBT equality. But it should not be forgotten that three years earlier, a group of brave transgender women took a similar stand for themselves. Screaming Queens: The Riot at Compton’s Cafeteria is their story.

“We were murdered, thrown in jail, raped, and thrown out like trash,” she said.

In spite of this, Elizondo’s memories of the neighborhood are largely positive. The Tenderloin wasn’t only the first place where she could be herself, it was the first place where she made friends with people who were like her—it was the first time she enjoyed a real sense of community.

It was a hard life. As Screaming Queens recounts, many of “the girls” were forced into sex work because no other professions were open to them. They spent their lives looking over their shoulders, wondering when the next beating might come. Compton’s wasn’t just a place where they could sit and schmooze; it was a place where they could check in and let the other girls know that they had survived the night.

But not even Compton’s was completely safe. Fifty years ago, LGBTQ people were, as one prominent gay writer stated, “the people of the demimonde.” He meant people of the half-light, living in the shadows. Equality laws at that time were but a fantasy, and police harassment was a regular occurrence.

One night, three years before the Stonewall Riots broke out in New York City, several police officers walked into Compton’s and ordered the trans patrons to “move on.” One officer tried to arrest a trans woman who was doing nothing more than drinking a cup of coffee. She threw the coffee into his face.

Almost immediately, other trans women joined in, throwing chairs and smashing windows. The next night they returned to picket Compton’s.

Unfortunately, there are no photos or film of the Compton’s riots, but when filmmaker Susan Stryker, herself a transgender woman, produced Screaming Queens, a number of the Compton’s rioters were still living, and they gladly shared their memories for Stryker’s camera.

One participant in the riots, Amanda St. Jaymes, took Stryker for an on-camera tour of the block where Compton’s once stood. Most movingly, St. Jaymes, who has since passed on, speaks gratefully of the gender reassignment surgery and education, which was paid for by the State of California.

“I got a good job as a secretary,” St. Jaymes said proudly.