Building a Family and Community | Sylvia Rivera (1751-2002): Not Just Cistory

cw: this blog discusses addiction to drugs and alcohol, police brutality, intercommunity racism and transphobia, suicide attempts, and the suicide of a parent

The idea of separating the the queer LGBT+ community into its disparate letters and parts is not a new one. One might argue that the splitting of the L, G, B, T, and others is an attempt by bigots to divide and conquer, to that I say yes, and, division is often coming from within the community. As frustrating as it is to see ableism, racism, fatphobia, transphobia, and any and all forms of bigotry can exist within the LGBT+ community. As we discuss Sylvia Rivera's life, we will be focusing on transphobia and racism. She spent nearly all of her time as an activist fighting for transgender individuals to be considered a part of the 'gay rights' movement. She fiercely defended her transgender 'siblings' and 'children', especially those of color.

Expression and Exploitation

cw: this next section includes description of the suicide of a parent, colorism, trans and homophobia, and verbal, physical, and sexual abuse.

Sylvia Rivera was born on the July second 1951 in the Bronx, to her Puerto Rican mother and a Venezuelan father (Klebine, n.d.). Unfortunately, "Rivera had an incredibly difficult childhood. Her father was absent and her mother died by suicide when Rivera was 3 years old" (Rothberg, 2021). She was raised by her grandmother, and began expressing herself with feminine clothes and makeup from a very early age.

Rivera’s home life did not support her or her self exploration. Her "grandmother took care of her for a period of time, but voiced her disapproval not only of Rivera’s mixed background that made her skin darker than she preferred... but also of her behavior, which was deemed too effeminate for a boy... After Rivera’s half-sister, Sonia, was taken away by her birth father, her grandmother resented her even more, and she often received beatings from her" (Klebine, n.d.). Rivera did not receive the safety and support that she should have in her own home, both as result of colorism and transphobia.

School was not any better, she suffered through "continued mockery and altercations with other students; her wearing of make-up, which started in fourth grade, contributed to her ultimate abandonment of formal education when she was mocked in the sixth grade and called “faggot” by a fellow classmate" (Klebine, n.d.). Rivera was a strong child, and weathered these assaults both at home and in school for as long as she could.

But finally, "[a]fter years of switching between living at her grandmothers’ house... a Catholic boarding school, and... with various family friends for long periods of time... she left home at the age of 11... [and made a life and living on] Forty-second Street, an area that was home to a community of drag queens, sex workers, and those who were hustling inside and outside of the gay community of New York in the early 1960s" (Klebine, n.d.). Many transgender youth find their home lives to be untenable, and opt to live on the streets and support themselves the only way that is open to them; sex work.

Thankfully, Sylvia finally found a supportive community and a family. "Rivera had been engaging in sex work before she left home by hustling with her uncle to earn extra money.... [Now she was] Informally “adopted” by a group of young drag queens and adopt[ed] the name “Sylvia” for herself, Rivera learned how to survive on the streets with their guidance, often changing sleeping location every night depending on where her friends could secure shelter..." (Klebine, n.d.).This family and the experience of living and working on the streets would shape her activism and the rest of her life.

It’s the Revolution!

cw: this next section includes description of police brutality and homo & transphobia.

Perhaps what Sylvia Rivera is best known for in the wider consciousness of the Queer and Transgender community is her participation in Stonewall. There has been a shift in the terminology used to refer to the events at the Stonewall. "While the events of Stonewall are often referred to as "riots," Stonewall veterans have explicitly stated that they prefer the term Stonewall uprising or rebellion. The reference to these events as riots was initially used by police to justify their use of force" (Library of Congress, 2019). I will keep the terms used by those quoted, but I myself will refer to the events as a rebellion in reaction to police raids in an effort to center those who where targeted by the police, rather than the narrative pushed by law enforcement.

On "June 28, 1969... a series of events between police and LGBTQ+ protesters [began] which stretched over six days" (Library of Congress, 2019). This nearly week-long resistance to the raid is often considered the start of the 'Gay Rights' movement.

In her book 'Transgender History: The Roots of Today's Revolution'*, Susan Stryker explains that "[t]he 'Stonewall Riots' have been mythologized as the origin of the gay liberation movement, and there is a great deal of truth in that characterization, but... gay, transgender, and gender nonconforming people had been engaging in militant protest and collective actions against social oppression for at least a decade by that time.... as a result of many years of social upheaval and political agitation, large numbers who were socially marginalized because of their sexual orientation or gender identity, especially younger people who were "part of the Baby Boomer generation, were drawn to the idea of 'gay revolution' and were primed for any event that would set such a movement off" (2008/2017, p. 106). Whether Stonewall was more of a culmination, or a beginning (or both), Sylvia Rivera was there.

The Stonewall itself wasn't explicitly a gay bar, rather it was a mafia-owned establishment whose owners didn't care what the patrons got up. This meant it was a sort of safe haven for Transgender, Queer Folks, & Drag Queens (Library of Congress, 2019). In the sixties "[p]olice raids were relatively frequent (usually when the bar was slow to make its payoffs to corrupt cops) and relatively routine and uneventful. Once the bribes were sorted out, the bar would reopen, often on the same night" (Stryker, 2008/2017, p. 108).

The events leading up to the raid were nothing out of the ordinary; "[t]he Stonewall was raided on average once a month leading up to the raid" (Library of Congress, 2019). "But in the muggy, early morning hours of Saturday, June 28, 1969, events departed from the familiar script when the squad cars pulled up outside the Stonewall Inn" (Stryker, 2008/2017, p. 108).

In her 2001 speech at the Lesbian and Gay Community Services Center for the June First Friday Meeting of the Latino Gay Men of New York Rivera described the events of the raids:

This is the second time in one week that the bar was raided. ...the police from the 6th Precinct would come in to each gay bar and collect their payoff.... If you did not have three pieces of male attire on you, you were going to jail. Just like a butch dyke would have to have three pieces of female clothing, or he was going to jail.... We are led out of the bar. The routine was that the cops get their payoff, they confiscate the liquor... A padlock would go on the door. [We would] ...disappear to a coffee shop or any place in the neighborhood for fifteen minutes. You come back, the Mafia was there cutting the padlock off, bringing in more liquor, and back to business as usual.

...instead of dispersing, we went across the street.... as the cops are inside the bar, the confrontation started outside by throwing change at the police.... "Here's your payoff, you pigs! You f---ing pigs! Get out of our faces." This was started by the street queens of that era, which I was part of, Marsha P. Johnson, and many others that are not here...

...The confrontation got so hot, that Inspector (Seymour) Pine, who headed this raid, him and his men had to barricade themselves in our bar... The people that they had arrested, they had to take into the bar with them, because there was no police backup for them. ...to this day, we don't know who cut the phone lines! So they could not get the call [for backup] to the 6th precinct....

...[A] Village Voice reporter [that was trapped inside the bar]... proceeded to tell his story, in the paper, that he was handed a gun. The cops were actually so afraid of us that night that if we had busted through that bar's door, they were gonna shoot.... Someone yanked a parking meter out the floor... It was loose, you know, I don't know how it got loose. But that was being rammed into the door....

...Once word of mouth got around that the Stonewall had gotten raided, and that there's a confrontation going on, people came from the clubs.... it was not just the gay community and the street queens that really escalated this riot; it was also the help of the many radical straight men and women that lived in the Village at that time, that knew the struggle of the gay community and the trans community.

...It was actually very exciting cuz I remember howling all through the streets, "The revolution is here!"... Cars are being turned over, windows are being broken, fires are being set all over the place. Blood was shed. When the cops did finally get there, the reinforcements, forty five minutes later, you had the chorus line of street queens kicking up their heels, singing their famous little anthem that up to today still lives on, "We are the Stonewall girls/ we wear our hair in curls/ we wear our dungarees/ above our nelly knees/ we show our pubic hairs," and so on and so forth.

...what I found very impressive that evening, was that the more that they beat us, the more we went back for. We were determined that evening that we were going to be a liberated, free community... (Rivera, n.d.).

Rivera is one of the women credited with throwing the first Molotov cocktail or the first brick, and there is no widespread consensus on the internet (is there ever?) of what actually happened (O’Neill, 2019). However, Sylvia herself, has said "'I have been given the credit for throwing the first Molotov cocktail by many historians but I always like to correct it; I threw the second one, I did not throw the first one!... And I didn't even know what a Molotov cocktail was; I'm holding this thing that's lit and I'm like 'What the hell am I supposed to do with this?' 'Throw it before it blows!' 'OK!'..." (Rivera, n.d.).

At just seventeen, Rivera must have felt like the world was shifting, leading the way to a better and brighter future. She has been quoted several times as having said that day in June “'I’m not missing a minute of this — it’s the revolution!'” (Dunlap, 2026). In some ways it truly was the start of something new, and in others it was just another brick in the road to liberation.

Not White or Cis Enough

cw: this next section includes mentions of homo & transphobia.

The energy generated by the events during the Stonewall raid turned into action quickly. "Within a month of the Stonewall Riots, gay activists inspired by the events in Greenwich Village formed the Gay Liberation Front (GLF), which modeled itself on radical Third World liberation and anti-imperialist movements. The GLF spread quickly through activist networks in the student and antiwar movement, primarily among white young people of middle-class origin. Almost as quickly as it formed, however, divisions appeared within the GLF, primarily taking aim at the movement's domination by white men and its perceived marginalization of women, working-class people, people of color, and trans people" (Stryker, 2008/2017, pp. 109-110). This was when Sylvia began to feel friction from the rest of the Gay Rights movement.

Ultimately, Sylvia was ostracized from the GLF and other organizations like "the less radical... Gay Activists Alliance (GAA) which aimed to reform laws rather than foment revolution" (Stryker, 2008/2017, p. 110). Despite her passion for what these organizations could do, "her identities as a street worker, drag queen, poor, and a Latina were troubling to the largely white, middle-class activist groups... “Sylvia was from the wrong ethnic group, from the wrong side of the tracks, wearing the wrong clothes – managing single-handedly and simultaneously to embody several frightening, overlapping categories of Otherness” (Klebine, n.d.). The institutions of white supremacy and capitalism had made themselves quite at home in these organizations, and that meant that Sylvia and others like her were not welcome.

Rivera's second most famous act of protest was her 'Y'all Better Quiet Down' speech. "In 1973... organizers tried to prevent Sylvia Rivera...from addressing the annual commemoration of Christopher Street Liberation Day, Rivera took the stage anyway and issued a devastating critique of the cisgender whiteness of the gay and feminist movements... (Stryker, 2008/2017, p. 128). I have included some of the speech here, but there are many places online where you can find it in its entirety.

Y’all better quiet down. I’ve been trying to get up here all day, for your gay brothers and your gay sisters in jail! They’re writing me every motherfuckin’ week and ask for your help, and you all don’t do a god damn thing for them.... The women have tried to fight for their sex changes, or to become women of the women’s liberation. And they write STAR, not the women’s group. They do not write women. They do not write men. They write STAR, because we’re trying to do something for them.... But do you do anything for them? No! You all tell me, go and hide my tail between my legs. I will no longer put up with this shit. I have been beaten. I have had my nose broken. I have been thrown in jail. I have lost my job. I have lost my apartment For gay liberation, and you all treat me this way? What the fuck’s wrong with you all?... I believe in the gay power. I believe in us getting our rights or else I would not be out there fighting for our rights. That’s all I wanted to say to your people.... (Nothing, n.d., p. 30)

This speech illustrates exactly what Sylvia saw as wrong with the Gay Rights movement, and the injustice and bigotry that were interwoven into the groups that made it up.

STAR and Marsha

Ever the fighter, and determined to improve the lives of her Transgender Siblings, Sylvia decided to get to work helping those the GLF and GAA would not. Together, Rivera and Marsha P. Johnson (who Rivera met in 1963) (Rothberg, 2021) founded "STAR--Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries.... to help street kids stay out of jail, or get out of jail, and to find food, clothing, and a place to live. [it was] ...an overtly politicized version of the 'house' culture that already characterized [B]lack and Latino queer kinship networks, where dozens of trans youth could count on a free and safe place to sleep.... Their goal was to educate and protect the younger people who were coming into the kind of life they themselves led..." Stryker, 2008/2017, p. 110). Rivera wanted other trans kids of color to have a safer and happier time of growing up on the streets than she had had.

Both women played an active role in STAR House "Rivera explained in 1998, 'Marsha and I decided it was time to help each other and help our other kids. We fed people and clothed people. We kept the building going. We went out and hustled the streets. We paid the rent.' Though Rivera was only nineteen herself, she became like a mother to many of the residents at STAR House, and she and Johnson helped to form a home and family for those who needed it most" (MonkEL, 2015). They both created a community from the ground up, and despite the fact that STAR House lasted for only two or three years... its legacy lives on even now" (Stryker, 2008/2017, pp. 110-111).

Despite the lack of acceptance from other Gay Rights organizations, whether explicit or not, there were some groups that supported STAR. "Some STAR members, particularly Rivera, were also active in the Young Lords, a revolutionary Puerto Rican youth organization. One of the first times the STAR banner was flown in public was at a mass demonstration against police repression organized by the Young Lords in East Harlem in 1970, in which STAR participated as a group" (Stryker, 2008/2017, pp. 110-111). It is evident that there is more support amongst different groups of people, than the overculture would like us to realize.

Time Away from New York City (and Back Again)

cw: this next section includes mentions of substance abuse as well as multiple suicide attempts.

The end of STAR House compounded with the lack of acceptance and support from the Gay Rights movement deeply affected Sylvia Rivera, and she struggled deeply for the next chapter of her life. "Rivera frequently experienced homelessness and had problems with substance abuse. At one point, Rivera attempted suicide. Her friend Johnson brought her to the hospital and helped her get healthy again. After this experience, Rivera left New York City and activism behind for a bit" (Rothberg, 2021). A true family, her friends supported and held her.

When she left New York City, she moved to Westchester, and worked in food service for a while. She and her then-lover Frank bought a house, which they lived in until they lost it to a crack addiction. That was how she became unhoused once again and when she moved to a pier in the West Village. She remained on the pier for a year-and-a-half, and resumed her Mother role in the community; giving advice and comforting those who came to her (Dunlap, 2026).

The ongoing ostracization from the mainstream Gay Rights movement along with all the other struggles she personally faced, as well as all of the bigotry from both within and without the LGBT+ community meant that "In 1995, [Rivera] attempted suicide [once again] by walking into the Hudson River; the same river where... Marsha P. Johnson, was found dead in 1992" (Klebine, n.d.). Thankfully, she did not succeed, and was able to find purpose and continue fighting.

End of Life and Legacy

Eventually the wider Gay community made overtures at repairing the relationship they had with Sylvia Rivera. "In 1994, Ms. Rivera was given a place of honor in the march marking the 25th anniversary of Stonewall. [She recalled the event, saying] 'The movement had put me on the shelf, but they took me down and dusted me off... Still, it was beautiful. I walked down 58th Street and the young ones were calling from the sidewalk, ‘Sylvia, Sylvia, thank you, we know what you did.’ After that I went back on the shelf. It would be wonderful if the movement took care of its own. But don’t worry about Sylvia.'" (Dunlap, 2026). It is obvious in her tone and words that she was still, rightfully, unhappy with how she and her trans siblings and children had been treated by the people that should have been standing by them.

Despite everything, Sylvia still wanted to make a difference. In 1997 she founded another space where Transgender people could live safely; Transy House (Dunlap, 2026). It was through Transie House (the name seems to have been spelled multiple ways) that Sylvia met the woman she would spend the rest of her life with. When Sylvia was moving into Transie house, Julia Murray was just recovering from a mental crisis. During this time the two women became very close friends. They even slept together every night so that Julia didn't have to be alone. They eventually became lovers and even considered getting married (Isay, 1999).

In Julia, Sylvia found someone who understood who she was, as well as what she had gone through as a Transgender woman. She said "I feel that both of us being transgendered, we understand what the other has gone through. We have always been with men, but the men that we have met in our lives haven't been able to give us the sensitivity that we share between ourselves. She's a person that has made my life different. She's helped me -- I'm not doing drugs, and I'm not drinking so much. It's just that we're happy together" (Isay, 1999). After so much time helping others and caring for them, Sylvia had found someone who could and would do the same for her. Undoubtedly the last years of her life we better for having Julia in them.

Despite her desire to see a better world for transgender folks, especially those of color, and those who had done sex work, she did not live to see much change. Sylvia Rivera passed away at the heart-breakingly young age of 50 on February 19th, 2002 due to liver cancer (Klebine, n.d.). Of course "Julia Murray, was with her at the time of her death" (Rothberg, 2021).

Sylvia believed a better world was possible, and she believed that she would be there to see it. She said "Before I die, I will see our community given the respect we deserve. I’ll be damned if I’m going to my grave without having the respect this community deserves. I want to go to wherever I go with that in my soul and peacefully say I’ve finally overcome" (Nothing, n.d., p. 55).

Even though she did not live to see this change, Rivera's legacy continues to this day. "The Sylvia Rivera Law Project... guarantees 'all people are free to self-determine their gender identity and expression, regardless of income or race, and without facing harassment, discrimination, or violence.'" (MonkEL, 2015). There are streets named after her, statues of her and Marsha P. Johnson, and her portrait hangs in the National Portrait gallery (MonkEL, 2015). Despite how well-deserved these honors are, I can't help but feel that Rivera might find them a little less than pointless, when Transgender folks, especially Trans women of color, are still so horribly treated.

However, it does appear that the women's movement has started to understand that these women, once so entirely excluded from their own liberatory movements, have much wisdom to give, and belong at the center of the movement. "One of the first large-scale public protests of the Trump administration's priorities was the January 21, 2017, Women's March on Washington, held the day after Trump's inauguration.... The march's official 'Guiding Vision and Definition of Principles' statement named trans pioneers Sylvia Rivera, Marsha P. Johnson, and Miss Major Griffin-Gracy among 'the legions of revolutionary leaders who paved the way for us to march.'..." (Stryker, 2008/2017, p. 233).

Even if Sylvia is no longer here to continue her work, there is much we can to do to support and further her vision. If you are a white (like me) we must make a conscious effort to ensure that BIPOC members of the Queer and Trans communities are welcome in our spaces, not as guests or tokens, but as members of our 'family' and their voices and experiences must be centered, listened to, and believed. We cannot simply 'allow' them to be involved. This is their movement just as much as ours.

