senator, as mayor of San Francisco.īaker moved to New York in 1994 and created a milelong rainbow flag for the gay pride parade, which that year commemorated the 25th anniversary of the 1969 Stonewall uprising.Ĭurrent San Francisco Mayor Edwin Lee said in a statement that the rainbow flag “has become a source of solace, comfort and pride for all those who look upon it.” He said Baker rejected advice to patent the rainbow flag design and never made a penny off it.īaker also designed flags for civic occasions including the inauguration of Dianne Feinstein, now California’s senior U.S. The flag was initially eight colors, but it was cut to six because of the limited availability of fabrics, Jones said. “People looked up and faces lit up and, without any explanation, this was now our flag.” “It was quite amazing to stand there and watch all these thousands of people turn off Market Street into San Francisco Civic Center Plaza and march beneath these giant flags that were flapping in the wind,” Jones said.
