TL;DR
- Silver Platter, a beloved queer Latino bar in Los Angeles, faces demolition.
- Latinos in Heritage Conservation named it among 13 endangered Latino heritage sites.
- The list includes historic cemeteries, churches, neighborhoods, and murals across the U.S.
- Advocates warn less than 1% of national historic places reflect Latino history.
- Local leaders back the effort to protect these cultural landmarks.
Historic Latino Queer Bar on the Brink
For decades, the Silver Platter has been the glittery heartbeat of Los Angeles’ Westlake neighborhood—a neon-lit haven where Latino and LGBTQ souls could dance, laugh, and unapologetically exist. Built in the 1920s and turned into a bar in 1963, it became an intergenerational refuge for queer Latinxs seeking safety and celebration in a world too often hostile. Now, the iconic bar is facing demolition as developers circle like vultures.
“This bar is historic,” declared owner Margarita Xatruch, perched on one of the bar’s signature red vinyl chairs. “Everyone knows they can come here to celebrate. It’s very important so that we can continue the Latin legacy we have here.” The Silver Platter isn’t just a bar—it’s where queer stories and Latino pride entwine, surviving decades of stigma and discrimination. And yet, like many queer cultural spaces, it risks erasure for the sake of profit-driven development.
Fighting to Save Latino Heritage
The bar’s inclusion on a new list from Latinos in Heritage Conservation shines a spotlight on a bigger crisis: the quiet disappearance of Latino heritage from the American landscape. The list names 13 endangered sites spanning centuries of history—from the Elgin Cemetery in Texas, once a segregated burial ground for Mexican Americans, to the adobe-built Sacred Heart of the Church of Jesus in Ruidosa, the 19th-century Barrio Chihuahita in Tucson, and Las Barracas in Longmont—a rare surviving example of migrant farmworker housing.
Art also takes center stage: the beloved Our Lady of Guadalupe Vietnam Veterans’ Memorial Mural in Chicago, plus landmark Latino murals in San Francisco’s Mission District, along Oakland’s freeway walls, and a 1930s mural in Washington, D.C. preaching racial unity. But according to the group’s director Sehila Mota Casper, climate change, gentrification, and plain neglect threaten to erase them all.
“We wanted to be proactive, to tell their stories and promote the preservation of these sites,” Mota Casper explained, noting that less than 1% of the National Park Service’s National Register of Historic Places is linked to Latino heritage. In other words: an entire community’s legacy is getting ghosted from American history books.
A Call for Pride and Protection
For LGBTQ folks, the loss of places like the Silver Platter cuts even deeper. These spaces have long offered sanctuary from hate, homophobia, and racism—a rare oasis where queer Latino identity could thrive. As the bar’s future teeters, Xatruch’s daughter, Martha Vásquez, voiced the anxiety that’s become all too familiar for queer spaces under threat: “That instability, economically, politically, locally, is very stressful. We’re fighting to see if we can find another location.”
This isn’t just about saving bricks and neon signs. It’s about affirming that queer Latino history matters—and that it deserves the same fierce protection as the grand old mansions and battlefields that get historic status without question. As Mota Casper put it, “There are many chapters missing in the books of American history… Without that type of protection, we will lose sites.”
Support is growing from lawmakers like Eunisses Hernández and Joaquin Castro, who have championed greater Latino representation in national cultural registries. Their backing signals that this fight isn’t just cultural—it’s political.
If the Silver Platter disappears, it won’t just be a bar closing. It’ll be another erasure of queer and Latino existence—a glittering, defiant slice of history gone dark. And the LGBTQ community isn’t ready to let that light go out.