Tours highlight Chicago's LGBTQ+ history
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Mike McMains leading a weekend tour. Photo: Carrie Shepherd/Axios
Walking and trolley tours offer Chicagoans an opportunity to learn more about LGBTQ+ history in the Loop, the North Side and the South Side.
Why it matters: LGBTQ+ people don't always get proper recognition because so many of their stories have been ignored or stifled. The tours celebrate how integral LGBTQ+ people were —and are — in politics, publishing, architecture, the military and business.
Driving the news: Mike McMains, the one-man operation behind Tours with Mike, leads the tours, which connect buildings and locations to LGBTQ+ people and moments in history.
How it works: The downtown tour meets at Ida B. Wells and State Street where guests scan a QR code that offers more details and visuals for each stop along the tour.
- The walking tour (at $30 per person) is about one mile and takes two hours.
The big picture: This is the second year McMains has offered the LGBTQ+ -focused tours for Pride month, and he purposefully included downtown and the South Side, where the history isn't discussed as often as it is in neighborhoods like Northalsted.
- McMains also offers private tours, which can be LGBTQ+-themed, throughout the year.
Between the lines: McMains shares anecdotes on the tour suggesting some figures from the 19th century into the 21st century may have been gay or transgender even if they didn't publicly identify as such because of long-held hostility toward the LGBTQ+ community.
Case in point: Louis Sullivan, "Father of the Skyscraper" and mentor to Frank Lloyd Wright, is featured during a stop by Sullivan's Auditorium Theatre.
- McMains shares what ostensibly is a love letter from Sullivan to Walt Whitman and points out the architect's preference for visiting men's clubs.
Zoom in: Some spots along the downtown route include modern LGBTQ+ power players like Chuck Renslow, founder of International Mr. Leather, and Lena Waithe, a Columbia College graduate.
What they're saying: "There are so many contributions that LGBTQ people have had all over the city, and I hope that people are just encouraged to try to learn more and to see these are really amazing stories that people have not heard of," McMains tells Axios.
If you go: Tickets must be reserved in advance.
- Tickets are still available (at $40 per person) for the June 22 South Side trolley tours, departing from Millennium Park at 10am and 1pm.
- Downtown and North Side walking tours are also offered this month.
The bottom line: I learned so much about a part of Chicago history I thought I really knew. I was especially touched by the story of a transgender soldier from the Civil War.