A veteran of the 1969 Stonewall Inn uprising, Sylvia Rivera was a tireless advocate for those silenced and disregarded by larger movements. Throughout her life, she fought against the exclusion of transgender people, especially transgender people of color, from the larger movement for gay rights. Along with Marsha P. Johnson, Rivera started the Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries (STAR), a space to organize and discuss issues facing the trans community in NYC, and later founded Transy House in Park Slope, Brooklyn.
She died in 2002 at the age of 50. In 2015, a portrait of Rivera was added to the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C., making her the first transgender activist to be included in the gallery.