We also cannot continue to sperate movements. Intersectionality is key. Transgender people can and do exist under other marginalized identities, and it is foolish to pretend that these identities do not inform each other. If we work together we can achieve things that we never could have dreamed of.

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References

Dunlap, D. W. (2026, March 6). From 2002: Sylvia Rivera, Figure in Birth of the Gay Liberation Movement, Dies at 50. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/06/nyregion/sylvia-rivera-dead.html

Isay, D. (1999, June 27). Lives; “I Never Thought I Was Going to Be a Part of Gay History.” Nytimes.com; The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/1999/06/27/magazine/lives-i-never-thought-i-was-going-to-be-a-part-of-gay-history.html

Klebine, A. (n.d.). “Hell Hath No Fury like a Drag Queen Scorned”: Sylvia Rivera’s Activism, Resistance, and Resilience · Challenging Gender Boundaries: A Trans Biography Project by Students of Dr. Catherine Jacquet · OutHistory: It’s About Time. Outhistory.org. Retrieved March 26, 2026, from https://outhistory.org/exhibits/show/tgi-bios/sylvia-rivera. Challenging Gender Boundaries: A Trans Biography Project by Students of Catherine Jacquet.

Library of Congress. (2019). Research Guides: LGBTQ+ Studies: A Resource Guide: Stonewall Era and Uprising. Guides.loc.gov; Library of Congress. https://guides.loc.gov/lgbtq-studies/stonewall-era

MonkEL. (2015, October 26). Sylvia Rivera: Activist and Trailblazer. Npg.si.edu. https://npg.si.edu/blog/welcome-collection-sylvia-rivera

Nothing, E. (2015). STREET TRANSVESTITE ACTION REVOLUTIONARIES: SURVIVAL, REVOLT, AND QUEER ANTAGONIST STRUGGLE. [zine].

O’Neill, S. (2019, May 31). Who Threw the First Brick at Stonewall? Let’s Argue About It. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/31/us/first-brick-at-stonewall-lgbtq.html

Rivera, S. (n.d.). Our armies are rising and we are getting stronger. [Transcript]. “First Friday of the Month” meeting, June 2001. Retrieved March 27, 2026, from https://www.historyisaweapon.com/defcon1/riverarisingandstronger.html

Rothberg, E. (2021, March). Sylvia Rivera. National Women’s History Museum. https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/sylvia-rivera

Stryker, S. (2017). Transgender History (2nd ed.). Seal Press. (Original work published 2008)

Fight for Who You Are | Chevalière d'Éon (1728-1810): Not Just Cistory

CW: this blog post contains descriptions of a transgender person's genitals as well as the disregard of her bodily autonomy. Medical language is used.

There is a certain special fascination people have for what is labeled 'different' or taboo'. This has long included the bodies of people who don't look exactly like what is deemed 'normal'. From 'freak shows' of the past to proposed bills today that require minors to undergo physical examination of their genitals and testing of hormone levels, namely testosterone, to prove their right to participate in high school sports (Sport Resolutions, 2022). Certain bodies have been considered public property and fodder for spectacle when a point needs to be made, or entertainment had.

The Chevalière d'Éon was subject to this scrutiny as well. There was a lot of discussion and speculation around what was under her dragoon uniform and dresses. There is some debate over whether she encouraged or discouraged this speculation, but either way, it would not have been such a long-enduring topic of discourse, or even a discussion at all, if d'Éon had simply been a cis woman.

For the duration of this blog post I have decided to use both she/her/hers and he/him/his pronouns, rather than they/them/theirs. Many of the contemporary articles about d'Éon have used they/them/theirs when referring to her. However, I have come to the conclusion that using these two sets of pronouns as appropriate is more authentic.

D'Éon referred to herself as either 'him' or 'her' throughout her life. While gender-neutral pronouns have existed since before d'Éon's time, I have not come across any evidence of her using them for herself. I will only be using he/him/his when d'Éon was 'living as a man', and not when she was 'living as a woman' or when speaking about d'Éon generally. this reflects that d'Éon chose to dress and live as a woman, even when it was not required of her.

The Advantage of a ‘Man’s’ Education

Charlotte-Geneviève-Louise-Augusta-Andréa-Timothéa d'Éon de Beaumont or Charles-Geneviève-Louis-Auguste-André-Timothée d'Éon de Beaumont (henceforth referred to as d'Éon, regardless of the gender she was presenting as) was born on the fifth of October, 1728 (Charles, Chevalier d’Éon de Beaumont | French Spy | Britannica, n.d.). She was part of "a noble family in Tonnerre, Burgundy" (Rotondi, 2024) and was, by all accounts raised as a boy. D'Éon claimed, later in life, to have been forcibly raised as a boy, despite her sex, to please a father who wanted a son (Rotondi, 2024). Whether this is factually true or not, is uncertain. However, it is possible, that this is how d'Éon's upbringing felt to her, regardless of how her family perceived her.

D'Éon was given the education expected of the son of a noble during this time and "excelled academically and graduated from law school" (Figes, 2021). Her education was certainly something most women were not afforded during the eighteenth century. "After graduating from Collège Mazarin... in 1749, the 21-year-old gained a literary reputation with [his] political writings" (Rotondi, 2024). This both hinted at his skill at politics as well as set him up for a life of intrigue and political play.

Spymistress D'Éon

D'Éon's life of espionage began 'in 1756 [.] "d’Eon was recruited for the Secret du Roi, or King's Secret, a network of spies working for French King Louis XV. D’Eon was sent to Russia in two capacities: Officially, as Secretary of the Embassy in St. Petersburg. Secretly, the King tasked d'Éon with gathering intelligence in the court of Empress Elizabeth in a bid to put a Frenchman on the Polish throne" (Rotondi, 2024). D'Éon must have been very good at being a spy, because she was one for a good portion of her life.

Russia may have opened d'Éon's eyes to the part of herself that was not what society assumed her to be. On the other hand, she could have known she was female for her entire life. Either way, she participated in the "weekly 'metamorphosis balls' [held by Empress Elizabeth,] where men of the court dressed as women and noblewomen, as men.... Gary Kates, author of Monsieur d’Eon Is a Woman*... [says] 'Every nobleman and noble lady would have known what it was like to cross-dress and did so all the time at masquerade balls'" (Rotondi, 2024). It was a tantalizing opportunity to flout social convention and ignore propriety, in favor of dressing up and having fun. This crossdressing was only acceptable so long as it was kept to these balls.

Later, when d'Éon was on her way to becoming a household name, she insisted that part of her role as a spy involved her dressing as a woman and that she "served as a lady-in-waiting to Empress Elizabeth, but there is little historical evidence to confirm this" (Rotondi, 2024). She flouted the implicit understanding that the crossdressing was to be kept to balls only. Not only, according to her, did she dress as a woman at formal functions, but she did so all of the time, fully living as one in service to her country.

Bram Stoker, of Dracula fame, wrote Famous Imposters and included the Chevalière d'Éon as a subject. He covers her time in Russia, assuming her claim that she was there pretending to be a woman was true. It does throw the rest of what he writes about her into doubt, but sharing what was believed about her one hundred years after her death, and what made her worth remembering to the world, is something to be included (with a grain of salt for you to take, of course).

Stoker describes her time in Russia as an undercover lady's maid and her return as her 'brother'. "In the following year he returned to France whence he was immediately sent again to St. Petersburg with the title of Secretary of Embassy. But this time he went in his man’s clothes and as the brother of the pretended female reader. By this time he had been made a lieutenant of dragoons" (Stoker, 1910, pp. 271–272).

As well as being a talented spy, D'Éon was also a talented military leader. "D’Eon... distinguished himself by his courage in the battles of Hoecht; of Ultrop, where he was wounded; of Eimbech where he put the Scotch to flight; and of Osterkirk, where at the head of 80 dragoons and 20 hussars he overthrew a battalion of the enemy" (Stoker, 1910, pp. 271–272). She continued to avail herself of her country and build goodwill upon which her identity would later be tolerated.

At the end of the Seven Years War, D'Éon "went to London in 1762, with the Duc de Nivernais... On returning to Versailles with the Treaty of Paris ratified... he received the cross of St. Louis" (Charles, Chevalier d’Éon de Beaumont | French Spy | Britannica, n.d.). It is clear that as well as being a sensationalist, and skilled spy, D'Éon was also trusted by the king.

He was well rewarded for his work and "[t]he newly minted Chevalier d’Eon was named Chargé d'Affaires and interim ambassador in London...." D’Eon's spy work continued. He was tasked with "Identifying locations for a sea invasion of England even as the two Kings were publicly proclaiming peace" (Rotondi, 2024). This job suited D'Éon, and she was reluctant to leave it.

France vs. D'Éon

However, nothing lasts forever, and "D'Éon was enjoying a luxurious London lifestyle when their replacement, the Comte de Guerchy, was named and d’Eon was demoted to secretary... 'D’Eon had a huge ego,' says Kates. '[He] thought [he was] the best person for the job.'" (Rotondi, 2024). This was not what the French Government wanted to hear, and it was now that her relationship with France began to sour.

Determined to get D'Éon back under France's direct control, "the French Foreign Ministry made several attempts to kidnap and arrest him. In retaliation, d’Eon intimated to his superiors in the Secret that he would tell everything if he wasn’t vindicated" (Rodriguez McRobbie, 2016). In 1764 "d'Éon published secret state correspondence to British audiences in a scandalous publication known as the Lettres, mémoires, et négociations" (Figes, 2021) as proof that he was serious about sharing what he knew. D'Éon was, apparently, not one to give up, or one to refuse to stoop to underhanded means to get what she wanted.

Fearing what might come out if he didn't capitulate, "Louis XV quietly gave D’Eon a lifelong pension of 12,000 livres annually, in exchange for reports about British politics and handing over the incriminating documents about the Secret he possessed.... and he was forbidden from returning to France" (Rodriguez McRobbie, 2016). In the end of this particular scandal, D'Éon was able to get out of the exchange, exactly what she wanted; the ability to continue as she was in London as a person of importance, even if, publicly she was no longer a member of the French government.

Speculation and Scandal

Now, she was something of a celebrity and a household name in London. It was during this stretch of time that speculations about her gender (what we would now label her 'sex') began to run rampant. "Popular broadsheets were printed portraying d’Eon as half man, half woman. The London Stock Exchange began taking bets on the Chevalier’s gender. Rather than refute the statements, the Chevalier fanned the flames, even challenging a prominent banker to a duel" (Rotondi, 2024). D'Éon appears to be a person who liked, or at least wasn't afraid of, scandal, and she continued to insist that she was a woman, and shared (and created) stories to fill in her life as she felt it should have been lived.

Regeime changes are not kind to blackmailers however, and "when Louis XV died in 1774, his son... Louis XVI... saw no utility in having effectively two foreign policies, one secret, and, moreover, he no longer wanted to invade Britain. So d’Eon was again a problem" that needed to be solved (Rodriguez McRobbie, 2016).

How do you negotiate with a negotiator? The French sent Pierre Beaumarchais. In 1775, he "approached d’Eon to negotiate his return to France and, crucially, the return of any documents he possessed pursuant to his spy work. After several months of discussion, d’Eon [acquiesced]... He would give up all papers and return to France as soon as possible" (Rodriguez McRobbie, 2016).

Of course, d'Éon must have gotten something pretty good out of the bargain to leave her exciting life of intrigue and celebrity. He was once again "offered a life annuity of 12,000 livres a year… and agreed to dress as a woman for the rest of [her] life in exchange for being legally proclaimed female" (Rotondi, 2024). "In 1777 he received the command; 'By order of the king: Charles-Geneviève-Louise-Auguste-Andrée-Timothée d’Éon de Beaumont is commanded to leave off the dragoon’s uniform which she is wearing, and to dress according to her sex'" (Charles, Chevalier d’Éon de Beaumont | French Spy | Britannica, n.d.). This might have been thought of as a punishment for d'Éon, or it may have been an opportunity to end the controversy by declaring her 'female', but whatever the case, d'Éon was only to happy to accept, and dressed and lived as a woman for the rest of her life, even after this agreement was void.

The king wasn't a radical supporter of a person's right to exist as who they are. Instead "'Louis 16th thought d’Eon really was and had always been a woman'... Plus, declaring d’Eon legally female was politically expedient: 'There weren’t women ambassadors or diplomats, so d’Eon couldn’t rise to power again....' (Rodriguez McRobbie, 2016). D'Éon was clearly a worthy political player regardless of speculation or gossip, and needed to be made as harmless as possible.

Not one to let gender roles, or the fact that France did not consider her fit for military service anymore, confine her , '[w]hen France entered the American Revolution on the side of the colonists in 1778, d’Eon offered to lead an army of women. The offer was declined" (Rotondi, 2024).

Unable to continue with her career in espionage, and not able to fight for her country, or its allies, as a legal woman, she "forged a new career performing fencing demonstrations. Popular prints show d’Eon fencing in a black dress... [and] the Croix de St Louis during these fights" (The Chevalier d’Eon - National Portrait Gallery, 2024).

She was able to still make ends meet even "[w]hen the French Revolution began in 1789, [and her] annual French pension was suspended and money became scarce" (The Chevalier D’Eon, n.d.). With her public fencing exhibitions and despite no longer being relied on by the king or an empress, many eyes were still on d'Éon.

At the end of the revolution, d'Éon "was now legally free to dress as [she] pleased. D’Eon chose to dress exclusively as a woman for the final 33 years of [her] life" (Rotondi, 2024). It is her decision to continue living and dressing as a woman even after she was no longer was required to, that makes me, as a transgender individual look to d'Éon and say 'I know you.'

As d'Éon aged, her ability to perform would have waned. She had lived lavishly throughout her life. Her spending combined with the loss of her allowance meant she "spent several months in prison for unpaid debts. In 1805 [she] received an advance from a publisher to write [her] Memoirs" (Figes, 2021), a perfect project for a storyteller like her.

Historians theorize that these memoirs were both at least partially ghostwritten, and fictionalized. The manuscript was never published (Rotondi, 2024). In her final years she grew "increasingly religious and [wrote] “What I am writing is not for the feeble souls of this century... How much I have suffered in body and soul. All that I know is that my transformation has made me into a new creature' (Rotondi, 2024). I can only speculate to the meaning of these lines, but they resonate in a way that is also familiar.

At the very end of her life, "the Chevalier lived with a widowed friend, Mrs[.] Coles, in modest circumstances.... d'Eon died in poverty in May 1810, at the age of 81... (The Chevalier D’Eon, n.d.). When her death was discovered, doctors were sent for.

CW: this next section contains descriptions of a transgender person's genitals as well as the disregard of her bodily autonomy. Medical language is used.

An inspection of her her body was done, and an anatomical drawing of her genitals was made in order to prove that she was actually a male. This illustration is available to view digitally as an archived item in the British Museum's collection. The piece is described as an "Anatomical drawing of the penis and emaciated thighs of Charles Genevieve Louis Auguste Andree Timothee D'Eon de Beaumont (called the Chevalier D'Eon), drapery over the stomach and beneath the buttocks..." (Turner, 1810). The meta data for the image includes a transcription of the inscription:

Drawn from the Body of the Chevalier D'Eon, May 24. 1810. I hereby certify that I have inspected & dissected the Body of the Chevalier D'Eon, in the presence of Mr. Adair, Mr. Wilson, & Le Pere Elizee, & have found the Male Organs in every respect, perfectly formed. May 23rd. 1810. Golden Square. In consequence of a note from the above Gentleman, I examined the Body, which was a Male; - the original Drawing was made by Mr. C. Turner, in my presence. Dean Street, Soho. May 24th. 1810. and inscribed London Published June 14th 1810 by C Turner (Turner, 1810)

When the results of the examination of d'Éon's body were published society “painted d’Eon as one of the greatest con men in history—an actor who made people believe something that was utterly untrue..." (Rotondi, 2024). A life full of adventure, intrigue, and loyalty was pushed aside in favor of the scandal of d'Éon's body and the shape it took, and utterly unfair rendition of a life that repeats even today.

D'Éon, and Today: A Dreadful Tradition

This gross invasion of privacy and disrespect to a woman who had made her gender known repeatedly and incredibly publicly, is sadly typical of the sort of public ownership assumed over transgender bodies. Courts decide whether we can compete in sports, or receive gender affirming care, and the public takes for granted that trans folks are willing to share all about 'what's in their pants', and that it is acceptable to pick apart every aspect of someone's appearance to determine whether they are transgender or not.

This attention ranges from distasteful, to discomfiting, to dangerous, and is continues to be one way society exerts control over individuals who do not fit neatly into the boxes deemed appropriate to society. This is not something exclusive to transgender individuals, disabled folks, people of color, and fat people, amongst others all receive this treatment too.

Charlotte-Geneviève-Louise-Augusta-Andréa-Timothéa d'Éon de Beaumont was an incredibly intelligent woman, with, apparently, an ego to match. She both supported and thwarted kings and empresses, and defied social convention for decades. She was sure of who she was, and made it known to the world. While it may not be advisable for all of us to become spies for kings, or act as emissaries for the countries we live in, we could perhaps emulate the Chevalière d'Éon in our bravery and determination to live as our authentic selves, propriety be damned.

The original painting featured in this blog is available for purchase.

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NOTE! Some links (those with an * next to the name) are affiliate links. I will receive a small commission if you use these links to purchase something. It will not change the price of the product for you.

