<p>For many in Chicago’s LGBTQ+ community, Pride Month and beach season go hand in hand. This includes an important ritual: digging the rainbow gear out of storage bins, putting on flip-flops and heading to Kathy Osterman Beach.</p><p>Colloquially known as “Hollywood Beach,” this vast patch of sand starts where DuSable Lake Shore Drive ends, extending from Hollywood Avenue to Ardmore Avenue, east of the Edgewater neighborhood.</p><p>Hollywood Beach is considered Chicago’s “gay beach.” Every spring and summer, hundreds in the LGBTQ+ community gather there to dance, play volleyball and soak in the sun and water.</p><p>“We always felt like this is just where we belong,” said Erin Stafford, who was enjoying the beach on a recent afternoon. Stafford has been coming to this beach with her partner Theresa Salus since before their 10-year-old son was born.</p><p>“We knew that it was the place where we could just be free … and meet other people who were queer,” Salus added.</p><p>But Hollywood Beach wasn’t always as crowded — or as gay — as it is now.</p><p>Originally called Ardmore Beach, it was developed<a class="Link" href="https://www.chicagoparkdistrict.com/parks-facilities/osterman-beach" target="_blank" ><u> as a northern extension of the Lincoln Park neighborhood</u></a> in the 1950s.