Clay model of bust of Harvey Milk in the studio of the Daub Firmin Hendrickson Sculpture Group.

On June 2, 2008 a bust of Harvey Milk was accepted into the Civic Art Collection during a meeting of the Full Commission. Designed by the Daub, Firmin, Hendrickson Sculpture Group, the work was unveiled during a gala party at San Francisco’s City Hall on May 22, 2008, what would have been Milk’s 78^th birthday.

A joint undertaking between the Harvey Milk City Hall Memorial Committee and the San Francisco Arts Commission, the effort to place the art work in City Hall began in 2003 when the Board of Supervisors passed a resolution supporting the creation of a memorial to Milk. This was the first such public/private partnership of its kind.

An established leader in the LGBT community, Harvey Milk advanced the struggle for equal rights by becoming one of the first openly gay elected officials in the United States, winning a seat on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1977. Less than a year after taking office, Milk, along with Mayor George Moscone, was assassinated by a political opponent.

The placement of this memorial, in the very building where Harvey Milk served and lost his life, marks the first such tribute to a LGBT leader to be placed in a seat of government in the United States. The bust, made of bronze with a marble pedestal, is located in the Supervisor’s Rotunda on the 2nd floor of San Francisco City Hall.