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References

Charles, chevalier d’Éon de Beaumont | French spy | Britannica. (n.d.). Www.britannica.com; Encyclopedia Britannica . Retrieved March 17, 2026, from https://www.britannica.com/biography/Charles-chevalier-dEon-de-Beaumont

Figes, L. (2021, February 23). The gender fluidity of the Chevalier d’Éon. Artuk.org; Art UK. https://artuk.org/discover/stories/the-gender-fluidity-of-the-chevalier-don

Rodriguez McRobbie, L. (2016, July 29). The Incredible Chevalier d’Eon, Who Left France as a Male Spy and Returned as a Christian Woman. Atlas Obscura. https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/the-incredible-chevalier-deon-who-left-france-as-a-male-spy-and-returned-as-a-christian-woman

Rotondi, J. P. (2024, January 10). The French Diplomat Who Lived as Both a Man and a Woman | HISTORY. HISTORY. https://www.history.com/articles/chevalier-d-eon-french-spy-man-woman

Sport Resolutions. (2022, June 6). Ohio transgender athletes bill allows doctors to examine genitalia. Sportresolutions.com; Sport Resolutions. https://www.sportresolutions.com/news/ohio-transgender-athletes-bill-allows-doctors-to-examine-genitalia

Stoker, B. (1910). Famous Impostors (pp. 271–272). STURGIS & WALTON COMPANY. https://www.gutenberg.org/files/51391/51391-h/51391-h.htm#IX_THE_CHEVALIER_DEON

The Chevalier d’Eon - National Portrait Gallery. (2024). Npg.org.uk; National Portrait Gallery. https://www.npg.org.uk/collections/research/new-research-on-the-collection/the-chevalier-deon

The Chevalier d’Eon. (n.d.). The British Museum. Retrieved March 19, 2026, from https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/desire-love-and-identity/chevalier-deon

Turner, C. (1810). 1868,0808.7947 [Hand-colored, stipple]. The British Museum. https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/P_1868-0808-7947

Standing up for Yourself means Standing up for Others| Aimee Stephens (1960-2020): Not Just Cistory

Content Warning: this post includes the mention of suicide.

Aimee Stephens was the very first person whose I painted as a part of my Not Just Cistory series. I was inspired, at the time, by the recent victory of the court case she had instigated, as well as saddened by her recent death. She did not live to experience the victory of her court case, but she did help protect all of the other working trans folks in the United States. I wanted to honor the woman who was brave enough to stand up for herself, and demand to be treated equally by her employer regardless of what letter was marked down on her birth certificate.

Content Warning: This blog post contains the mention of a suicide attempt.

Early Inklings and and Conservative Upbringing

There is a common narrative that all transgender folks know that they are trans from a very young age. This is is a generalization of the complex path transgender individuals take untangling their own perceptions of self from the roles that influences like society and culture have placed on them.

However, some transgender folks do have a sense of their gender identity early on, and Aimee Stephens was one of them. She shared that even at age five she knew she was a girl (ACLU). Having been born "Dec. 7, 1960" (Ortiz, 2020) the atmosphere in the mid sixties towards transgender people was even less accepting than it was now. Stephens said in a 2019 interview with Detroit News, "growing up in a conservative Baptist family in Fayetteville, North Carolina, 'it's certainly not something that was talked about'...'It was shoved in the closet, and you didn't mention it again' (Burke, Stephens 2019).

The Stonewall Rebellion was still nine years away (Library of Congress), and while trans folks did exist, and were living their lives (Other subjects of the Not Just Cistory Series that were alive during this time include: Carmen Rupe, Bobbie Lea Bennet, Dora Richter, Danielle Bunten Berry, Aleshia Brevard, Holly Woodlawn, Rita Hester, and Vanessa Show, just to name some of them!) but there was no internet, and the communities that did exist were hidden and certainly not visible to an elementary-age child.

Finding her Calling and Identity

Aimee graduated from Mars Hill University in 1984 with a degree in religious education and obtained a degree in mortuary science from Fayetteville Technical Community College in 1988 (Ortiz, 2019). She didn't plan, at first to become a funeral director or embalmer. "[F]uneral services, [was] a career she discovered while studying to become a Baptist minister. She enjoyed knowing that she was helping people remember their loved ones at peace" (Ortiz, 2019). Aimee worked for decades providing comfort and dignity to families and the deceased, even though she herself was denied the same comfort and dignity that living as herself would have granted her.

When the internet became a place regular folks could visit, transgender folks gathered and shared their experiences, creating, for the first time, a way for individuals who were isolated from others like them, to share their experiences and find community. Aimee was one of these people, connecting with transgender communities for the first time. She explained ""the Internet came about, [and] I got the chance to explore a little, and said, hey, there's other people out there that kind of feel like I do'" (Burke, Stephens 2019). Of course, knowing that you're trans, and being able to understand what this means for yourself and live authentically are two different things, and do not often happen simultaneously.

Becoming Aimee Entirely

In the meantime, "[s]he married and divorced and married again after reconnecting with a childhood friend, Donna. [In the late nineties,] she moved to Michigan to be with her... settling in Metro Detroit" (Burke, Stephens 2019). While her life continued, Aimee still struggled to come to terms with and understand what her feelings around her gender and identity meant for her.

The tension and secrecy manifested itself in Donna and Aimee's marriage until Donna confronted her wife, demanding to know if she was cheating on her with another woman (Burke, Stephens 2019). Aimee decided to be honest with her wife, recalling "'I kind of laughed when she said that because it kind of was another woman, but not the way you'd expect,'... 'I said it was me, and this is what I'm dealing with" (Burke, Stephens 2019). This first bravery on Aimee's part is one that so many of us have gone through, in one way or another.

Thankfully, Aimee's vulnerability about her struggles was met with love (as it should be). "Donna suggested Stephens see a therapist, which she did, eventually coming to the conclusion she was transgender.... [She also] supported Stephens through her transition, as did most of her extended family" (Burke, Stephens 2019). With how popular attitudes towards transgender individuals have curdled in the past ten or so years, it is gratifying to see that the hatred we are experiencing has never been the norm.

Unfortunately, despite "living as a woman in every part of her life but work, where she feared the reaction to revealing her 'true self'" Aimee still struggled. 'I hated that every day I had to go, because I was not being honest with myself or anybody else at that point,' she said (Burke, Stephens 2020). This sort of dissonance between who a person is, and who they have to present to the world can be incredibly grating, and distressing, even if it is only in a singular part of their life.

In November 2012, Stephens decided to end her life. She felt trapped, saying "she couldn't go on living as 'two separate people'... In my mind, I was thinking: If I can't go forward and I can't go backwards, where does that leave me? I only had one conclusion in my mind, which was to end my life and let it be over'...". Ultimately she did not go through with her attempt, realizing that "'I liked me too much... And the only thing for me to do was to choose life and move forward, regardless'" (Burke, Stephens 2019). thankfully, Stephens was able to continue to take steps forward.

That same year "Aimee made the decision to tell her coworkers that she is a woman (ACLU)". This was the final step she needed to take in order to live as a woman, as herself, in every part of her life. Her letter read: "What I must tell you is very difficult for me and is taking all the courage I can muster... I have felt imprisoned in a body that does not match my mind, and this has caused me great despair and loneliness... I will return to work as my true self, Aimee Australia Stephens, in appropriate business attire. I hope we can continue my work at R.G. and G.R. Harris Funeral Homes doing what I always have, which is my best! (Ortiz, 2020)”. This act of bravery and vulnerability was another one that so many transgender individuals must take in order to be authentically themselves that is not typically required of cisgender folks.

A First Brave Step

Two weeks after she told her boss, in 2013, she was fired (ACLU). Some of the articles go into the reasoning of her boss, the funeral home's owner, Thomas Rost, but I do not feel that going into detailed description his motives to be relevant. I am writing about Aimee, and while Thomas did greatly affect her life in this aspect, I think it will suffice to share his statement in court, under oath, about why he fired Aimee; "Well, because he was no longer going to represent himself as a man. He wanted to dress as a woman” (Ortiz, 2020). He also referenced his religion, saying that he "believes the Bible teaches that a person's sex is 'an immutable God-given gift,' that it is wrong for a person to 'deny' his or her God-given sex" (Burke, Stephens 2019).

Remember, Aimee had received education to become a Pastor, and she did not agree with his interpretation. She said "'Having studied the Bible, I know that's not in the Bible'..." (Burke, Stephens 2019). She also pointed out that "'If he’s read and studied, and this is the conclusion he’s come to, that’s certainly his right. But that’s where his right ends. His belief doesn’t give him the option of discriminating against somebody else and the way they believe'"(Burke, Stephens 2019). Clearly he did not see Stephens as a woman, or respect her own knowledge of herself as a person.

Not willing to be simply tossed aside and denied the respect granted to others, Aimee Stephens embarked on another journey of bravery. She "filed a complaint with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which sued the funeral homes, saying her employer had violated the Civil Rights Act of 1964. But a district court ruled in the employer’s favor. Ms. Stephens then won in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, in Cincinnati" (Ortiz, 2020). This began the case's rise through the courts. The "decision [of the Sixth Circuit] was challenged by the funeral home, represented by the Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative nonprofit group, and in April 2019 the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case on the question of whether the Civil Rights Act protects transgender people from workplace discrimination" (Ortiz, 2020).

The end to Aimee's employment at R.G. and G.R. Harris Funeral Homes caused Aimee and her family strife, even beyond the emotional distress of being dismissed from a job and career that she loved, simply for being open and honest about herself. She now faced a struggle that many transgender individuals experience; the inability to find employment. We can't know if her transgender identity played a role in this struggle, but whatever the reason "she struggled to find work in the funeral home industry after her firing, despite her decades of experience. She had interviews, second and third interviews, then her calls wouldn't be returned" (Burke, Stephens 2019)

As time passed, the family's financial struggles continued, and "[s]he and Donna had to sell some of their possessions to get by financially. 'We're survivors,' she said... Despite the financial hardship, Stephens has not regretted challenging Rost's decision" (Burke, Stephens 2019). Stephens knew how important it was, not only for her, but for trans folks across the country, that she stand up to bigots who thought they could fire individuals for how they presented themselves.

Thankfully, she "eventually got a position as an autopsy technician at the Detroit Medical Center's Sinai-Grace Hospital dissecting bodies for pathologists..." and was able to work "through the end of 2014 when her kidneys failed. Between doctor's appointments and dialysis treatments, she couldn't work full-time and was forced to retire" (Burke, Stephens 2019). Throughout all of this, Stephens' case continued its way through the courts.

Victory and Bravery

When the Supreme court agreed to hear Stephens' case Aimee became the first openly transgender person whose civil rights case was heard by the court. (Romo, 2020) Her act of bravery allowed for her to pave the way for others whose choice of self-expression through dress does not align with the typical expectations for the sex printed on their documents. When Aimee "traveled to Washington for the Supreme Court hearing on the case... She said at the time that she was overwhelmed by the number of people demonstrating on her behalf... 'To hear them outside of the courthouse steps chanting my name, telling me that they loved me, that has a big effect on you... The more I’ve seen the support, it gives me the strength to get up another day, to go on fighting another day and give that same hope to all the rest'" (Ortiz, 2020). Aimee's bravery had become a beacon that transgender folks could and did rally around.

In the end, the supreme court judged "that LGBTQ people are protected under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which states employers cannot fire, refuse to hire or otherwise penalize people because of their sex" (Romo). More technically, The ruling was "Affirmed, 6-3, in an opinion by Justice Gorsuch on June 15, 2020. Justice Alito filed a dissenting opinion, in which Justice Thomas joined. Justice Kavanaugh filed a dissenting opinion (Barnes)". Aimee's fight for respect and the right to dress professionally in a way that affirmed her identity, now extended to every transgender person in the United States.

Aimee passed away as a result of her kidney disease on May 12th, 2020, just a month before the ruling on her court case (Romo, 2020). While she was unable to see her victory on this side of life, she undeniably impacted multitudes of transgender individuals.

Fundamentally, Aimee Stephens wanted what all people, both trans and cis gender, want. "If you're part of the human race, which we all are, we all deserve the same basic rights. We're not asking for anything special. We're just asking to be treated like other people are "' (Romo, 2020).

Aimee Stephens, and her story, are featured in the first collection of my Ancestor Cards.

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NOTE! Some links (those with an * next to the name) are affiliate links. I will receive a small commission if you use these links to purchase something. It will not change the price of the product for you.

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References

ACLU. (n.d.). R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes v EEOC & Aimee Stephens. American Civil Liberties Union. Retrieved March 11, 2026, from https://www.aclu.org/cases/rg-gr-harris-funeral-homes-v-eeoc-aimee-stephens

Barnes, A. (2018, August 6). R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes Inc. v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. SCOTUSblog. https://www.scotusblog.com/cases/case-files/r-g-g-r-harris-funeral-homes-inc-v-equal-opportunity-employment-commission/

Burke, M. N. (2019, September 16). “I chose to stand up”: Mich. transgender woman takes firing fight to High Court. The Detroit News. https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/politics/2019/09/16/michigan-transgender-rights-case-supreme-court/2231329001/?gnt-cfr=1&gca-cat=p&gca-uir=false&gca-epti=z119924u116124v119924&gca-ft=285&gca-ds=sophi

Library of Congress. (2019). Research Guides: LGBTQ+ Studies: A Resource Guide: Stonewall Era and Uprising. Guides.loc.gov; Library of Congress. https://guides.loc.gov/lgbtq-studies/stonewall-era

Ortiz, A. (2020, June 16). Aimee Stephens, Plaintiff in Transgender Case, Dies at 59. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/12/us/aimee-stephens-supreme-court-dead.html

Romo, V. (2020, May 12). Aimee Stephens, Transgender Woman At Center Of Major Civil Rights Case, Dies At 59. NPR.org; National Public Radio. https://www.npr.org/2020/05/12/854946825/aimee-stephens-transgender-woman-at-center-of-major-civil-rights-case-dies-at-59

Community Care is Queer | Carmen Rupe (1936-2011): Not Just Cistory

Content Warning: this post includes detailed descriptions of police violence against a trans woman of color, and the mention of the suicide of a parent.

Raised on Family and Tradition

Content Warning: this next part mentions the suicide of a parent.

Carmen Rupe, one of the most famous drag queens, political activists, and Mother to many of the queer and trans folks of Aotearoa (also known as New Zealand), was born on "10 October 1936 at Waimiha, between Taumarunui and Te Kūiti, the child of Elsie Tekahukete Wilson (Ngāti Hauā, Ngāti Heke-a-Wai) and her husband, John Edward Rupe (Ngāti Maniapoto)" (Townsend, 2020). She was an incredible trailblazer, was known as a beloved member of the queer and trans community in Wellington during her lifetime.

Rupe's childhood was largely characterized by family and farm life. She lived amongst her extended family, which included her "koro (grandfather) [who] was a respected tohunga (priest), [and] their kuia (grandmother)... was an expert weaver of korowai (cloaks)..." as well as her "three brothers and three sisters" (Townsend, 2020). Farm life in Waimiha was guided by the Māori maramataka (calendar) and there was no electricity, refrigeration or indoor toilet (Townsend, 2020). Carmen Rupe was surrounded by loved ones and Māori culture from the very beginning of her life.

In 1941, when Carmen was five, her father committed suicide (Townsend, 2020). In no family, is a tragedy like this painless, but it must have been incredibly hard for young Rupe and her family, given how close they all were, and how family was valued. Elise did eventually remarry, to "Inuhaere Rupe (Te Rupe), John’s brother. The couple had a further six children before Te Rupe’s death in 1947". This meant that Carmen had 12 siblings. Despite the large size of her family, Carmen and her mother were able to maintain a close relationship, and she seems to have accepted Carmen's gender (expression) and, later, sexuality (Darling, 2020).

Rupe, was aware "from a young age that she did not fit into the gender that was assigned to her at birth by the colonizing society of her country, and like many young transgender people, she expressed herself through play, dressing up in her grandmother’s clothes often. When she was fifteen, she even performed Hula at a local celebration wearing a dress" (Darling, 2020).

Familial support has not been uncommon for the subjects of the Not Just Cistory series so far, and, in Rupe's case, Māori culture and tradition support multiple genders beyond cisgender men and women. "Those who were born with the wairua (spirit) of a gender different to the one they were assigned at birth may call themselves ‘irawhiti’ (with a gender that changes or is associated with change), ‘whakawāhine’ (creating or becoming a woman), ‘tangata ira tāne’(a person with the spirit or gender of a man), or one of a number of other terms" (Schmidt, 2011). These beliefs have endured through to the present day, despite the attempts at assimilation by European colonizers.

Army Life and the Beginning of Being Carmen

At the young age of fifteen, Carmen left home, and struck out on her own. She worked in a sawmill, then the Taumarunui Post Office, and later worked in the Mosgiel Woollen Mills (Townsend, 2020). During this time she has her first romantic relationship with a man, and it confirmed what she had always known, that she was attracted to men (Townsend).

In the 1953, at seventeen, Rupe moved to Auckland where she was soon was "enlisted into compulsory military service, and it was there that she began to participate in drag performances, something that the other soldiers were not only entertained by but often encouraged" (Darling, 2020). She was able to express herself in a way that was socially acceptable, by participating in these 'morale boosting' events.

After she was discharged she "started work as an orderly at Cornwall Hospital in Auckland" (Townsend, 2020). Up until this point, Carmen had gone by her birth name and dressed traditionally masculine, and had generally lived as a man. However, during this time she began to present more femininely, and would go out in public dressed as a woman. She also began her career as a sex worker during this time, sometimes travelling between Australia and New Zealand with her clients (Townsend, 2020).

Rupe also chose the name Carmen for herself around this time. When she was asked for her name by a client she replied 'Carmen', inspired by the main character of the 1945 movie 'The Loves of Carmen' (Townsend, 2020). She was finding a way to live her life as herself, both in the metaphorical sense, but also in the practical sense.

Life in Sydney (the first time)

Content Warning: this next part includes detailed descriptions of police violence against a trans woman of color.

In 1959 Carmen Rupe moved to Australia after her mother's death (Darling, 2020). From her very first night in Sydney, she would go to places like Hyde Park, Blue Meringue Street, Kings Cross, or The Wall where she could pick up or be picked up by other men, this being before she began to live and work openly as a woman (CarmenRupe MemorialTrust, 2013). This was, of course, not without risk, but finding such a vibrant queer community immediately upon arrival to a new country, must have felt like a lifeline and a miracle to Rupe.

When she started working as a female transgender prostitute and drag queen (to use the terms she used for herself in interviews) the danger was increased. While the police disliked the male sex workers (and Sex work in general was illegal in Australia in general, at the time (Bailey, 2025)) they were incredibly brutal on transgender sex workers and drag queens in particular.

