EQuality Downers Grove will stage a reading of The Laramie Project, host a civil rights lecture and hold a Tea Dance on three October weekends for LGBTQ History Month.

All three events are free. Registration is required for each.

The lineup, first reported by My Suburban Life, opens Tuesday, Oct. 6, with "After Matt: A Turning Point in LGBTQ+ History," a presentation by civil rights lecturer Greg Baird at the Downers Grove Public Library from 7 to 8:30 p.m. Baird, based in the Chicago area, will cover the 1998 hate crime against University of Wyoming student Matthew Shepard, the timeline of events and the changes that followed. Registration is available through the library's website.

On Sunday, Oct. 11, the group's second Tea Dance runs from 6 to 9 p.m. at Skeleton Key Brewery, 8102 Lemont Road.

Jeff Wood, EQuality Downers Grove education committee facilitator, said tea dances have roots in a time when gathering openly was risky for LGBTQ people. "Tea dances were a way for gay people to gather and not break any liquor law on Sundays," Wood said. "It was a way to get together and celebrate life."

EQDG held its first Tea Dance last year. Wood described the event as three hours of dancing, eating and community fellowship.

The month closes with a staged reading of The Laramie Project at 7:30 p.m. Friday, Oct. 16, and Saturday, Oct. 17, at Downers Grove First United Methodist Church, 1032 Maple Ave. The play, created by New York's Tectonic Theater Project, dramatizes a community's response to Shepard's murder through interviews with well over 100 people.

EQDG board member Jack Phillips is directing the reading. Performers will carry scripts onstage but move and interact with each other and the audience, Phillips told My Suburban Life.

Board member Debbie Anderson-Phillips said she and fellow member Jodi Harap originally considered The Laramie Project for the group's One Book, One Town program before deciding to stage it instead. "We thought people really need to look at this again," Anderson-Phillips said.

Anderson-Phillips drew a distinction between June's Pride Month and October's History Month. Pride Month celebrates people feeling free to be themselves, she said, while October is about remembering the struggles and journey of the LGBTQ community.

Registration for the Tea Dance and The Laramie Project is available at eqdg.org/eqdg-events.