Originally it was eight colours strong – pink and turquoise were dropped to make mass production easier – and each colour means something. Baker went beyond Milk’s challenge, describing his method with the words, ‘A true flag cannot be designed – it has to be torn from the souls of the people.’
When Milk said ‘It’s not about personal gain, it’s not about ego, it’s not about power, it’s about giving those young people out there hope,’ he led the way for every LGBT movement since. The Rainbow Flag has been part of the LGBT movement since 1978, when, at the request of Harvey Milk (the first openly gay man to be elected to public office in the United States), activist and artist Gilbert Baker (1951–2017) designed it in his studio in San Francisco. The Rainbow Flag waving in the wind at San Francisco’s Castro District.
