Please note: You must preregister for this ride.
Distance: 31 miles
Pace: B (moderate, occasional stops)
Terrain: 2 (few low hills, a challenge for beginners)
Elevation gain: about 1,500 ft.
This year is the 45th anniversary of the assassination of Supervisor Harvey Milk and Mayor George Moscone and we will honor their memory and legacy by visiting their memorial sites. On November 27, 1978 Supervisor Dan White assassinated Supervisor Harvey Milk and Mayor George Moscone in cold blood at City Hall. Coming less than two weeks after the Jonestown Massacre in which deranged cult leader Jim Jones ordered the killing of Rep. Leo Ryan and his party, the double assassination sent horrifying shockwaves through the LGBT community and set back the progressive agenda in San Francisco by decades (and incidentally, demonstrating that assassination does work, at least for a while). George Moscone is interred at Holy Cross Cemetery in Colma and Harvey Milk is enshrined in the San Francisco Columbarium. Along the way we plan to visit both sites as well as that of Jose Sarria, aka the Empress Norton, who was Harvey Milk’s spiritual and political predecessor.
This will be a comfortably paced ride. We start at the site of Harvey's camera shop in the Castro and head out to Golden Gate Park and down the Great Highway to Westlake Shopping Center and into Colma to Woodlawn Memorial Park and Holy Cross Catholic Cemetery. We will stop at George Moscone’s gravesite to share a few words and then head northward back to SF to the Columbarium for our final stop at Harvey Milk’s site, which is very close to McLaren Lodge. Afterwards if you want a snack or lunch we may stop at Velo Rouge Cafe or Arguello Market.
Bring water and a snack. Bring a lock for lunch if plan to join us.
Meet at the site of Harvey Milk's old camera shop, 575 Castro Street, SF at 9:30 a.m. Ride out at 9:45 a.m.
You can download a cue sheet, map, and GPS track
here.
Rain will postpone this ride to Sunday December 10.
If you are unfamiliar with George Moscone and Harvey Milk, here are some sites where you can learn about their history and legacy as well as the politico-social climate in San Francisco at the time.
Moscone: A Legacy of Change (video)
Milk’s speech at Gay Pride (video)
The Times of Harvey Milk trailer (video)
https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/san-francisco-leaders-george-moscone-and-harvey-milk-are
https://www.history.com/topics/gay-rights/harvey-milk
And where is Harvey these days?
https://cemeteryclub.wordpress.com/2018/02/01/four-graves-for-harvey-milk/
And here is information about Jose Sarria:
https://legacyprojectchicago.org/person/jose-sarria
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jos%C3%A9_Sarria