The event opened on May 6 with a day of seminars, workshops, and lectures in the Fireside Lounge of the Moyer Student Union at the university, featuring such speakers as UNLV professors Donald Carns and Vern Mattson, activists Gudrun Fonfa and Terry Wilsey, attorney Kevin Kelly, Dr. Sponsored by the Gay Academic Union of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, the Metropolitan Community Church, and Nevadans for Human Rights, Gay Pride 1983 was a week-long series of events May 6-14 hosted at the university and at various bars around Las Vegas.

While Gay Pride celebrations commemorating the Stonewall Riots had been going on around the country since 1970, Las Vegas didn’t establish its Gay Pride celebration until 1983.