If you’ve been out and about in Hillcrest lately, you may have noticed the rainbow banners that are draped from street poles along the neighborhood’s main streets. The colorful display occurs every year at this time, and it is one of the first harbingers that San Diego’s Pride season is just around the corner. Businesses and homeowners will get in on this decorating too. You will see rainbow flags and banners adorning their storefronts and billowing from front porches across town from now until Pride festivities conclude at the end of July.

We all know that those six bands of color signify LGBT Pride, but have you ever wondered how the rainbow flag became our internationally recognized symbol? It is an important part of LGBT history and the story warrants repeating now as San Diego gears up for its 32nd annual Pride celebration, entitled: “Equality! No Turning Back!”

Over the years, there have been many colorful symbols associated with the LGBT community. The pink triangle was one of the earliest symbols identified with gay people. Its origins date back to World War II when the Nazis used pink triangles to mark gay men in concentration camps. In the 1980s, the gay movement resurrected the pink triangle in an attempt to turn a mark of shame into a symbol of pride.

In the 1960s, the colors purple or lavender became closely associated with the fledgling movement for LGBT rights. And if you go way back to 19th-century England, green was the color used to symbolize homosexuality. None of these colors and symbols has caught on quite the way that the rainbow flag has, though. The rainbow flag, however, has gone through some changes over the years.

The first rainbow flag was the brainchild of a San Francisco artist named Gilbert Baker. When a San Francisco LGBT activist put out a call for a definitive symbol for the community in 1978, Baker stepped up with his concept. For his efforts, Baker is often referred to as the Betsy Ross of the LGBT community.

But Baker’s original design was quite different from the rainbow flag we are used to seeing today. Baker’s flag featured eight strips in the following colors: pink, red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet. The selected colors represented sexuality, life, healing, sun, nature, art, harmony and spirit.

Baker dyed and sewed his prototype flag by hand. When he tried mass-producing the flag, however, he discovered that the hot pink he had used for the first stripe was not commercially available. So the rainbow flag went through its first transformation as the pink stripe was eliminated.

Due to an unexpected tragedy, another stripe disappeared in 1979. San Francisco’s first openly gay supervisor, Harvey Milk, was assassinated at the end of 1978. The city’s LGBT community was devastated by the loss, but they wanted to turn that act of senseless violence into a unifying moment.

When the following year’s Pride events were being organized, the Pride committee decided to use the parade to reinforce the community’s enduring strength. Pride organizers turned to Baker’s rainbow flag for a symbol of the community’s solidarity. The length of the parade route would be draped in the colors of the flag. But the seven remaining colors of the flag lacked symmetry, so the indigo stripe was discarded. Thus, three colors could be displayed on each side of the parade route.

With the violet stripe renamed purple, the current rainbow flag made its debut. An iconic and easily identifiable symbol, the rainbow flag slowly began to gain popularity. What started in San Francisco soon spread to other American cities and eventually to other countries. The rainbow flag has even been officially recognized by the International Congress of Flag Makers. In short, the rainbow flag has become our mobilizing symbol.

According to Gilbert Baker, there is no “right side up” for this flag – it may be flown either red up or purple up.

When you see those broad bands of red, orange, yellow, green, blue and purple flying high during this year’s Pride season, remember what they represent. That rainbow is a symbol born out of our community’s need to show its strength. You too can take part in that solidarity. All you need is a rainbow flag and enough pride in yourself and your community to display it.

Ron deHarte is the executive director of San Diego LGBT Pride.