Harvey Milk, the famously gay Supervisor of the city of San Francisco -- and the first openly gay man in history to win election to a substantial political office -- was no stranger to death threats. "If a bullet should enter my brain," he once declared, "let that bullet destroy every closet door."

Some time later, on November 27, 1978, Daniel White, a troubled anti-gay conservative former city supervisor, shot Milk twice in the head.

[Thanks to a psychologist's testimony that junk food had exacerbated White's depression (see "Twinkie defense") and a carefully selected jury, White received just five years with parole. The resulting gay riot led to the hospitalization of more than 160 people.]