Elliott Blackstone
The Unsung Hero
Sgt. Elliott Blackstone was an SFPD for 26 years, from the 1950s-70s. He was a pioneer of what's now called community-based policing, but was then called the Police Community Relations Unit. He was the first SFPD liaison to what was then called the "homophile community," starting in 1962. His first job was to make nice with the gay community after the so-called "Gayola Scandal" in the early 1960s, when several SFPD officers were arrested for taking bribes and kickbacks from gay bar owners. This is the scandal that resulted in the formation of the SF Tavern Guild.
As a result of these efforts for the homophile community, Blackstone became very active in trying to change police procedures related to bathroom entrapment and other issues of concern to the gay community. He worked closely with Mattachine, Daughters of Bilitis, and Glide's Council on Religion and the Homosexual, and was deeply involved with homophile community activism to establish the Central City Anti-Poverty Program in the Tenderloin in 1966, a pioneer multiservice agency funded through the Johnson-era War on Poverty, which was largely staffed by gay and lesbian activists like Mattachine leader Don Lucas and African-American lesbian community elder Jeannie Bowie.
Blackstone considered himself a "social worker with a badge" and thought it made more sense to try to change bad laws than to punish people for doing things (like gay sex) that were criminalized but not wrong.
Blackstone was assigned by the police department to mediate the grievances that led to the Compton's Cafeteria Riot in 1966, in which drag queens and gay hustlers banded together for the first time in US history to fight back against police oppression. Prior to this time he had no experience working with transgender people, or queer street youth, but he quickly rose to the task, mentoring leaders of the Vanguard gay youth group, and becoming the most important advocate for transgender people in the city.
At a time when the city would not prescribe hormones to transsexuals through city-funded public health clinics, Blackstone took up a collection at his church to buy hormones and distribute them to transgender women free of charge. This was only one instance of his remarkable leadership on this issue. He was the linchpin of a network of early transgender activists and advocates that took shape in 1966, after the Compton's riot.
He helped facilitate the first peer-support group for transgender people, Conversion Our Goal, which began meeting at Glide in 1967. He was given a grant by the wealthy FTM philanthropist Reed Erickson, whose generosity built much of the early transgender medical services' infrastructure beginning in 1964, to oversee the first peer-staffed transgender services agency in the world, The National Transsexual Counseling Unit(NTCU), beginning in 1968. He did all this work while remaining on the payroll at SFPD, and considered these activities to be part of his job to promote good relations between the LGBT community and the police.
In 1973, reactionary elements in the SFPD raided the NTCU offices, arrested the two peer counselors, and planted narcotics in Blackstone's desk in an effort to frame him and end his progressive activism within the Department. Elliott was able to avoid criminal charges, but his career was irreparably damaged. He was reassigned from his job as community relations unit liaison to the gay community, and worked his last two years on the force as a beat cop, walking a foot patrol. Coincidentally, his beat covered the Castro, which was just them becoming a gay neighborhood, and he became friends with a local businessman who had a camera store on Castro Street, a man by the name of Harvey Milk.
Blackstone's retirement dinner in 1975 drew all the leaders of gay community, who deeply appreciated his work on their behalf. In retirement in Pacifica, Blackstone continues to do advocacy work on behalf of LGBT concerns, and other diversity issues, within the Presbyterian Church at the national level.
Blackstone is a featured interviewee in Victor Silverman and Susan Stryker's recent public television documentary SCREAMING QUEENS: THE RIOT AT COMPTON'S CAFETERIA. At the 2005 world premiere at the Castro Theater, Blackstone received a standing ovation from a sold-out crowd of more than 1000 people, when he answered an audience member's question; asked why, as a straight man, he had worked so hard on behalf of LGBT rights, he said, "Because my religion teaches me to love everybody."
In this 40th Anniversary year of the Compton's Cafeteria Riot, Elliott Blackstone richly deserves recognition for his vital yet poorly remembered contributions to our community.
Related Link: Advocate for Transgender Rights at Compton’s Cafeteria Riot to Be Honored