In an interview shared by the Carmen Rupe Memorial Trust on YouTube Carmen describes in an straightforward manner what police did when you were caught working as a female sex worker, were you transgender. The police would:

beat us up there outside outside in the street. They took us down to Darlinghurst police station and give us another hiding and beat us up and then they also ripped our wigs... off our heads and they also ripped all our prostitute female attire... and if we had women's underpants were in more trouble. You had to have men's underwear if if you're going to do a proper show... [T]hey put um telephone books down our chest so they can punch us. [T]hey used to also hose us in the in the Darlinghurst police station, give us a good beating up, good hiding, then they threw us in the straight cells for court the next morning... [A] lot of the guys who got picked up...were thrown in straight cells beaten up badly by the straight guys because they hated gay men drag queens and male prostitutes and drag prostitutes... [Y]ou don't mind getting picked up overnight but the worst part if you got picked up on a Friday night you didn't go to court until Monday, if you're in drag... you had this long black beard and so anyhow everyone used to laugh and... it didn't look very nice with a uh five o'clock shadow going at ten o'clock into court and then trying to get home partly dressed in drag... (CarmenRupe MemorialTrust, 2013).

It seems that no matter where you look throughout modern history, police are beating and humiliating transgender folks, particularly those who are women, sex workers, people of color, or some combination of the three.

Despite the danger she worked as the first Māori drag queen, performing in venues such as Les Girls in Kings Cross, and The Purple Onion, the first openly gay bar in the area (Transgender Icon Carmen Rupe Dies in NSW, 2011). This was the start of her lifelong role as an admired drag queen and community leader.

Rupe was arrested multiple times throughout her life, once being sent to Long Bay Prison, which was an incredibly dangerous place for anyone who wasn't a straight cisgender man. She explained that she was there for two weeks while the authorities checked her documents, since she was a New Zealander, rather than an Australian (CarmenRupe MemorialTrust, 2013).

The police would also raid the houses of known transgender and gay sex workers, looking for anything 'abnormal', so, once she was in a better financial situation, Carmen rented out a 'decoy' flat that she could tell the police was her residence, and avoid their invasive searching (CarmenRupe MemorialTrust, 2013).

In the same interview where she describes the despicable treatment by authorities, she explained that anyone who was visibly trans or queer would not be able to get any 'straight' work because the attitudes of the over culture mirrored that of the police, which is why she, and so many others turned to sex work, to have enough money to live (CarmenRupe MemorialTrust, 2013). It's not that trans or queer people are more likely to want to be a sex worker or are more likely to enjoy sex work (though some do, and that is fine), but more often it's that they cannot find any other 'straight' work, as Carmen put it.

Return, Rest, and Recuperation

Eventually, Carmen did move back to New Zealand. It wasn't necessarily by choice, however. She went back to Wellington to avoid the escalating police brutality, explaining that "the police was giving us a hiding every week and I was just getting sick and sore and wounded" (CarmenRupe MemorialTrust, 2013). Thankfully, "New Zealand wasn't so bad, because we were New Zealanders and we were safe at home" (CarmenRupe MemorialTrust, 2013). This was a time of rest and recovery for Carmen, after such a long stretch of being persecuted by the police, as well as a time of growth and community building.

After a six-month stretch in prison spanning 1962 and 1963 (she was charged with 'permitting a premises to be used as a brothel' she returned to Auckland and used the money she received in an inheritance to open a boarding house and live, finally, full-time as a woman (Townsend, 2020). Despite the legal strides being made around the world, the fact that money makes living our truth often easier in many ways, is still the case.

Despite her new business venture, she continued to put the skills she had honed in Sydney to use, performing as "an exotic dancer at Strip-A-Rama... and at private parties... At the end of the performance she removed her wig to reveal ‘Trevor’ beneath the costume – a dramatic act intended to shock" (Townsend, 2020).

In 1966 Carmen's life as herself was given another legal support; after being arrested for dressing as a woman "Justice McCarthy ruled that it was not illegal for men to dress in women’s clothing and dismissed the case. It was a win for all trans women, and Carmen never wore male clothing again" (Townsend, 2020). This was, in some ways the beginning of Carmen's legal advocacy for the LGBT+ people of Aotearoa.

Carmen the Entrepreneur

Now that Carmen could legally (and with a bit more safety) live openly as a woman, she continued her transition. "She legally changed her name to Carmen Tione Rupe on 2 September 1968.... [She continued taking the] female hormones [she began] in the 1950s, and in the 1970s she had breast augmentation surgery along with electrolysis" (Townsend, 2020). The tides were beginning to shift for Carmen, and for other Transgender people in Aotearoa.

In 1967 she began the venture that would ultimately gain her international recognition: Carmen's International Coffee House. Beyond being just a cafe, it was a safer space for trans and queer folks to meet and connect, which included, of course, sexual encounters. The interior of 86 Vivian St. "was an eccentric mix of Asian, Egyptian, Arabian and African décor. Plush red velvet curtains, oriental rugs and reproductions of classical European paintings adorned the walls, while antiques were juxtaposed with a tropical fish tank, piano and jukebox, displays of peacock features and wild grasses" (Townsend, 2020).

As a part of keeping her clientele cafe, Rupe devised a code cafe customers could use to indicate "their preferences by how they arranged their teacups and saucers. A cup placed upside down on a saucer requested sex with a woman; a cup on the side a transgender liaison; a saucer on top of a cup a homosexual encounter" (Townsend, 2020). Beyond the coded language of cup and saucer placement, the physical space itself was designed to protect; "the entrance had a confusing and intricate set of stairs" (Darling, 2019) and there was a buzzer that could be pressed if and when the police arrived, to alert the sex workers and their clients (Townsend, 2020). Rupe knew just how violent the police could be, and took precautions when creating this haven for the queer and trans folks of Wellington.

Not only did Carmen Rupe provide safety for her patrons, she created employment for others in the community. "The staff were a mix of drag queens, female impersonators, transvestites and transsexuals, plus a few gay men, straight men and lesbian women. Some of the hosts were sex workers but many were not. Above all, staff were expected to be welcoming to everyone" (Townsend, 2020). While sex was on the proverbial menu, it was not a requirement for employees to work there.

Buoyed by the success of Carmen's International Coffee House, Rupe opened several other locations around the city, including an antique shop (Townsend, 2020). Her years of experience within the hospitality and entertainment industry were an asset that allowed her to support herself and her community when few with an economic power would.

Mayor Carmen?

But Carmen was not simply satisfied with her cafes, entertainment establishments, and the community building she had done so far. In 1977 she ran for Mayor of Wellington. "She campaigned for hotel bars to be open till midnight or even 2am, the drinking age to be lowered to 18, prostitution to be made legal, homosexual acts to be decriminalised, abortion to be decriminalised and nudity on some beaches" (Transgender Icon Carmen Rupe Dies in NSW, 2011). She was unsuccessful securing the position of mayor, but the fact that all of the issues on her platform listed above are now legal (Transgender Icon Carmen Rupe Dies in NSW, 2011), does suggest that she was successful in other ways.

Both before and after her bid at mayor, Carmen worked tirelessly with charities. She used her fame from publicity stunts such as declaring that she new of a member of Parliament who was gay, as well as appearing topless at different events, to promote causes that would support her community and Aotearoa as a whole (Townsend, 2020). Despite her identity and work toeing the line of illegality, and public taboo, she was appropriately beloved; when ["s]he announced her availability to do public talks for charity, and the response was so overwhelming she immediately took 25 bookings" (Townsend, 2020).

Returning to Australia

While Carmen was recuperating in Wellington, Australia had begun to change. She described the turning of the tide in Sydney, saying "All the gay people had a huge big thing in in king's cross to leave the drag queens alone; a Stone Wall thing or Mardi Gras thing... [T]hey won and [the police] were not allowed to touch them, the gays, and beat them up and pick them up and give them a hiding for nothing. I'm told that's where it all started, 78, 79..." (CarmenRupe MemorialTrust, 2013).

In Australia, Carmen continued to the most good that she was able. She "[managed] a small community centre and [continued] helping homeless and vulnerable people. She was an advocate for safe sex and HIV/AIDS education as well as LGBTIQ+ rights. As a respected and enthusiastic member of the Sydney-based Te Rau Aroha kapa haka group, she raised money for the casualties of Kings Cross (Townsend, 2020)." It is no wonder that Carmen Rupe was and is still known as a pillar of the Trans and Queer communities she lived in.

Carmen Rupe lived in Sydney for the rest of her life. She did regularly return home to Wellington, and was still an active member of the Queer and Trans community there (Townsend, 2020).

She died in 2011 of Kidney Failure. "Following hip surgery... [that year] Carmen was admitted to hospital several times" (Transgender Icon Carmen Rupe Dies in NSW, 2011) before passing away at the age of 75 (Darling, 2019). Her funeral and the public mourning of her death were widespread in both Australia and New Zealand, with "Wellington Mayor Celia Wade-Brown [describing] Carmen [as] a cheerful and colourful personality. 'I admired her strength in living her life on her terms and standing up against discrimination.'" (Transgender Icon Carmen Rupe Dies in NSW, 2011).

A Legacy of Love

It is almost impossible for me to sum up Carmen Rupe's legacy. She worked for so long in so many different ways to make the world a better place, while always remaining authentic to herself. I think, perhaps, the best way to explain it, without restating this entire blog post (you could always read it again, if you wanted), is that while she may not be able to continue her work on this plane any more, she created a powerful example of what it means to be a force for change. She worked both within and without the law, creating community resources using her skills and strengths, when there were few others.

If we want to follow in Carmen's footsteps and transgender individuals, and as community members (wherever we live) we need to seek out our bravery and begin to make change where we can. We shouldn't be afraid of a little notoriety and scandal, and use it to our advantage. And finally, we need to be our truest, most vibrant selves while we work.

Carmen Rupe, and her story, are featured in the first collection of my Ancestor Cards.

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NOTE! Some links (those with an * next to the name) are affiliate links. I will receive a small commission if you use these links to purchase something. It will not change the price of the product for you.

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References

References

Bailey, K. (2025, October 7). The Oldest Profession Podcast. Old Pros. https://oldprosonline.org/carmen-rupe/

CarmenRupe MemorialTrust. (2013, December 8). CARMEN RUPE TRIBUTE. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2mQmAVnpMg

Darling, H.-H. (2020). Carmen Rupe. Making Queer History. https://www.makingqueerhistory.com/articles/2019/10/20/carmen-rupe

Schmidt, J. (2011). Gender and Diversity - Māori and Pasifika Gender Identities. In Te Ara - The Encyclopedia of New Zealand. https://teara.govt.nz/en/gender-diversity/page-4

Townsend, L. (2020). Rupe, Carmen Tione. In Dictionary of New Zealand Biography. Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand. https://teara.govt.nz/en/biographies/6r6/rupe-carmen-tione

Transgender icon Carmen Rupe dies in NSW. (2011, December 14). The Sydney Morning Herald. https://www.smh.com.au/world/transgender-icon-carmen-rupe-dies-in-nsw-20111215-1ovgn.html

The Roots of TDoR | Rita Hester (1963-1998): Not Just Cistory

Content Warning: this post includes semi-graphic descriptions of violence against a Black trans woman, police incompetence, and transphobia, a second notice will be given at the second where these topics are discussed

Gwendolyn Anne Smith and Penni Ashe Matz created Transgender Day of Remembrance (frequently abbreviated as TDoR), but there is another woman to whom respect and honor is due on this day in particular. It was Rita Hester's death, and the reaction to it by both the general public and the LGBT+ community at large, that had that inspired the two activists to found the holiday which has been celebrated every year since 1998 (Riedel, 2022).

Part of my heart breaks to write about Rita Hester in the context of TDoR, as there is so much more to her than her death, as there is for any person. I will endeavor, as I always do, to share information about her than just the piece that she is most known for.

An Early Life of Love

Rita Hester was born on November 30th 1963 (Sosin, 2020). She'd be 61, almost 62 at the publication of this blog post, were she still alive. Even from a young age Hester was an individual who was very feminine. Her sister described Rita's identity as known and accepted by the entire extended family (Sosin, 2020). She was surrounded by love and acceptance from birth.

As Rita grew, however, it become more and more evident that Hartford, was not the place for her .As "a Black trans woman... [Hester] chafed against the expectations placed on her by her surroundings" (Riedel, 2022). "'In Hartford, people got assaulted and got hurt and all the other stuff'" (Sosin via Hester, 2020), and understandably, that was not an ideal living situation.

Like so many other trans folks both before and after her, she looked towards cities to find a more accepting atmosphere. "[A] hundred miles away in Boston, there were parties and rock clubs where it didn’t matter that she was trans" (Riedel, 2022) and, in Boston, Rita thrived.

Finding her Place and Spreading her Wings

Enamored with Boston's queer community, "In her early twenties, Hester moved north permanently to Boston’s Allston neighborhood" (Riedel, 2022). It was 1988 and the city was her oyster (McNaught, 1998, p. 25). Here she found a second family; one that spanned both the queer and straight communities.

A Boston Phoenix article published less an month after Rita's murder begins with "Hester's friends have different perceptions of what the 34- year-old was like, but they all agree on one thing: 'The girl could dance!' Hester, they recall, was an incredible entertainer whose dance shows... [from] four years ago are still talked about. Glossy black waist-length braids. Voluptuous candy-apple-red lips and eyelashes so long they could almost create a breeze. Hester was six foot two and weighed about 200 pounds, but her friends say she was as agile as a tiny dancer. And she lit up a room with her warm, boisterous greetings"(McNaught, 1998, p. 21). Her friends said that "Hester lived large and loved big" (Sosin, 2020). Given how she was remembered by her community, it is clear that Hester was a vibrant soul that brought so much life and joy to the communities that she was a part of.

Living her own Life

Rita did not let herself be confined to the queer bars and clubs of Boston; she patronized bars in both the 'straight' and 'queer' parts of Boston. "One of Hester’s friends in Boston, Jessica Piper, remembered her as the only link between the city’s queer bars and the decidedly hetero nightlife uptown. 'The other queens wouldn’t go out to Allston from fear...and the straight Allston kids didn’t want to go to downtown queen bars' (Riedel, 2022)". Hester did not limit herself in how or where she could enjoy life, and undoubtedly, her life was richer for it.

Hester having a foot in each world was worrying to those closest to her in the trans community. They understood that Rita, while pretty, vivacious, and friendly, she was not entirely safe in the world that so rigidly adhered to the gender binary and cissexual expectations (Sosin, 2020). It was at one of these straight bars that she met her best friend; Brenda Wynne. She was "a white cis woman who called Rita her 'best friend in life'... [and they] shared a deep bond..." (Riedel, 2022). It was not all danger and ostracization from those that lived in the 'straight world', Rita found connections and community there as well.

Hester lived her life on her own terms, earning money as a sex worker and a dancer (McNaught, 1998, p. 23). Rita was also "deeply embedded in the city's rock scene" (Sosin, 2020) and "[she went] from attending shows in rock clubs to performing and dancing in them" (Reidel). She was so talented, that she performed internationally, traveling as far as Greece and Germany to dance (McNaught, 1998, p. 25). Rita was a talented woman, and was able to make a living off of her skills as a performer.

Her Life Cut Short

Content Warning: this next part includes semi-graphic descriptions of violence against a Black trans woman, police incompetence, and transphobia

The first to notice that things were not as they should be on the day that Hester was murdered were those closest to her. Friends, one of whom was Wynne, realized that Rita wasn't meeting up with them, as planned (Sosin, 2020). Later that evening, Hester was seen to have had "an altercation with a man at the bar who followed her out when she left.... others report[ed] that Hester went from Silhouettes to the Kells before going home. According to neighbors, two men were seen coming out the back door of Hester's apartment later that night" (McNaught, 1998, p. 25). Some of those in Rita's community and were concerned about things they saw happening that night, though they could not have known what the larger context and danger were.

The information from the police and their response is detailed and clear, but gives no answers, and little context. "Officers responded to a call about a fight at Rita's address at 6:12 p.m... and were dispatched 7 minutes later... When they found Hester, she was still alive on the floor. She had been stabbed repeatedly in the chest... More than an hour passed between the time police were dispatched and an ambulance took her to Beth Israel Hospital, where she died of cardiac arrest" (Sosin, 2020). The scene itself is almost too horrible to imagine. There had to have been blood everywhere, not to mention Rita was still fighting for her life, even if the attacker had fled.

While the police report does acknowledge that she was stabbed repeatedly, but what it leaves out is that "a brutal stabbing of this nature is evidence of a very personal killing" (Munroe, 2015). Was the killer a client of Rita's, or someone she knew personally? Evidence suggests that it was someone who knew Rita, since "there was no evidence of forced entry and nothing was stolen" (Munroe, 2015). Clearly, robbery wasn't the motive, and she must have let them in.

Then, there's the fact that Rita was a transgender woman. "Such frenzied damage is a common feature in many murders of transwomen, usually indicating shame and other emotional turmoil on the part of the killer" (Munroe, 2015). The earliest information made public about her murder would have left you not knowing that the murder victim was a transgender woman, unless you knew Rita personally.

The first to notice that things were not as they should be on the day that Hester was murdered were those closest to her. Friends, one of whom was Wynne, realized that Rita wasn't meeting up with them, as planned (Sosin, 2020). Later that evening, Hester was seen to have had "an altercation with a man at the bar who followed her out when she left.... others report[ed] that Hester went from Silhouettes to the Kells before going home. According to neighbors, two men were seen coming out the back door of Hester's apartment later that night" (McNaught, 1998, p. 25). Some of those in Rita's community and were concerned about things they saw happening that night, though they could not have known what the larger context and danger were.

The information from the police and their response is detailed and clear, but gives no answers, and little context. "Officers responded to a call about a fight at Rita's address at 6:12 p.m... and were dispatched 7 minutes later... When they found Hester, she was still alive on the floor. She had been stabbed repeatedly in the chest... More than an hour passed between the time police were dispatched and an ambulance took her to Beth Israel Hospital, where she died of cardiac arrest" (Sosin, 2020). The scene itself is almost too horrible to imagine. There had to have been blood everywhere, not to mention Rita was still fighting for her life, even if the attacker had fled.

While the police report does acknowledge that she was stabbed repeatedly, but what it leaves out is that "a brutal stabbing of this nature is evidence of a very personal killing" (Munroe, 2015). Was the killer a client of Rita's, or someone she knew personally? Evidence suggests that it was someone who knew Rita, since "there was no evidence of forced entry and nothing was stolen" (Munroe, 2015). Clearly, robbery wasn't the motive, and she must have let them in.

Then, there's the fact that Rita was a transgender woman. "Such frenzied damage is a common feature in many murders of transwomen, usually indicating shame and other emotional turmoil on the part of the killer" (Munroe, 2015). The earliest information made public about her murder would have left you not knowing that the murder victim was a transgender woman, unless you knew Rita personally.

