There was a time when working on gay history was a sure path off the tenure track. Blessedly, that time is past. Many of the witnesses to the story in the early chapters of this book are dead, often untimely so. Hopefully, that time is also past. Meanwhile, there are George Chauncey, Brett Beeman, Elizabeth Kennedy and Madeline Davis, Allan Bérubé, Larry Gross, Craig Rimmerman, Kenneth Wald, Clyde Wilcox, Lillian Faderman, Stuart Timmons, John D’Emilio, Martin Duberman, Andrew Sullivan, David Johnson, David Allyn, David Carter, Ronald Bayer, Randy Shilts, Jennifer Brier, Deborah Gould, John-Manuel Andriote, Stephen Branford, Gary Mucciaroni, Lisa Keen, Suzanne Goldberg, Steven Epstein, Ellen Ann Anderson, Nathaniel Frank, Stephen Bransford, Pat Cain, Paisley Currah, Richard Juang and Shannon Price Minter, Neil Miller, Adam Nagourney and Dudley Clendinen, and dozens more, who thoroughly researched and lovingly preserved the past, so that we latecomers could see. Details of the debt are in the endnotes. A special bow to Sarah Schulman and Jim Hubbard for the ACT UP Oral History Project, an accessible record of incomparable value to anyone who wants to learn about that crucial time in gay history.