[6][10][11] Johnson was a member of the Gay Liberation Front (GLF) and co-founded the radical activist group Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries (STAR), alongside close friend Sylvia Rivera.

[12] Popular in New York's gay community, she was also active in the city's art scene, modeling for Andy Warhol and appearing onstage with the drag performance troupe Hot Peaches.

While initially ruled a suicide by the New York City Police Department (NYPD), controversy and protest followed the case, resulting in it eventually being re-opened as a possible homicide.

[18][19] After this, she described the idea of being gay as "some sort of dream", rather than something that seemed possible, and so chose to remain sexually inactive until leaving for New York City at age 17.

[27][26] In 1970, Sylvia and Marsha gave an interview to radio station WBAI, where Johnson stated she was undergoing feminizing hormone therapy with the goal of getting gender surgery.

[28] In an interview with Allen Young, in Out of the Closets: Voices of Gay Liberation, Johnson discussed being a member of the Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries (STAR).

[5] As Edmund White wrote in his 1979 Village Voice article "The Politics of Drag", Johnson also liked dressing in ways that would display "the interstice between masculine and feminine".

"[32] There is some existing footage of Johnson doing full, glamorous, "high drag" on stage, but most of her performance work was with groups that were more grassroots, comedic and political.

[40] Johnson, who was also HIV positive,[41] became an AIDS activist and appeared in Hot Peaches production The Heat in 1990, singing the song "Love" while wearing an ACT UP, "Silence = Death" button.

[42] While the photos of Johnson in dramatic, femme ensembles are the most well-known, there are also photos and film footage of Johnson dressed down in more daily wear of jeans and a flannel shirt and cap,[43] or in shorts and a tank top, and no wig, such as at the Christopher Street Liberation March in 1979,[44] or singing with the New York City Gay Men's Chorus at an AIDS memorial in the 1980s,[45] or marching in a protest in Greenwich Village in 1992.

[43] Though generally regarded as "generous and warmhearted" and "saintly" under the Marsha persona, Johnson's angry, violent side could sometimes emerge when she was depressed or under severe stress.

[46] During those moments when Johnson's violent side emerged, according to acquaintance Robert Heide, she would be aggressive, short-tempered, speak in a deeper voice, and, as Malcolm, would "become a very nasty, vicious man, looking for fights".

[47] In the 1979 Village Voice article, and further elaborated upon by Stonewall historian Carter, it had perhaps been for this reason that other activists had been reluctant at first to credit Johnson for helping to spark the gay liberation movement of the early 1970s.

While the first two nights of rioting were the most intense, the clashes with police would result in a series of spontaneous demonstrations and marches through the gay neighborhoods of Greenwich Village for roughly a week afterwards.

[47] According to Carter, Robin Souza reported that fellow Stonewall veterans such as Morty Manford and Marty Robinson had witnessed Johnson throw a shot glass at a mirror in the torched bar, screaming, "I got my civil rights!

[14] Prior to Carter's book, it was claimed Johnson had "thrown a brick" at a police officer, an account that was never verified by any of the rioters that were there that night.

Johnson also confirmed not being present at the Stonewall Inn when the rioting broke out, but instead had heard about it and went to get Rivera, who was at a park uptown sleeping on a bench, to inform her about it.

[51] However, many have corroborated that on the second night, Johnson climbed up a lamppost and dropped a heavy bag onto a police car, shattering the windshield.

[48][52] On the first anniversary of the Stonewall uprising, on June 28, 1970, Johnson marched in the first Gay Pride rally, then called the Christopher Street Liberation Day.

One of her most notable direct actions occurred in September 1970, staging a sit-in protest at Weinstein Hall at New York University alongside fellow GLF members after administrators canceled a dance when they found out that it was sponsored by gay organizations.

During a time when same-sex marriage was illegal in the United States, the judge asked what "happened to this alleged husband", Johnson responded, "Pig shot him".

[57] Initially sentenced to ninety days in prison for the assault, Johnson's lawyer eventually convinced the judge that Bellevue Hospital would be more suitable.

[57] In 1970, Johnson and Rivera established STAR House, a shelter for homeless gay and trans youth,[58] and paid the rent for it with money they made themselves as sex workers.

"[67] Johnson remained devoutly religious in later life, often lighting candles and praying at St. Mary's Catholic Church in Hoboken,[68] which was renamed Our Lady of Grace in 2008.

"[75] Johnson expressed a relationship with the Divine that was direct and personal, saying in her last interview (June 1992), about leaving home in 1963, "I got the Lord on my side, and I took him to my heart with me and I came to the city, for better or worse.

[80][81] Johnson's death occurred during a time when anti-gay violence was at a peak in New York City, including bias crime by police.

[66] Johnson was one of the activists who had been drawing attention to the issue, participating in marches and other activism to demand justice for victims, and an inquiry into how to stop the violence.

[66][43] Johnson's body was cremated and, following a funeral at a local church and a march down Seventh Avenue, friends released her ashes over the Hudson River, off the Christopher Street piers.

During the fight he called Johnson a homophobic slur, and later bragged to someone at a bar that he had killed a drag queen named Marsha.

[14] In 2016, Victoria Cruz of the Anti-Violence Project also tried to get Johnson's case reopened and succeeded in gaining access to previously unreleased documents and witness statements.