Media Misstep

The news coverage about Rita Hester's murder followed the pattern that many of us are familiar with. Her gender, name, and pronouns were not reported on correctly. In short, her identity was not respected, and that aspect of the crime was lost in the reporting. It was initially reported that " a man who was also a transvestite had been stabbed to death" (Nangeroni, 1999).

Boston Globe reported Daniel Vasquez described Hester in an article "as a 'nightclub singer and a party-thrower, a man who sported long braids and preferred women’s clothes.' He also referred to 'Hester’s apparent double life,' and used male references for Rita throughout the story" (Nangeroni, 1999). It was clear that the media and police force were not interested in who Rita was, and how that may factor into her killing.

There was an article written for The Boston Pheonix soon after Hester's murder, remarking on the outcry about the incorrect description of Hester in the media. The article's author quotes multiple people who insist that the murder is more important than how she was described in the media immediately after her death. One of which particularly leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Jeff Epperly, the then editor of Bay Windows was quoted saying that "he too, believes the main issue is that someone was brutally murdered" (McNaught, 1998, p. 23). On the surface this makes sense, and I agree. Her being killed, and the killer going without being caught is a big issue. However, his quote continues with "'If we were writing a feature piece, we would go with [the gender identification] the subject wanted... but this is the news, and we have to deal with the facts. And the fact, according to police records is that the victim was biologically a male'"(McNaught, 1998, p. 23). This, to me, is a frustratingly uncritical way to look at the press surrounding Rita Hester's murder.

Now, I don't know Mr. Epperly, and I have used this new article as a source in this blog post beyond this part, because I do believe that it is a useful contemporary source. However, it is a perfect example of the lack of respect afforded to trans people, particularly trans women, and trans folks of color who tragically make up the majority of trans folks who are attacked and killed in the United States each year (Sosin, 2020). If we cannot do something as simple as describe the victims accurately then what hope is there for getting them justice? Yes, solving the crime of her murder is important, but Rita Hester also deserves to be respected and described as who she was, and not by the assumptions made by the police, and then parroted and defended by the media.

Transgender Day of Remembrance & Recent Years

On the one year anniversary of Rita Hester's death, a handful of Transgender activists joined together to remember and name all of the transgender individuals who were murdered in the past year. This was the first Trans Day of Remembrance.

Many folks who were aware of other anti LGBT+ hate crimes and murders and their victims could not name Rita herself (Smith, 2012). The founders of TDoR, as well as Hester's family and community felt that the public's response reflected the "disregard police and media show for Black transgender murder victims" (Bedford & Sosin, 2023). Rita deserved to be remembered correctly and respected, as do all transgender individuals.

In 2023 a new detective was assigned to Hester's case, and on the 28th of November of that year, they renewed their search for her killer (Bedford & Sosin, 2023). This time Rita's name and identity will be respected during the investigation. This is good news as "The average clearance rate for murders with transgender victims from 2010 through 2020 was about 48%, ...The national average murder clearance for that same time period was roughly 62%...[and] The disparity is even greater in cases where police have deadnamed or misgendered victims" (Lantz via Bedford & Sosin, 2023). We can only hope that with the correct questions being asked, some answers will be found, and some closure, if there is any to be had, can be given to Hester's family and loved ones.

Remembrance is Necessary: Conclusion

Rita Hester was a vibrant, talented woman, who lived her own life to the fullest, and should have been been able to live a long and fulfilling life. She was brutally murdered by someone who knew her, and hated her, most likely simply for being transgender. Then, in the wake of her death, she was disrespected repeatedly not only by those who reported on the crime that ended her life, but also those that were supposed to be solving the crime.

Today, Rita's legacy lives on in the lives she touched, but also in Trans Day of Remembrance. We remember those who have died from violence against trans people. The remembering is an essential part of the work that we do to work to create a better future. We cannot build something new if we don't understand where we have come from.

The original painting featured in this blog is available for purchase, and Rita Hester, and her story, are featured in the first collection of my Ancestor Cards.

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NOTE! Some links (those with an * next to the name) are affiliate links. I will receive a small commission if you use these links to purchase something. It will not change the price of the product for you.

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References

Bedford, T., & Sosin, K. (2023, December 4). Boston police recommit to solving murder of Rita Hester, whose death inspired Transgender Day of Remembrance. GBH. https://www.wgbh.org/news/local/2023-12-04/boston-police-recommit-to-solving-murder-of-rita-hester-whose-death-inspired-transgender-day-of-remembrance

McNaught, S. (1998, December 11). Displaced Anger: Is Rita Hester’s murder being eclipsed by the transgender community’s grammatical agenda? The Boston Phoenix December, 21, 23, 25. https://ia601809.us.archive.org/19/items/sim_boston-phoenix_december-11-17-1998_27_50/sim_boston-phoenix_december-11-17-1998_27_50.pdf

Munro, D. (2015, November 19). Grieving lives lost without reason on Transgender Day of Remembrance. WHYY. https://whyy.org/articles/grieving-lives-lost-without-reason-on-transgender-day-of-remembrance/

Nangeroni, N. (2025). Rita Hester’s Murder and the Language of Respect | GenderTalk. Gendertalk.com. https://www.gendertalk.com/language-of-respect/

Riedel, S. (2022, March 31). Remembering Rita Hester, Who Changed What It Means to Remember Trans Lives. Them. https://www.them.us/story/rita-hester-trans-remembrance-visibility-memorial

Smith, G. A. (2012, November 20). Transgender Day Of Remembrance: Why We Remember. HuffPost; Huffington Post. https://www.huffpost.com/entry/transgender-day-of-remembrance-why-we-remember_b_2166234

Sosin, K. (2020, July 17). Her death sparked Transgender Day of Remembrance. 22 years later, still no answers. NBC News. https://www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc-out/her-death-sparked-transgender-day-remembrance-22-years-later-still-n1233809

A Shooting Superstar | Holly Woodlawn (1946-2015): Not Just Cistory

We have told the stories of several trans women in the Not Just Cistory series that achieved the life they wanted for themselves by conforming to the gender expectations of women at the time and blending in with the women around them. There is nothing wrong with this, and is still something many trans folks (both men and women) do today. Holly Woodlawn, on the other hand, was not interested in blending in, in any sense of the word. 

Early Life

Holly Woodlawn was born in Juana Diaz Puerto Rico in 1946 on October 26, to a Puerto Rican mother, and a German-American father (Grimes, 2015). She described “the culture [as] more Caribbean. Everyone's naked, it's hotter, you come out earlier. I was having sex when I was seven and eight in the bushes with my uncles and cousins - of course, they were only 11 or 12 themselves. I was raised in a house full of women and my uncle was gay. We lived in a little tiny town, so those were my role models” (Paterson, 2007). Her time in Puerto Rico was an essential foundation to her identity and sense of self in terms of her gender.

Woodlawn didn’t live in Puerto Rico long. She left in 1955, when she was 9, with her mother. They moved to New York, where her mother met and remarried, to a Polish-Jewish immigrant named Joseph Ajzenberg, who adopted Woodlawn as his child (IMDb & Sieger, 2015). Her time in New York, and later Miami, Florida, were not particularly happy times for Woodlawn. She was uncomfortable in her middle-class suburban life, and felt as if she didn’t know who she was (Patterson, 2007). Suburban stability painfully constricted a young Holly Woodlawn.

Her teen years were a prologue to the rest of her life. She made a copy of her father’s car keys and would take his car to drive down to the gay beach and party (Russell, 2025). Her adolescent rebellion culminated in summer 1962, when she was supposed to be attending summer school to fix her failing grades (a result from spending too much time partying).  She instead took the trajectory of her life even more into her own hands, and joined up with a group of Cuban Queens and sold some jewelry and made her way north to New York City (Patterson, 2007), where she was sure the rest of her life was waiting to begin.

However, her travels came to a halt like a bus at the end of its line when she ran out of money in Atlanta Georgia. She ended up hitchhiking the rest of the way north (Patterson, 2007). Woodlawn was living through the part of her life she would be most well known for, (but not the most interesting, in my opinion) though she had no way of knowing at the time. Despite all her ambition, adventures, and accomplishments, Holly Woodlawn was most known, both during her life, and now after her death, as the ‘Holly’ in Lou Reed’s song ‘Walk on the Wild Side’ and as a Warhol Superstar. Her verse chronicles her traveling to New York City to begin her new life.

Once in New York she had to create a new life for herself from scratch, and it was not easy. She took on a myriad of jobs to make ends meet. During this time she was also “a street-urchin in New York, a speed freak, a thief, a housewife, a go-go dancer, a beauty queen who was crowned Miss Donut in Amsterdam, New York, a floor model at Saks Fifth Avenue, a rioter at Stonewall, an Off-Broadway star, and a celebrated cabaret performer” (Copeland, 2025, p. 89). This hard-scrabble life was a continuation of living outside of the ‘normal' (normal meaning white, suburban, middle class) world that Holly had been attracted to her entire life. However, she had her sights set even higher in the heavens.

Into the Orbit of the Famous

Woodlawn wanted to be a part of Andy Warhol’s orbit, one of his ‘Superstars’. I am aware of the irony of interrupting the story of a trans woman to tell the story of a cis man, but knowing who Warhol was, is important to understanding Holly and her goals, so we will briefly diverge.

Warhol was a first generation Polish-American, whose parents immigrated to the United States (The Warhol). He “graduated from Carnegie Institute of Technology (now Carnegie Mellon University) in Pittsburgh with a Bachelor of Fine Art in Pictorial Design in 1949 and soon after moved to New York City to pursue a career as a commercial artist” (The Warhol). This was where he and Holly Woodlawn would meet. 

Warhol worked as commercial artists for the first part of his career, but he is most known for his transgressive attitudes towards art, and his contributions to the Pop Art movement (the Warhol). His other paintings were often a critique of consumer culture, the iconic Campbell’s Soup cans piece, among them (Dupêcher, 2019) He continued, throughout his career, to paint commissioned portraits of the famous and elite individuals he became more and more involved with (the Warhol). Even this man, who adored the wild, avante garde life Holly desired, had his ‘safety net’. Many of the women he surrounded himself with did not have and could not create the same for themselves. 

The other aspect of his creative endeavors was what Woodlawn was most drawn to, and entwined with; his films. He was a prolific film maker, and his “feature-length films that delved into New York’s underground subcultures and turned… [his] collection of artists and misfits into ‘superstars’” (Dupêcher, 2019), which was exactly who Holly wanted to be.

Her chutzpah was what initially attracted Warhol to her. During this time in the mid and late sixties, Woodlawn was acting in plays, and after one in 1969 when she was interviewed by a journalist, she proclaimed she was one of Warhol’s superstars (Grimes, 2015). Warhol heard about this and wanted to meet her. This sort of preemptive sort of connection is ironically similar to how Lou Reed wrote about her in “Walk on the Wild Side” (don’t worry, we’re almost to that part). 

One Man’s Trash…

The project that made her an actual Warhol Superstar was the Paul Morrissey-directed Warhol film Trash, which was filmed in Morrissey’s basement (Patterson, 2007).  Woodlawn, who was 23 by my math, was initially intended to just be in one or two scenes, but Morrissey loved her and her improvisations so much that she ended up filming for six days (Grimes, 2015). Holly is inextricably entwined with Trash. Much of her lines were self-created, and Woodlawn said that, along with the dialogue, even the clothing used as costuming was hers as well. She had been exactly where her character in the movie was (Grimes, 2015), and related to her intensely. For her efforts she was paid $25 per day, and she never received any money in residuals from Warhol (Copeland, 2025, p. 115). 

Holly had finally made it; not only was she starring in one of Warhol’s movies, she was improving upon it! There was even an attempt by director George Cukor to nominate Holly for an Academy Award for her role in Trash but she was not considered. There are a plethora reasons floating around as to why she wasn’t, from the film being non-union (and the Academy did not, apparently, consider non-union films at the time) ( Woodruff, via Copeland, 2025, p. 164) to those in charge of making the decision could not decide on whether to categorize her as an actress or actor (Patterson, 2007). This must have seemed like her big break!

Is Another Man’s Biggest Hit

In 1972 Holly Woodlawn received a call from her friend telling her to turn on the radio. Confused, she told her that she didn’t have a radio (American Masters Digital Archive (WNET), 1997). This was how Holly found out she was the subject of the first verse of a new song; Walk on the Wild Side. She didn’t know Lou Reed, beyond attending the concerts he performed in (Patterson, 2007), yet the there she was:

 Holly came from Miami, F-L-A

Hitch-hiked her way across the USA

Plucked her eyebrows along the way

Shaved her legs and then he was a she

She says, "Hey babe, take a walk on the wild side"

Said, "Hey honey, take a walk on the wild side" (Reed, 1972)

Each verse of the song describes a Warhol Superstar. The first is Holly, of course, then Candy, who is Candy Darling. ‘Joe’ references Joe Dallesandro, who was Woodlawn’s co-star in Trash  Similarly, the ‘sugar plum fairy’ mentioned was the name of a character played by Joe Campbel (who dated Harvey Milk, coincidentally), and ‘Jackie’ is Jackie Campbell (Hann, 2015). Each of these individuals were queer and/or trans.

The fact that all of the subjects of “Walk on the Wild Side” were Warhol Superstars may seem like an incredible coincidence. At least, until one learns that Warhol was the mastermind, so to speak, behind the song. Penny Arcade (another Warhol actor) said that, Women in Revolt, another of his movies starring Woodlawn, “inspired Warhol to inspire Reed in his turn to write “Walk on the Wild Side”.... Warhol suggested it to Lou Reed because of the movie we were all in, Women in Revolt” (Moyer, 2015). “Walk on the Wild Side” was initially released as a single, but became a part of Reed’s album Transformer (produced by David Bowie) ended up being the biggest hit of his career (Trebay, 2013), and in a way he had Woodlawn and her contemporaries to thank for that.

After Warhol and Reed

1972 is the moment where the quantity of information about Woodlawn’s life decreases precipitously. At best you might get a vague sentence about her moving to California and starting fashion school, but that’s about it. Depending on when the article was written it may close out with the information regarding her death. 

But, Holly was more than the men who featured her in their art. She lived an entire life outside of Warhol and Reed’s influence. She did indeed eventually move to California after Warhol’s death in 1987 (Patterson, 2007) but before that she “moved back home to live with her parents in Miami for several years before returning to New York and finding modest stage success as a club singer” (Villegas, 2021). She was determined to continue to carve out a life for herself in the way she found to be worth living, even if her time with Warhol had not granted her long-term fame.

After moving to Hollywood she continued to hustle just like she had on the east coast, refusing to give up. At this time she met Jeff Copeland, another struggling dreamer, who she became fast friends with. He ended up writing her biography with her, which was titled A Low Life in High Heels, and was published in 1991 (Villegas 2021). More recently Copeland has published Love you Madly, Holly Woodlawn: A Walk on the Wild Side with Andy Warhol’s Most Famous Superstar* which details his friendship with her in the 80s and 90s, including the time spent writing her memoir.

In 1989, at Copeland’s insistence, Woodlawn got a job at Wacko, “an eclectic collectible shop that sold battery-operated tin toys, Pee-wee Herman dolls, vintage Frankenstein models, thousands of fun postcards, and anything else that was kitschy, and retro-cool” (Copeland, 103). A fitting place to find an avant-garde superstar like Holly Woodlawn.

She also, during this time, decided to go to design school. In order to attend she had to get her GED (remember, she had dropped out of school at 15) and secure financial aid, but with those hurdles cleared, and the advance from her memoir, she was able to attend the Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandising (Copeland,182). She excelled at design, and  enjoyed her studies (Copeland, 224). She considered creating a fashion line for transgender women after graduation (Copeland, 2025, p. 250). This was a wonderful creative outlet, and a chance to build something for herself.

These projects, along with the writing of her memoir helped keep Woodlawn’s life stable, for a time. Her literary agent sold the manuscript for A Low Life in High Heels  to St. Martin’s Press for $40,000 US (Copeland, 2025, p. 174), which is almost $102,000 US today (CP Inflation Calculator). This success, combined with the whirlwind promotional tour in the leadup to the book’s publication certainly suggested that the pendulum of Woodlawn’s career was on the upswing.

The success of the memoir added to Woodlawn’s momentum. She was invited to party after exclusive party, and everyone in Hollywood knew who Holly Woodlawn was (Copeland, 2025, pp. 237-45). This was the life that Holly had wanted for herself ever since she first claimed to be an Andy Warhol Superstar, and she loved every minute of it.

However, the momentum began to slow as time passed. Both authors of A Low Life in High Heels wanted the book to be adapted as a movie, but they struggled to get the book in front of the people who could make that happen (Copeland, 2025, p. 250-251). Perhaps looking for more change, “Holy got bored with ringing up knick-knacks at Wacko. She had published a memoir now and was celebrated in the press. Working as a cashier just seemed so menial…. So [she] quit Wacko and got a job as a phone sex operator" (Copeland, 2025, p. 251). However, she “lasted a few weeks before she was fired for drinking on the job,” (Copeland, 2025, p. 215). If this were a novel instead of a woman’s life, it would be called foreshadowing. 

Despite a lack of interest, hope for a movie deal continued, just as life did. In 1992, the trade paperback version of A Low Life in High Heels was released, and a friend of Holly's co-wrote a live television show for her to star in (Copeland, 2025, p. 259). Woodlawn also returned to doing cabaret performances across the US (Copeland, 2025, p. 259) continuing to find the spotlight wherever she could. 

Suddenly, there was movement and “Madonna was in cahoots with a big producer and a world-famous writer to make a movie based on Holly Woodlawn’s autobiography…. The deal was being set up at Columbia Pictures through Dolly Parton’s production company…” (Copleand, 2025, pp. 261-262). This was just the sort of second wind that Woodlawn had been hoping for. 

At this moment I must acknowledge that the bulk of the information being referenced during this portion of Holly’s life comes from Love You Madly, Holly Woodlawn*, and while this book does contain a wealth of information about Holly’s life during the 1980s and early 90s, it is from Jeff Copeland’s point of view, because not only is he the author, but it’s about his experience working and being friends with Holly Woodlawn. 

