Eureka Springs Pride 2026
Eureka Springs Pride programme
Training on Main Street Eureka Springs.
Three performances during the weekend at Inspiration Point.
Queer art exhibition at Inspiration Point.
Workshop on Main Street Eureka Springs.
Hotels around Eureka Springs
Tap the map for prices and availability.
About Eureka Springs
Eureka Springs is a small town of a little over two thousand people in northwest Arkansas, set in the Ozark Mountains. For a place this size it has an unusually visible queer history, and Pride here is not limited to one weekend a year.
The heart of it is Diversity Weekend, held several times a year, including in spring and in fall. The local chamber of commerce calls it the town's own take on LGBTQ+ Pride. Local businesses across town host drag shows, meetups, workshops, advocacy events and performances. The weekends are funded by local businesses, people and organizations rather than corporate sponsors. They are organized by Out In Eureka, part of the nonprofit Diversity In The Ozarks, which works for a community where people can express their gender identity and sexual orientation freely.
There is also a Pride week in June, so the town marks the traditional Pride month as well. Dates and programs change from one edition to the next, so it is worth checking the organizer's announcements before planning a trip.
The town's legal history helps explain its reputation. The city council voted unanimously to create a domestic partnership registry open to both same-sex and opposite-sex couples. Opponents tried to overturn it through a referendum petition, but the registry stayed. Eureka Springs later became the only city in Arkansas to extend health insurance to the domestic partners of city employees, and the first city in the state to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples. Voters also approved, by a wide margin, a non-discrimination ordinance covering sexual orientation and gender identity. When a state law later sought to block local protections of this kind, city officials said they intended to keep the ordinance in place.
Visiting during a Diversity Weekend or Pride week means seeing a small Ozark town that built its openness step by step over many years.
Eureka Springs Pride – frequently asked questions
From the magazine
Magnus Hirschfeld and His Institute: What Was Lost on 6 May 1933
Long before Stonewall, Berlin had a place where homosexual people found advice and recognition. How the Institute for Sexual Science began and why it was destroyed in 1933.
Harvey Milk and Proposition 6: The November 1978 Victory
In 1978 a California ballot measure would have forced queer teachers out of public schools. Harvey Milk fought it, and voters rejected it. What happened and what it has to do with Pride.
Brenda Howard and the Pride Week: Who Turned a Memorial March into a Tradition
After Stonewall, a march marked the anniversary in 1970, and later a whole week. Brenda Howard is named as one of the people behind it. What is documented and where the title Mother of Pride stays disputed.