2018 was one for the record books!

The 48^th anniversary of Pride celebrations throughout the week, including the Pride Parade and Festival on Saturday, June 9, saw almost one million participants at a series of 50+ events.  This year’s historic parade included more than 55,000 marchers from 360 contingents who marched along the 2.27-mile route from Copley Square the City Hall Plaza lined with an estimated 750,000 spectators.  The Pride Festival at City Hall Plaza was filled with activity all day long including 130 vendors, a Family Fun Zone and headline entertainers Martha Wash and Big Freedia, who drew huge crowds.

One of the highlights of the Pride Parade was the contingent of Mayors from across the country who were hosted by Mayor Martin J. Walsh for the annual United States Conference of Mayors meeting in Boston.  Mayor Walsh marched with 100 mayors who all wore rainbow sashes in support of the LGBTQ community. The Mayors were active on social media throughout the parade, helping Boston Pride trend nationally on Twitter. The Parade also included Grand Marshal, Freedom for All Massachusetts, the coalition of organizations fighting the repeal of the public accommodations law that would remove transgender rights.

“The parade was both a celebration of the LGBTQ community and also a reflection of this year’s Pride theme – Rainbow Resistance  – and demonstrated that we can never be silent because our rights are being threatened both here at home and in Washington DC,” said Sylvain Bruni, president of Boston Pride. “We are wicked proud of our community and allies for their outpouring of support during Boston Pride Week 2018.”

The Parade also included a remembrance contingent to honor 11 transgender people who were fatally shot or killed by other violent means so far in 2018.

Pride Week included more than 50 events throughout the community, which kicked off with the annual Rainbow Pride Flag Raising on City Hall Plaza, followed by Pride Day @ Faneuil Hall, the High Heel Dash for Charity, Pride Political Forum on the repeal of the public accommodation law, Pride Lights, Pride Night @ Fenway, Pride Night @ The Revolution, block parties in the Back Bay and Jamaica Plain and the Official Pride Closing Party at The Grand.

Pride Sponsors helped to fund costs associated with the parade, festival and other free public events, and 10 percent of all sponsorships are dedicated to the Boston Pride Community Fund, which supports grassroots LGBTQ organizations.  Since 2016, Boston Pride has awarded over $50,000 to 35 local grassroots organizations, supporting the mission of promoting social justice for the LGBTQ community.^[1]

Parade Marshals

Grand Marshals

Freedom for All Massachusetts – In June 2015, the broad-based bipartisan coalition Freedom for All Massachusetts launched with the goal of updating Massachusetts’ longstanding civil rights law to include nondiscrimination protections for transgender people in public places. The campaign aimed to add gender identity as a protected category in the Commonwealth’s public accommodations law.

Honorary Marshals

Jo Trigilio – Jo has been a leader in the LGBTQ community serving on the Boston Dyke March organizing committee for more than a decade before stepping down a few years ago. Jo is an ongoing contributor to the Boston Pride Guide and has extended themselves to assist Boston Pride in addressing the issue brought by the community.

Gordon Burns, who recently passed away, was a longtime Pride volunteer and Committee member. Gordon joined Boston Pride over 10 years ago to foster the engagement of LGBTQ older adults in the Pride celebration, and to ensure continued exchanges between the older and the younger generations of the community. Gordon was a founding member of the Senior Pride Coalition, as well as a member of the Boston Prime Timers, the Boston Partnership for Older Adults, the Massachusetts Association of Older American and OLLI Lifelong Learning Institute at UMass Boston.

Edith “Edie” Windsor, who passed away in 2017, was a hero of the fight for marriage equality and the lead plaintiff in the Supreme Court case that bears her name. Edie made groundbreaking contributions to the LGBTQ community through her activism over the years. The “Windsor decision,” which was handed down in 2013 by the US Supreme Court, ensured the federal recognition of same-sex marriages performed in 13 states and in the District of Columbia.

Pride Pageant Winners

The Pride Pageant took the year off to restructure the event.

Festival/Concert Entertainers

Big Freeda (Headliner), Verna Turbulence (Emcee), Happy Little Clouds, Long Arm Rex, Queens with a Mission, Fast Freddy (Emcee), Boketto The Wolf, Justin Dearborn, and Niya Norwood

Block Party DJS/Performers

Back Bay Block Party – DJ Kitty Glitter (Headliner) DJ Gay Jim
JP Block Party – DJ L’Duke (LeahV) Performances by: Sapphira Cristal, Kamden T. Rage, Jayden Jamison, Lakia Mondale, New Fame