At this point the two had a falling out over the screenplay rights. Jeff and Holly had agreed, at the outset of the writing of the  proposal for A Low Life in High Heels, that Copeland would be the one to write the screenplay (Copeland, 2025). However, now Woodlawn, and their agent, wanted Jeff to relinquish that claim to the ’famous writer’ chosen by Madonna and the ‘big producer’ so that the deal could go forward (Copeland, 2025). Holly Woodlawn was a person for whom fame was always the end goal, so it may have seemed like a reasonable sacrifice, in the service of her life long goals. 

Copeland did eventually relinquish the rights, and the deal with Columbia Pictures and Madonna went forward (Copeland, 2025, p. 266), reigniting the fire of fame surrounding Holly Woodlawn. “ [Madonna’s] name alone created a publicity firestorm for the book that went around the world” (Copeland, 2025, 271). Since she was once again famous, Holly decided not to pursue a job in fashion after she graduated with her degree. Her friends insisted that she was too famous to need a day job (Copeland, 2025, p. 272), and unfortunately, she listened.

Frustratingly, the movie deal fell through at the last second, “[t]here was a brouhaha amongst the producers that caused the entire deal to collapse” (Copeland, 2025, p. 273). This forced Woodlawn back onto the “cabaret circuit performing A Low Life in High Heels as a cabaret show in bars and clubs…” (Copeland, 2025, p. 275). She was back to what she had always done, hustling to get to where she wanted to be. 

Eventually the hustling by both Jeff and Holly paid off, and in 1995 the movie rights were optioned by Michael Zoumas. This time Copeland was in charge of writing the script, along with director Rose Troche, but Holly was largely left out of the creative process of writing the script, which infuriated her. Proving once again the fickleness of Hollywood, this iteration never made it to production either. This was a pattern that continued for more than a decade (Copeland, 2025, p. 276-278). Woodlawn never lost hope that A Low Life in High Heels would be made into a movie, and continued to work towards that dream for the rest of her life. 

Later Life

As Holly’s life continued on, her alcoholism worsened, and while she and Copeland were no longer close, he does give some insight into this part of her life. She lived, for a time “with a friend of hers in Beachwood Canyon… [in a house that was] so close to the Hollywood sign, it was almost in the backyard” (Copeland, 2025, p. 283). She had some stability, until, of course, the landlord sold the house and she was forced to move in with an acquaintance/romantic partner. After he was sent to jail for attacking Holly, she lived in that apartment for several years (Copeland, 2025, p.284). 

Woodlawn’s flame of fame never really rekindled, though she “ had occasional cameo roles in films like “Billy’s Hollywood Screen Kiss” in 1998 and, in 2014, the Amazon television series “Transparent” (Grimes, 2015). She was always ready for new opportunities and adventure, even if they were becoming fewer and farther between.

Woodlawn’s health began to decline when she tripped and fell, damaging several nerves, and losing some of her ability to walk. She got sober at her doctor’s orders, but her health continued to worsen (Copeland, 2025, p. 284). The effects of a lifetime of drinking and drugs had too much inertia to be stopped now. 

In a 2007 interview John Patterson describes Holly’s as “bent and frail, though indefatigably cheerful, using a Zimmer frame because of various slowly fusing discs in his spine that, he says, are unimaginably painful and incurable. ‘Oh no, this is IT, honey, downhill all the way from here on!’” (Patterson, 2007). (A note: Patterson uses he/him for Holly here, evidently because Holly was presenting masculinely that day.) Holly was still holding onto hope and her chutzpah despite her ailing health and lack of resources.

In 2015 Woodlawn was diagnosed with “terminal cancer that spread to her brain”  (Copeland, 2025, p. 285). She professed a desire to return home to pass in Puerto Rico, and while that did not occur, she was provided for in her last month by friends and fans, who all contributed to an online fundraiser. She passed away on December 6th, 2015 at the age of 69 (Darling, 2019). 

Holly was One of a Kind: Conclusion

Not only did Holly Woodlawn refuse to live a typical life, she refused to adhere to any gender expectations. She didn’t strive to be seen as a cis woman, and was open about her anatomy and fluidity with her presentation. 

She was willing to change her presentation to suit the needs of the environment she found herself in. While she was living with her parents she presented herself as a man. Copeland said that when he picked Holly up from the airport once he hadn’t recognized at first, she had a crew cut and stubbled, not to mention she was wearing Bermuda shorts, sneakers and a polo (Copeland, 2025, p. 80). However, she also presented femininely for the vast majority of her life, and she had an eclectic sense of style as well as great skill in the application of makeup (Copeland, 2025). She might have been called a chameleon, given how completely she could change her appearance, except for the fact that the end goal was never to blend in. 

Holly was very open about the gender affirming care that she had (or not ) received, though that was not what it was called in the 1960s and 70s. She had estrogen injections in the 1960s (Copeland, 2025, 93), but never had any sort of gender reassignment surgery (GRS). She didn’t feel the need to surgically alter her body, and she was more than willing to profess her love for her natal genitalia. “Holly loved having a cock. She told me so herself. The only reason she had ever considered a sex change in her youth was because the man she fell in love with wanted her to have it” (Copeland, 2025, p. 140). Woodlawn was an individual intimately comfortable with her body, and her identity, once she was able to carve a place for herself as an adult.

We could try to pin modern labels on Holly Woodlawn all we like, transgender/woman/vestite/sexual, genderfluid, agender, but the modern, rigid ways of thinking we seem to have boxed ourselves into would be a disservice to her. I think it is best if we just accept her identity for herself; “‘Darling what difference does it make if I’m a man or a woman? I’m Holly! Can’t those Motherfuckers understand that?’” (Woodlawn, via Copeland, 2025, 165). Holly Woodlawn’s story and identity are just as much a part of the time she lived in with the people who inspired her and she surrounded herself with, as it was her unwillingness to accept a role that didn’t suit her identity or her life. 

 Holly spent her life on a journey to fame that, for better or worse, she was unwilling to compromise on. That journey has become an inspiration to many trans folks, but “‘there was no role model for a Holly Woodlawn,’ said Penny Arcade, a fellow Warhol acolyte. ‘For Holly, whatever sacrifices she made in terms of acceptance of her family and society could never compete with the sense of freedom that Holly needed – the freedom to be herself’” (Moyer, 2015). She was truly a trailblazer, and even if it wasn’t the way she imagined, she definitely reached a superstar level of fame as a trans pioneer.

The original painting featured in this blog is available for purchase, and Holly Woodlawn, and her story, are featured in the first collection of my Ancestor Cards.

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NOTE! Some links (those with an * next to the name) are affiliate links. I will receive a small commission if you use these links to purchase something. It will not change the price of the product for you.

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References

(1 , 1). Holly Woodlawn , Lou Reed: Rock And Roll Heart [Video]. American Masters Digital Archive (WNET). https://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/archive/interview/holly-woodlawn/

Copeland, J. (2025). Love You Madly, Holly Woodlawn*. Feral House.

Darling, H.-H. (2019, December 16). Holly Woodlawn. Making Queer History. https://www.makingqueerhistory.com/articles/2019/12/16/holly-woodlawn

Dupêcher, N. (2019). Andy Warhol. The Museum of Modern Art; MoMA. https://www.moma.org/artists/6246-andy-warhol

Grimes, W. (2015, December 7). Holly Woodlawn, Transgender Star of 1970s Underground Films, Dies at 69. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/07/movies/holly-woodlawn-transgender-star-of-1970s-underground-films-dies-at-69.html

Hann, M. (2015, December 7). Lou Reed’s Walk on the Wild Side: what became of Candy, Little Joe and co? The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/music/shortcuts/2015/dec/07/holly-woodlawn-walk-on-the-wild-side-lou-reed-candy-little-joe

IMDb, & Sieger, R. (2015). Holly Woodlawn - Actress, Additional Crew. IMDb. https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0940341/bio/?ref_=nm_ov_bio_sm

Moyer, J. (2015, December 7). Holly Woodlawn: Actress and star of Andy Warhol’s Factory, immortalised in “Walk on the Wild Side” | The Independent. The Independent. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/holly-woodlawn-actress-and-star-of-andy-warhol-s-factory-immortalised-in-walk-on-the-wild-side-a6763936.html

Patterson, J. (2007, September 26). “Oh, the things I did!” The Guardian; The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2007/sep/26/art.theatre

Reed, L. (1972). Walk on the Wild Side [Song] On Transformer. RCA Victor.

Russell, G. R. (2025, February 5). “I’m a Woman, Darling”: The Life and Times of Warhol Superstar Holly Woodlawn. Interview Magazine. https://www.interviewmagazine.com/culture/the-life-and-times-of-warhol-superstar-holly-woodlawn

The Andy Warhol Museum. (2010). Andy Warhol’s Life. The Andy Warhol Museum; The Andy Warhol Museum. https://www.warhol.org/andy-warhols-life/

Trebay, G. (2013, November 1). The Real-Life Stories Told in “Walk on the Wild Side.” The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/03/fashion/The-Real-Life-Stories-Told-by-Lou-Reed-in-Walk-on-the-Wild-Side.html

Villegas, J. (2021, July 8). Remembering Holly Woodlawn, Trans Icon and Puerto Rican Queen of Underground Cinema - Latina. Latina. https://latina.com/remembering-holly-woodlawn-trans-icon-and-puerto-rican-queen-of-underground-cinema/

Her Story Lives on, and so Did She | Dora Richter (1881-1966): Not Just Cistory

A comment I often get on Instagram when I share about different aspects of Queer and Trans history is that ‘trans people are a new phenomina’. I could share many different figures from throughout history, like Elegabalus, or Public Universal Friend, both individuals who could be considered Transgender by today’s metrics who were born before 1800. 

However, I want to point out why some people genuinely believe this. (Ignoring the fact that many people simply lie to fit their own beliefs.) It’s because there have been multiple concerted efforts over the years to erase both queer and trans history. 

Regimes and groups who have decided that trans and queer individuals (however they were labeled and understood at the time) did not fit into their ideal societies and therefore should not exist, nor should the history of their existence. 

Dora Richter was almost one of those erased, by the Nazis in this case, however, she and her story survived. She was thought to have been murdered by the Nazis in the 1930s, but recently it was discovered that she had escaped and lived.

Early Life

While most of Dora’s history takes place in Berlin, it does not begin there. “Dora was born into a poor farming family in 1891 in the Erzgebirge region of Germany.” (Stroude, 2021) She was born ”[o]n April 16, [1891 or] 1892… Richter was born and baptized Catholic on April 17” (Lili-Elbe-Bibliothek, 2023). 

One exciting piece of ephemera that has been found recently is a record of Dora’s baptism! There are errata associated with this entry: “a note about the change of [Richter’s] first name was added, and the name was corrected in the baptismal entry! Additionally, the baptismal register contains a letter granting permission for the name change, including instructions to correct the name” (Lili-Elbe-Bibliothek, 2023). This official documentation suggests a level of support from the Catholic church and community more than 100 years ago is still being fought for by the trans community today.

Further evidence of the support Dora received from those around her is that her parents allowed her to dress and live as a girl (Riedel, 2022). Dora experienced what we would now call dysphoria. What little record we have of her early life suggests this, including the fact that she attempted to amputate her own penis at the age of six (Riedel, 2022).

Life in Berlin

Dora moved to Berlin and began the next phase of her life. Of course, she had to work, and she was a waiter, living in stealth (meaning that she lived and dressed as her gender assigned at birth while working as a waiter, but as a woman the rest of the time. (Smith 2024).

Pre WWII- Berlin was, “a hotbed of queer socializing, organizing, and theorizing during the early 20th Century…. They provided venues for serious discussion of politics and identity… the most striking example of the era’s permissiveness was the institution of ‘transvestite passes’” (Sanders, 2020). This was one of the many aspects of our Queer and Trans history that the Nazis tried to erase, as well as all of the writings that were produced before and during this time.

Dora would be one of the recipients of the passes when, after being arrested for wearing women’s clothing multiple times a sympathetic judge “released Richter into the care of Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld, who promised her employment at his Institut fur Sexualwissenchaft, or Insitute for Sexual Science — the first modern research institute for queer and transgender health, nestled in Berlin’s idyllic Tiergarten park” (Riedel, 2022).

Dora Richter was one of many women who worked for Dr. Hirschfeld (another of the domestic maids was painter Lili Elbi) (Bryan-Quamina). Those in charge of the institute understood that pass or no pass, it was hard for ‘transvestites’ to find work. So, they hired them as maids and secretaries (Stroude, 2021).

Richter received her first gender affirming surgery, an “orchiectomy, which she obtained via a surgeon named Dr. Erwin Gohrbandt in 1922” (Riedel, 2022). This was cutting-edge science at the time, and it allowed Dora’s body to utilize estrogen as it’s primary sex hormone, in turn, “her body became fuller, the growth of beard diminished, breast growth became noticeable and also the fat pad of the pelvis... took on more feminine forms”, effects similar to the results of modern HRT, achieved by taking a testosteron blocker, and a hormone such as estrogen or progesteron (Abraham via Riedel, 2022).

Finally, in the early 1930s, Dora Richter received what may have very well been the very first vaginoplasties due to the efforts of Dr. Levy-Lenz and Dr. Gohrbandt (Riedel, 2022). Richter and her compatriots were essentially putting their bodies and lives on the line for science and to be affirmed in their identity, a sacrifice that we, their trans descendants, are still indebted to them for.

The institure itself was quite famous internationally, “be[omcing] known as an institution providing counselling and treatment for ‘physical and psychological sexual disorders’ as well as, in particular, for ‘sexual transitions’, Hirschfeld’s term for homosexuals, transvestites and hermaphrodites. (The First Institute for Sexual Science) Transvestite was the terminology current at the time, and was coined by doctor Hirschfeld himself. (Stroude, 2021). 

Of course, this meant that it was a top priority for demolition by the Nazis. “On the 6th of May, 1933, the Deutsche Studentenschaft (German Student Union) and Nazi Sturmabteilung (Storm Troopers) raised the Institut, looting and destroying much of the contents. Thousands of books, journals, and other materials were burned in the street outside of the Institut” (Smith, 2024) This destruction in of itself was horrid, but it was made even worse by “Gohrbandt, with whom [Hirschfeld] had performed supportive operations, joined the Luftwaffe as chief medical adviser” (Schillace, 2021).

The destruction of the institute was not entirely successful in its goal to wipe out the memory of the Trans Mecca that was the Institute and its research, and despite their best efforts, we still know of them today.

She Lived

It was believed until recently that Dora Richter was murdered during this raid or soon after in a concentration camp. However, in 2023, a researcher named Clara Hartmann discovered the baptismal record we talked about before. The record was dated the 28th of January 1946, which was more than ten years after her supposed death (Smith 2024).

Hartmann followed the documents and discovered that “[b]y May of 1946, Dora Richter would reside in Nuremberg. She would live there for an additional 20 years, finally passing away on the 26th of April, 1966 in Allersberg, Germany. She was 74 years old” (Smith, 2024). We do not know much about her life after she fled the institute, but we do know that she escaped and lived.

Record Your Histories

We live in a world that relies so heavily on the written word; we only know about Dora Richter’s life because of documentation. I implore you to record your lives as trans and queer folks. Whether you write things down or record them, find a way to ensure that your story lives on for our own descendants. 

Our stories are precious and worth the telling, otherwise, those who fear and hate us wouldn’t work so hard to erase them  

The original painting featured in this blog is available for purchase, and Dora Richter, and her story, are featured in the first collection of my Ancestor Cards.

Bibliography

The First Institute for Sexual Science (1919-1933). Magnus Hirschfeld und das Institut für Sexualwissenschaft. (n.d.). https://magnus-hirschfeld.de/ausstellungen/institute/

In böhmischen Dörfern – Dora Richters Taufeintrag gefunden. Lili-Elbe-Bibliothek. 2023, April 25). https://lili-elbe.de/blog/2023/04/dora-richter-taufeintrag/

Bryan-Quamina, Gabrielle Magnus Hirschfeld and the Institute for Sexual Science. Science Museum Blog. (n.d.). https://blog.sciencemuseum.org.uk/magnus-hirschfeld-and-the-institute-for-sexual-science/

Riedel, S. (2022, March 15). Remembering Dora Richter, one of the first women to receive gender-affirming surgery. Them. https://www.them.us/story/dora-richter-first-trans-woman-to-receive-gender-affirming-surgery

Sanders, W. (2020, January 27). 9 lesser-known details of queer persecution during Nazi Germany. Them. https://www.them.us/story/queer-persecution-during-nazi-germany

Schillace, B. (2024, February 20). The forgotten history of the world’s first trans clinic. Scientific American. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-forgotten-history-of-the-worlds-first-trans-clinic/

Smith, G. (2024, June 25). Dora Richter lived. Philadelphia Gay News. https://epgn.com/2024/06/25/dora-richter-lived/ 

Stroude, W. (2022, September 26). The incredible story of the first known trans woman to undergo gender confirmation surgery. Attitude. https://web.archive.org/web/20230620111801/https://www.attitude.co.uk/culture/sexuality/the-incredible-story-of-the-first-known-trans-woman-to-undergo-gender-confirmation-surgery-304097/

The Great Race for Coverage | Bobbie Lea Bennet (1947- 2019): Not Just Cistory

There’s a saying ‘Those who don’t learn their history are doomed to repeat it’ credited to George Santayana, a Spanish Philosopher (Virginia Tech). There’s another saying as well… ‘wibbly wobbly, timey-wimey,” which is attributed to the Doctor. Both suggest that, in their own ways, time is a loop. For those of us who are familiar with Trans and Queer History (either through research or living it) and are currently experiencing current events in the United States this feels extra relevant. 

At the time of the writing of this blog post “25 states have enacted laws/ policies limiting youth access to GAC [Gender Affirming Care]” (Kates, 2024). There have also recently been court cases regarding transgender individuals’ ability to have their insurance covering their Gender Affirming Care, particularly surgeries. 

Just this year “[a] federal appellate court in Richmond became the first in the country to rule that state health-care plans must pay for gender-affirming surgeries” (Weiner, 2024). Just next door,”[i]In West Virginia, transgender Medicaid users challenged the state’s program, which since 2004 has by law banned “transsexual surgeries…. [and] In North Carolina, state employees challenged their coverage, which in 2018 excluded surgical treatment of gender dysphoria — the clinical diagnosis of a disconnect between a person’s gender and birth sex”  (Weiner ,2024). The fight for state and federal healthcare programs to cover gender-affirming care for transgender individuals is still very much ongoing.

And now we come to the subject of this installment of ‘Not Just Cistory’, Bobbie Lea Bennett. What Bennett is most known for, perhaps, is not only being the first person to have her gender-affirming care (commonly referred to as sex-reassignment surgery or SRS at the time) covered by her insurance but for forcing Medicare to keep to their word to do so.

Early Life

Bobbie Lea Bennett was born on March 31st 1947 with osteogenesis imperfecta (Phoenix, 2022). Hopkins Medicine explains that “Osteogenesis imperfecta (OI) is an inherited (genetic) bone disorder that is present at birth. It is also known as brittle bone disease” (Johns Hopkins, 2022). This condition meant that she was a lifelong wheelchair user and that she was familiar with society’s response to someone who was different and needed medical treatment to alleviate the suffering caused by this difference.

Insurance Bait and Switch

Not much is available online about Bobbie Lea’s life, until the late seventies. Bennett was receiving transition services “through the Gender Identity Clinic at Galveston, Texas… [and] she had been told that the cost of her surgeries would be covered by Medicare under Social Security’s disability benefits program.” (p. 245, Matte). 

However, after receiving this life-changing surgery, she was denied coverage by Medicare, allegedly with no reason given for this change in tone (Phoenix, 2022) It was reported, later that year, that the decision had been reversed  “after ‘irate taxpayers’ flooded the Medicare offices with the phone calls opposing state payment for sex reassignment surgery under any circumstance” (p. 246, Matte).
It’s not hard to imagine, even 46 years later, angry citizens x-ing (is that what we call tweeting now? I’ve never been clear on that) about how ‘this is why Obamacare is ruining this country!!’. It’s certainly not an extinct mindset, as the many, many different cases currently being made to obstruct access for trans youth to life-saving health care.

Fighting Back

Regardless of the reason for the decision, Bennet decided to fight back.  She “mounted a very public media campaign to claim what she saw as her rightful benefits. She drove from her home in San Diego, first to the White House and then to Medicare Director Thomas M. Tierney’s office at Medicare headquarters in Baltimore, which she refused to leave until he would meet with her” (p. 246, Matte).

As a transgender woman who was also disabled, she qualified for medicare, and its coverage of her medical procedures, regardless of whether being transgender was considered a disability or not. This was different from other contemporary cases, which had relied on the idea that being transexual (as it was referred to at the time) was a disability, and therefore, the medical procedures to help mitigate it, ought to be covered by Medicare (p. 245 Matte). This intersectional identity gave Bobbie Lea Bennett an advantage of sorts, in terms of her argument.

Between the publicity her case had received, her right to coverage due to her existing disability outside of her gender, and her determination to see things through, “three days after their meeting, she received a cheque in the mail for $4600” (p. 246, Matte )  which would be worth $22,191.47 in today’s money, according to US Inflation Calculator. According to Transition, when the Los Angeles Times picked up the story, “Medicaid denied that the purpose of the cheque was to cover her sex-reassignment surgery and claimed that they were simply correcting a bureaucratic error in payments owed” (p. 246, Matte ).

Support & Connection

As well as having the support of the Medicare board (no matter how reluctant it was), Bennett seems to have had a supportive family. Four years later, in 1981, Bobbie’s sister, gave birth to a child, acting as a surrogate for Bobbie and her husband (Seattle Daily Times). This was another instance of Bobbie being in the news, as the Seattle Daily Times published a small article on January 17th, 1981 about the event.

Bennett was the host of “‘Barbie’s Talk Show’ which aired in Austin Texas….[it] was a community television program to raise public awareness about handicapped accessibility issues” (Honaker forest Lawn, 2019). “Bobbie founded the St. Tammany Organization for the Handicapped” as well as her talk show (Honaker Forest Lawn, 2019). Her understanding of creating visibility around an issue, and the importance of connecting with an audience may have helped her harness the media power she needed to make her cross-country trek a success.

Conclusion

Bennett has also been an inspiration to others, looking to create a conection and visibility for disability rights. The  screenplay, titled ‘Emily Driver’s Great Race Through Space and Time’ “follows 12-year-old Emily as she sets off on a time-traveling trip across the country after being denied a request for a needed wheelchair. On her journey, she meets leaders who fought for equal rights for people with disabilities throughout history” (Pierce, 2020) The creators, Mozgala and Brenner directly credit Bobbie Lea Bennett as a source of inspiration for the piece (Pierce, 2020).

Sometimes it’s hard to feel like we, as a queer and trans community, are making any progress when it seems like the more things change, the more they stay the same. To combat this feeling of hopelessness that comes with cyclical oppression, it’s essential to look to our elders and learn from their experiences, as well as to work together with and learn from other marginalized communities. We may not be a part of them, but many members of the trans and queer communities have intersectionalities that fall encompass those experiences.

Bobbie Lea Bennet, and her story, are featured in the first collection of my Ancestor Cards.

Bibliography

Johns Hopkins University. (2022, July 19). Osteogenesis imperfecta. Johns Hopkins Medicine. https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/conditions-and-diseases/osteogenesis-imperfecta#:~:text=What%20is%20osteogenesis%20imperfecta%20in,formed%20normally%2C%20and%20other%20problems.

Kates, L. D. and J. (2024c, August 22). Policy tracker: Youth access to gender affirming care and state policy restrictions. KFF. https://www.kff.org/other/dashboard/gender-affirming-care-policy-tracker/

Matte, N. (2014, November). Historicizing liberal American transnormativities: Medicine, Media, activism, 1960-1990 (thesis). Historicizing Liberal American Transnormativities: Media, Medicine, Activism, 1960-1990. University of Toronto. Retrieved August 23, 2024, from https://hdl.handle.net/1807/68460.

Obituary for Bobbie Lea Peterson at Honaker Funeral Home. Obituary | Bobbie Lea Peterson of Madisionville, Louisiana | Honaker Funeral Home. (2019). https://www.honakerforestlawn.com/obituary/bobbie-peterson

Phoenix, B. (2024, May 7). LGBT+ History month X disabled students group - Bobbie Lea Bennett. THE HOOT. https://thehootstudents.com/lgbt-history-month-x-disabled-students-group-bobbie-lea-bennett/

Pierce, J. R. (2020, March 2). Disability takes the wheel in “Emily driver.” AMERICAN THEATRE. https://www.americantheatre.org/2020/03/02/disability-takes-the-wheel-in-emily-driver/

Sister of transsexual bears baby boy for her. (1981, January 17). Seattle Daily Times. Retrieved August 23, 2024, from https://www.digitaltransgenderarchive.net/files/j96020802.

Virginia Tech. (2019, January 8). History repeating. College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences | Virginia Tech. https://liberalarts.vt.edu/magazine/2017/history-repeating.html

Weiner, R. (2024, April 29). Court says state health-care plans can’t exclude gender-affirming surgery - The Washington Post. The Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2024/04/29/gender-affirming-surgery-state-health-care-plans/ 

Southern Starlet | Aleshia Brevard (1937-2017)| Not Just Cistory

When I discovered that the first ever Trans+ history week was happening from the 6th of May to the 12, I knew that I had write another blog post in my Not Just Cistory series to celebrate. I decided to research Aleishia Brevard since she was one of the first women I painted back in 2022.

There is a burgeoning list of transgender actresses playing transgender super heroes now, and it is ‘super’ inspiring to read about women like Nicole Maines, Ivory Aquino among others, and their new roles playing some absolutely fantastic characters (Rude, 2022). Representation of this caliber is still new to myself and to many others, and not something I at all take for granted.

However, there was another actress who, in the 1970s, starred in Legends of the Superheroes as Giganta, a nemesis of Wonder Woman’s who was transgender, and her name was Aleshia Brevard (IMDB).

Trans and queer representation is something that is becoming more and more common in our media. Representation in this sense means that there are characters in the media that are a part of the LGBT+ and are a part of the story. There is, of course, ‘good’ representation and ‘bad’ representation and those labels are just as subjective as anything else in this world.

Sometimes trans people themselves are considered representation, that their experiences, and lives can be a way for others to not feel so alone. This isn’t inherently a bad thing, finding community online, and in real life is a wonderful way for people to learn and grow and feel more comfortable in their own skin, but sometimes, the people who are being the representation can feel pigeon-holed into only being known as transgender.

Brevard herself discusses this in a 2013 interview with Windy City Times, saying:

I did not go through gender reassignment to be labeled transsexual. I look at that as an awkward phase that I went through—sort of like a really painful adolescence. I don't even think of myself now in terms as transsexual. That's something I experienced and [something] I was (Brevard, Waldron, 2017).

This is not an opinion, like any shared in this blog post, that is universal to the transgender community and is one that should be approached with context and nuance.

I am aware that me featuring a biographic blog post about Aleshia Brevard as part of a series called ‘Not Just Cistory; in celebration of Trans+ History Week is… ironic, to say the least. However, as always, I will try to share the story of her entire life, not just the details relating to her being transgender.

Early Life

Brevard was born in 1937 “ in Erwin, Tennessee, although she spent much of her childhood on a farm in Hartsville” (Nashville Queer History). She was aware of her desire to exist as female from an early age, saying “I would drape a white Cannon towel over my head and pretend to be [actress] Veronica Lake. But I kept all of that to myself because I truly believed that if anyone—my parents included—knew who I really was, that I would be given away” (Brevard, Waldron, 2017). She also prayed nightly to become the girl ‘she knew herself to be’ (Brevard, Kowalska, 2013).

Those around her seemed to sense her identity, and she was described as “an effeminate and artistic child. As a young child… strangers would frequently “mistake” her for a girl, or comment that she was “too pretty to be a boy.” As a colicky three-year-old, her grandfather had dressed her in a skirt with a red ribbon in her hair, christening her ‘Rosy’” (Shephard, 2017).

In 1952, while Brevard was in her teens, Christine Jorgensen’s story of her transition made national news (Shephard, 2017), and surely had to seem like a dream come true to Brevard, even if it probably seemed impossible to her.

A Life on the Stage

Brevard didn’t remain in Tennesse for much time beyond her adolescence, moving to San Fransisco at age 20, and began her work as an actress (Nashville Queer History). Her first job was as a female impersonator at the club Finnochio’s, where she was billed as a Marilyn Monroe look-alike (Brevard, Waldron, 2017).

This job was a space for the young Brevard to explore her identity as a woman. Despite her managers, and the owners of Finnochio’s promoting her as a Monroe impersonator, she insisted that she “was not doing Monroe; [she] was just learning to be [herself], and [she] was young… (Brevard, Waldron, 2017).

Aleshia was quite successful onstage as a Marilyn look-alike, so successful in fact, that in 1961 Monroe herself came to see her perform (Brevard, Waldron, 2005).

In an interview, Brevard, described this job as imperfect, stating that “the problem with Finocchio’s was that to me it did not feel like ‘impersonation'. At long last, I was presenting myself as the woman who had secretly lived sequestered away for far too many years” (Shephard). This is a theme I see in my research over and over again, spaces where traditional gender expression is not required, and it allows for freedom and personal understanding, a form of self-representation.

Transition

Brevard was introduced to Dr. Harry Benjamin, who was responsible for the gender-affirming surgery of Christine Jorgensen, through a mutual friend and Benjamin approved her for a sex-reassignment surgery, which she then underwent in 1962 (Nashville Public Library, 2019).

After her surgery,”[s]he returned to Hartsville to recover from surgery with help from her family, who were loving and accepting of her transition” (Nashville Queer History). She also took this time to transition into being a woman in all of her life beyond the stage, before venturing out into the world again (Brevard, Kowalska, 2013).

Becoming a Star

Having completed this medical component of her Transition that she had started socially years before, she decided to pursue acting as a career, once again. She initially “attended East Tennessee State University for art,” but eventually went on to “attend Middle Tennessee State University and earn a degree in theater, where she was named ‘Best Actress’ in 1967” (Nashville Queer History).

Brevard would continue to move back and forth between Appalachia, the eastern US, and California, working as a model, a stage actress, a star of the movie and television screens, even a Playboy Bunny, and in her later life, a professor (Shephard, 2017). Brevard was a woman of many talents and was able to utilize her acting skills in many mediums.

She performed in eight movies throughout this second career; The Love God, Big Foot, Hitched, The Female Bunch, Smokey and the Judge, The Man With Bogart’s Face, Hard Country, and “American Pop (Brevard, Kowalska, 2013). Brevard also acted in many television shows during her career, The Partridge Family, Night Gallery, and Legends of the Superheroes being some of them (IMDB).

When asked which of her roles were most satisfying for the actress, she mentions her theatrical roles, even noting that, in a full circle moment, she played Marilyn Monroe’s role in the stage version of The Seven Year Itch (Kowlska, 2013).

She evolved her career from acting to directing and teaching theater at East Tennessee State University, this was not an entirely planned transition, but one that came naturally to her after all of her time on stage (Brevard, Waldron, 2017). Directing was not a lesser profession for Brevard, she says that she “truly love[s] directing, perhaps more than [she] adore[d] being on stage…” (Brevard, Kowalska, 2013). This career evolution from actress to director and teacher mirrors her choice to step from being stealth to publishing two different memoirs about her transition and life as a transgender woman, which in a way, turned her into a mentor for generations of future transgender individuals.

Coming Out

Aleshia lived most of her life in stealth, meaning that she did not advertise that she was transgender. She explained that this was for multiple reasons, one being that there was no real transgender community in Hollywood at the time (Brevard, Waldron, 2017). Having a support network and community is such an important part of not just survival for Trans people, but also thriving and living within a society that is oftentimes hostile to us.

She also had concerns about her professional life that encouraged discretion and her choice to be ‘stealth’ she explained that she “just wanted to compete on equal footing with other women…. I just wanted to act without labels” (Brevard, Waldron, 2017). Choosing to not disclose her transgender identity (Though I am not sure she would have phrased it exactly like that) allowed her to be seen for her merits and skills at a time when she would not have otherwise been.

She described the common thinking for trans women of the time as “to move forward, as seamlessly as possible, easing into mainstream society to live as our authentic selves… to live among, work alongside, and compete on an equal footing with other women, including those who had been born female (Brevard, Kowalska, 2013). While it is far more common now for transgender individuals to be open about their ‘transness’ (for lack of a better term), this is a sentiment shared by many transgender individuals still today and is an intensely personal one to make regardless of the decision made.

After her career as a director, Brevard moved to California, began teaching as a high school art teacher (Can you imagine having a movie star as an art teacher?), and began to work on her first memoir (Brevard, Waldron, 2017). This first book was titled ‘Woman I Was Not Born To Be: A Transsexual Journey’* and focused on “the early years and ends with the death of [her] mother in 1982. It was [her] mother’s death, and the absence of her ongoing support, that forced [Brevard] to find [her] own footing in life. (Brevard, Kowalska, 2013)

Upon publication, Brevard was stepping away from living her life in stealth, into the early 2000s online transgender community. She described the experience, saying “because I had lived in stealth, I had no idea about transgender becoming the umbrella term. When I published the book, I was absolutely shocked that I was spread all over the internet” (Brevard, Waldron, 2017).

On the the sequel, ‘The Woman I WAS Born to Be’, Brevard explained that she “had no intention of writing a sequel. [She] soon realized, however, that life had indeed gone on; the second half of [her] life had allowed many of Mozelle’s dreams for my future to come true. That struck me as much more important than the angst and early trauma that had gotten [her] there” (Brevard, Kowalska, 2013).

In the end “[t]he sequel, ‘WAS Born To Be’ [was her] favorite book, in that it chronicles a much happier and more fulfilling aspect of [her] life (Brevard, Kowalska, 2013), which is a wonderful example of how it does get better, even if it isn’t exactly the way we expected it to be.

Conclusion

Brevard passed away on July first, 2017, at the age of 79, from pulmonary fibrosis (Whiting, 2017) leaving behind a long list of film, television, and theatre credits, as well as many students whom she guided, as a theater professor, director, and art teacher. Not to mention all of the trans individuals who were, are, and will be inspired by her memoirs, and her story.

She is a wonderful example that anyone can be a superhero and that we all deserve to see ourselves in the world, and the media we consume. A talented actress, and devoted mother and teacher, Aleshia was able to create a space for herself in the world where she was valued and respected for her talents, not seen for the anatomy she had at any given point in her life.

Transgender individuals are able more now to exist openly and still be regarded for their skills and actions, but it is still so common for society to see the label ‘trans’ and just stop perceiving us, substituting stereotypes and preconceived notions for our personalities and skills.

This is a big part of why I live openly as a transgender individual, and create these biographic blog posts. It’s important to me that I share our history, curate and create that representation so that everyone, from widely openly transgender to completely stealth can have a form of representation in their lives that they may not have had otherwise.

The original painting featured in this blog is available for purchase, and Aleshia Brevard, and her story, are featured in the first collection of my Ancestor Cards.

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Bibliography

Aleshia Brevard. Nashville Queer History. (2021, November 3). https://nashvillequeerhistory.org/glossary-main/aleshia-brevard/

Brevard, A., & Kowalska, M. (2013, January 25). Interview with Aleshia Brevard. The Heroines of My Life. other. Retrieved May 10, 2024,. Parts 1, 1 continued, and 5

Brevard, A., & Waldron, T.-L. (2017, April 5). Actress reflects on transitioning, Marilyn Monroe connection. Windy City Times. other. Retrieved May 10, 2024,.

IMDb.com. (n.d.). Aleshia Brevard | Actress, additional crew. IMDb. https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0108087/

Other hidden figures: Aleshia Brevard. Nashville Public Library. (2019, April 13). https://library.nashville.org/blog/2019/04/other-hidden-figures-aleshia-brevard

Rude, M. (2022, March 30). 6 trans & nonbinary characters in DC TV shows & movies. Out Magazine. https://www.out.com/television/2022/3/09/trans-and-nonbinary-characters-dc-comics-dceu-tv-shows-and-movies#rebelltitem1

Shepard, N. (2017, November 19). A Tennessee trans icon comes home: Remembering Aleshia Brevard. Spectrum South - The Voice of the Queer South. https://www.spectrumsouth.com/tennessee-trans-icon-comes-home-remembering-aleshia-brevard/

Whiting, S. (2017, July 24). Aleshia Brevard, SF drag star and transgender pioneer, dies at 79. SFGate. https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Aleshia-Brevard-SF-drag-star-and-transgender-11344975.php

Mother of Multiplayer | Danielle Bunten Berry (1949- 1998): Not Just Cistory

I am often momentarily convinced by the narrative continually being forced upon us by angry gamer bros, that gaming has always been an entirely male industry, only recently opening its gates to women, but, despite what the trolls and misogynists say in the comments section, that simply isn’t true. In 1964, the first narrative video game was written by a woman; Mabel Addis, a teacher who wanted her students to be more engaged in her lessons on ancient Sumeria (Wilaret, 2019).   

From there, women’s involvement in gaming only grew. It is estimated that, in 1989, a mere 3% of video game developers were women, and in 2013 it was 12% (Gracer, 2013). Flash-forward to the year 2021 and Statistica says that 30% of game developers are women (and 8% are nonbinary, gender fluid/genderqueer, two-spirited, or transgender) (Clement, 2023). Suffice it to say that women have always been a part of creating video games, even if at a minuscule percentage. 

In 1989 Danielle Bunten Berry’s game M.U.L.E had already been published for six years, she was three years away from coming out publicly as a woman and beginning her transition, and eighteen years away from (post-humously) being added to the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences Hall of Fame (Costikyan, 2023). 

Berry is far from being the only transgender woman to help shape video games into what they are. She is in the company of other talented individuals such as Veda Hlubinka-Cook, Cathryn Mataga, Rebecca Heineman, and Jamie Fenton (Johnson, 2021), but she is the subject of our focus for this entry into the Not Just Cistory series

Early Life

Danielle Bunten Berry was born “February 19, 1949, in St. Louis, Missouri… [the first] of six children” (Costikyan, 2023). Danielle and her family moved to “Little Rock [Arkansas] in 1965, and Bunten lived in and around Little Rock until the last years of her life, when she moved to Palo Alto, California” (Costikyan, 2023).

Even during her childhood, games were an important part of Danielle’s life. In an interview, she states “When I was a kid the only times my family spent together that weren't totally dysfunctional were when we were playing games” (Hague, 1997). She goes on to explain how this influenced her philosophy when creating games, saying “Consequently I believe games are a wonderful way to socialize” (Hague, 1997). This philosophy is evident in across her career and has left an indelible mark on gaming as a whole.

As a teen and young adult “Bunten worked at a drugstore and as an assistant scoutmaster for a Boy Scout troop to provide extra money [to support her family]. Bunten graduated from Catholic High School for Boys” in Little Rock (Costikyan, 2023). 

A potent combination of intelligent and enterprising, “In 1971, Bunten opened a bicycle shop, the Highroller Cyclerie, near the University of Arkansas… and received a degree in industrial engineering from UA in 1974. Bunten’s first job involved doing mathematical modeling of urban systems for the National Science Foundation” (Costikyan, 2023).

Entering the Game Designing World

Right from the start of her game developer career, Bunten was an innovator, her “first game, 1978’s ‘Wheeler Dealers,’ [sic] was the first personal computer game that was packaged in a printed box, and one of the first — if not the first — computer games that allowed for more than two players” (Koon, 2012). 

Her innovative spirit and philosophy of communal gaming were evident, as “the game shipped with four custom-built controllers made from red wooden macrame beads with a single button glued into one end, which players used to make stock-market-like trades while competing against one another” (Koon, 2012).

She continued on her entrepreneurial path, when “in 1979, Bunten partnered with her brother and a few friends to found the game company Ozark Software [sic]. The group ran the organization from Bunton’s [sic] basement…” (AtariWomen).

A Cult Classic and Rockstar Status

The company began to take off when “[i]n 1982, Bunten was selected by Electronic Arts (EA), a recently founded company, as one of a handful of ‘electronic artists’ it published, and Ozark developed five games for EA over the next few years” (Costikyan, 2023).

One of the games that Bunten Berry was tasked to write for EA was M.U.L.E, which would become the cult classic she is most known for (Hague, 1997). Released in:

[1983, it is], a turn-based strategy game that could accommodate up to four players at the same console. An exercise in supply and demand economics, the game forces the players, who represent settlers on the planet of Irata, to compete over food, energy, and mineral resources (Costikyan, 2023).

M.U.L.E is sometimes considered to be a monetary failure, but in a 1997 interview Bunten Berry disagreed, saying:

given some caveats, it didn't do all that badly. It sold 30,000 copies, and for a game whose home platform–the Atari 800–went out of production just months after its release, that ain't bad. Also, although we ported it to the C64 it had a very poor solo capability but still sold good numbers there too (Hague, 1997)

Proving that she and her design company were not just one-hit-wonders, Ozark Softscape’s next game Seven Cities of Gold did even better, selling five times as many copies (Koon, 2012). Ozark Softscape and Danielle Bunten Berry had made their mark on the gaming industry, even if it wasn’t initially evident. 

EA, however, seemed to sense this (or maybe they just wanted to broaden their market, by making gaming look cool), treating Danielle Bunten Berry and her colleagues almost like rockstars:

a famous publicity shot of the Ozark Softscape team created for EA shows programmers Bill Bunten, Jim Rushing, Alan Watson and Dan[i] Bunten lounging picturesquely on a bench with a dog while a hot blonde sips a drink nearby, the four looking decidedly more like Lynyrd Skynyrd than a bunch of game geeks (Koon 2012).

Leaving EA

However, this honeymoon phase/world tour couldn’t continue forever. After creating several games for the company “Ozark and EA fell out over a new version of M.U.L.E. and EA’s insistence that it include combat, which Bunten felt was a betrayal of the game’s intent and aesthetic” (Costikyan, 2023).

Ozark Softscape did go on to create two more game titles, now working with Micropose, but they never did recreate the monetary success of their earlier titles, particularly Seven Cities of Gold (Koon, 2012). Melanie Bunten Stark, Danielle’s eldest, says that money was never the goal for her, she was in it for the love of the game (Koon, 2012). (Okay that was a dumb joke, but I just watched the first episode of Fallout, bear with me.)

Becoming Ms. Danielle Berry

In 1992, after the end of her third marriage, Danielle announced to people in both her personal and professional life, that she was a woman, and was beginning her transition (Costikyan, 2023). Danielle described Transition as “the name given to the time when your old pronoun doesn't fit anymore but neither does the new one” (Hague, 1997). In November of that year, she underwent gender-affirming surgery, which was, at the time called sex-reassignment surgery (Costikyan, 2023).

Another thing that was changed by her transition, was Bunten Berry’s involvement in the video game industry. In 1997 she described her new life and new priorities:

I'm a little more than three years into my new life role as Ms. Danielle Berry, and her career looks to be somewhat different from old Mr. Dan Bunten's. For one thing I'm not as good a programmer as he was. I'm also not as willing to sit for hours in front of a computer to make something that other people can use to socialize. I tend to need to socialize far more often than he did. Thus, I do design and consulting rather than programming and development. However, with my background I seem uniquely suited to this business so I think I'll stay around in one form or another for as long as they'll have me (Hague).

End of Life

Around the time of the publication of what would end up being her final game, Warsport, for MPath, an online gaming publisher, Bunten Berry was diagnosed with lung cancer, which would eventually kill her (Koon, 2012). 

In May of the following year, she was honored with an award for lifetime achievement from the Computer Game Developers Association. Two months later Danielle Bunten Berry passed away at the age of 49 on July 3, 1998(Koon, 2012). 

This award, given mere weeks before her death was not the last she would receive; indeed in 2007, she was added to the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences Hall of Fame (Costikyan, 2023).

Conclusion

However, her impact, in my opinion, is more deeply felt in the world of gaming today, than in any (well-deserved) award she received before or after her death. She has inspired developers like Will Wright, original designer of the Sims franchise, as well as Sid Meier, designer of the Civilization games (Costikyan, 2023), as well as multiplayer games at large.

She really was the mother of multiplayer. Not that someone else couldn’t have come up with what she did, but she did. It was her boundless creativity and ingenuity that started the evolution of what would become a core part of video games today.

Her belief that video games could be just as social as the board games she treasured with her family changed the trajectory of the industry in ways any other developer might not have, had they pioneered the radical idea of multiplayer instead.

Trans women and cis women have always been a part of gaming, even if their identities have been unknown to the public, and it is foolish to assume otherwise. Games have always been for whoever wants to play, and their creation is the same.

The original painting featured in this blog available for purchase, and Danielle Bunten Berry, and her story, are featured in the first collection of my Ancestor Cards.

Bibliography

Atari. (2019, March 6). Danielle Bunten Berry. atariwomen. https://www.atariwomen.org/stories/danielle-bunten-berry/ 

Clement, J. (2023, December 12). Global Game Developer Gender 2021. Statista. https://www.statista.com/statistics/453634/game-developer-gender-distribution-worldwide/ 

Costikyan, G. (2023, September 7). Danielle Bunten Berry (1949–1998). Encyclopedia of Arkansas. https://encyclopediaofarkansas.net/entries/danielle-bunten-berry-4524/ 

Graser, M. (2013, October 1). Videogame biz: Women still very much in the minority. Variety. https://variety.com/2013/digital/features/womengamers1200683299-1200683299/ 

Hague, J. (n.d.). Danielle Berry. In Halcyon Days: Interviews with Classic Computer and Video Game Programmers. interview, Dadgum Games. Retrieved from https://dadgum.com/halcyon/BOOK/BERRY.HTM. 

Johnson, S. (2021, May 30). Seven trailblazing LGBT+ pioneers who helped to shape video gaming as we know it. PinkNews. https://www.thepinknews.com/2021/05/30/lgbt-video-game-pioneers-david-gaider-danielle-bunten-berry-gaming/ 

Koon, D. (2019, April 26). Dani Bunten changed video games forever. Arkansas Times. https://arktimes.com/news/cover-stories/2012/02/08/dani-bunten-changed-video-games-forever?oid=2059426 

Willaert, “Critical Kate.” (2022, November 25). The Sumerian game: The most important video game you’ve never heard of. A Critical Hit! https://www.acriticalhit.com/sumerian-game-most-important-video-game-youve-never-heard/

The Vedette | Vanessa Show: Not Just Cistory

It’s become a tradition of mine over the past few years to paint portraits of transgender women from throughout history for Women’s History Month, which has evolved into my Not just Cistory series, where I share my paintings and do more research into the lives of my subjects, and then write it all up to share with all of you here. This entry is about a 20th century star whose career spanned the stage, the screen, and the world; Vanessa Show.

Early Life and Adolescence

Vanessa Show was born in La Banda, Santiago del Estero, on September 27, 1950 (2023, Montagna) to an Arabic family of ranchers and butchers. In an interview with Pagina 12’s Juan Tauil, Show explained that her grandfather was from Alexandria and her grandmother was Moroccan (2009).

Her parents separated when she was a teen, she was disinherited, and she moved to Buenos Aires (Tauil, 2009). She did not have a good relationship with her parents, particularly her father, and was not sad to leave them behind (infobae, 2017).

Show was always open about her sexuality, even as a child, effecting a sort of ‘deal with it’ attitude describing it in the Pagina 12 interview in this way, and also emphasizing that she demanded respect from her family, regardless of their opinions (Tauil, 2009).

A Career in the Spotlight

She started working at age fifteen as a dishwasher and a cook, before finally appearing onstage as a dancer at age seventeen, at the Teatro Maipo (Tauil, 2009).

She was given the name ‘Vanessa’ by Eber Lobato, and the last name ‘Show’ by a journalist who commented on her giving quite a show during her performance. She continued working for Lobato for a number of years (Tauil, 2009).

Vanessa Show was a vedette; similar to a burlesque dancer. She performed with many other dancers and performers who were very well-known at the time, and she became famous in her own right (Montagna, 2023). Before donning the name ‘Vanessa Show’ she was called ‘Señor Vedette’ by the press (Torchia, 2018).

Show was also a part of ‘La Revista del tercer sexo’ the first company made up entirely of transvestites (Tauil, 2009). (A note: translation here is imperfect (at least, more than usual) as the Spanish word ‘travestis’ can mean both ‘transvestites’ (an outdated term on its own), or drag queens, so I am unclear as to which is meant here, but I don’t think the lack specificity is necessarily a bad thing.)

Her life in Europe

Show spent a lot of time in Europe; both for her successful international tour, performing in France, Spain, Germany, Switzerland, and Italy, and, later, as an exile from Argentina (Montagna, 2023). While in Europe she was confronted with the hierarchy and competition of the European drag community and decided that she was going to stand up for herself as an artist and as a person (Torchia, 2018).

After her European tour, she came home to Argentina and resumed work at the club Hidrogen, experienced run-ins with the police, and received continual harassment from the government, she was even called a ‘sexual terrorist’ (Tauil, 2009).

She decided to return to Europe due to the militaristic governments that were in power in Argentina, and the growing threats she received, choosing to travel and work abroad (infobae, 2017).

She returned to Argentina in the 1990s and performed in films and was featured on television (Montanga, 2023). She also wrote her autobiography, titled ‘es Verdad’, or ‘The Truth’ in 2012 (Torchia, 2018).

Life as an Icon

In recent years Show had become a sort of beloved mother figure for the drag and trans communities of Argentina, discussing her role in/relationship with the queer community in a 2018 Pagina 12 interview with Franco Torchia.

She said that young drag queens and trans individuals would flock to her and that she was thrilled with the burgeoning community of drag queens, and the sense of comradery that was not present in the communities she was a part of in her youth (Torchia, 2018).

Show passed away in September of 2023 at the Providencia Sanatorium in Buenos Aires at the age of 72 (Montagna).

Conclusion

Vanessa Show was a confident woman who was determined to chase her dream and be successful in the way that she deemed correct for her own life. Being transgender often comes with a set of challenges that can seem insurmountable. It is refreshing and heartening to learn about the story of a trans woman who was able to make her own way.

Granted, everyone has their own experiences and challenges that are unique to them, she admits in the Pagina 12 article with Jaun Tauil that both her lighter skin tone and beauty allowed her to travel more freely through Europe and around the world than she might have been otherwise (2009).

Privileges and challenges considered (but not set aside), Show is an example of a woman who took no shit and expected the world to respect her for who she was. She was a trailblazer and is a reason why the drag community in Argentina is the way it is. She created an example of how a trans woman could live as herself and create space for that life, as well as the lives of others.

Vanessa Show, and her story, are featured in the first collection of my Ancestor Cards.

Bibliography

Note: All sources are in Spanish and have been translated to English for this blog post by me.

Infobae. (2017, November 13). Vannesa show: “Un día quise matar a mi padre.” infobae. https://www.infobae.com/2012/04/29/644878-vannesa-show-un-dia-quise-matar-mi-padre/

LA NACION. (2023, September 18). Murió Vanessa show, La Primera Vedette trans de la argentina. LA NACION. https://www.lanacion.com.ar/espectaculos/personajes/murio-vanessa-show-la-primera-vedette-trans-de-la-argentina-tenia-72-anos-nid15092023/

Tauil, R., & Show, V. (2009, April 17). Señora Show. Pagina 12. other. Retrieved March 7, 2024,. https://www.pagina12.com.ar/diario/suplementos/soy/1-701-2009-04-17.html

Torchia, F., & Show, V. (2018, February 2). Mostra Show. Pagina 12. other. Retrieved March 7, 2024,. https://www.pagina12.com.ar/92795-mostra-show

Success and Souffle | Lucy Hicks Anderson (1886- 1954): Not Just Cistory

Our first entry for the Not Just Cistory series is an entrepreneur and a businesswoman, who became famous across the United States during the first half of the twentieth century, for her business skills, her ability to host a party, and her fashion sense.

Early Life

Lucy Hicks Anderson né Lawson was born in “Waddy, Kentucky in 1886” (Keehnen & Salvo) and was adamant that she was a girl from birth, insisting that she wore dresses to school. Her doctor advised her mother to let her live as a girl, as it was obvious that she was in fact, a girl. Lucy received the support of her family and was able to live nearly her entire life as her true self. (Coren & Snorton, 2022)

Based on the 1900 census, Lucy spent her early years working for the Waddy family before moving away from home at age 15 (Keehnen & Salvo). During her travels, she met the man who would become her first husband; “Clarence Hicks, in New Mexico” (Coren & Snorton, 2022).

Entrepreneurial Success

She settled in the small town of Oxnard California in Ventura County, the home of a “major sugar factory that attracted blue-collar workers from the surrounding areas in Mexico” (Coren & Snorton, 2022).

Noticing a gap in the market, Lucy started “the only house of prostitution in Oxnard” (Hicks, Lucy L. [Tobias Lawson]).

During this time she was also “a renowned chef and hostess for wealthy families throughout her community” (Walker, 2018). She was a fantastic cook and was able to use this to traverse racial and gender lines in the community (Coren & Snorton, 2022).

A 1945 article after Lucy Hicks Anderson was outed notes her skills as a chef: “By the time she opened her first house of prostitution, off Oxnard's crib-bordered China Alley, her genius in the kitchen was the talk of the town” (CALIFORNIA: Sin & Souffl [sic] 1945). Even in ‘disgrace’ the society of the time was singing the praises of her cooking, a skill associated with women.

The Heart of a Community

She also remarried in 1944, to “a soldier named Ruben Anderson” (Coren & Snorton, 2022). During this period of the late thirties and early forties, Hicks Anderson’s business flourished and her scope of services spread. As time passed, she became more and more a part of the community, and:

tended children, helped dress many an Oxnard daughter for parties. The town thought little of seeing fat and prosperous Oxnard dames driving to Lucy's house to borrow one of her legendary recipes. When a new Catholic priest came to town, Lucy prepared the barbecue with which the parish welcomed him” (CALIFORNIA: Sin & Souffl [sic] 1945).

She was a beloved member of the community, and quite famous for her hosting skills and her fashion, being written about both in multiple magazines, one being Time magazine (Coren & Snorton, 2022). Her community also knew her from her generous “donations to charities such as the Red Cross and Boy Scouts” (Walker, 2018).

She was also a great supporter of the soldiers of the Second World War and their families. She bought war bonds, threw going away parties for soldiers, and consoled the parents of the ones who did not return home (Walker, 2018).

Betrayal by Her Community

Months after her second marriage, “in August 1945, an outbreak of venereal disease was said to have come from Hicks' establishment; Lucy and all of her employees had to be examined by a doctor” which led to her being outed as a ‘man’ (Hicks, Lucy L. [Tobias Lawson]).

Lucy was charged with perjury; the rationale being that she signed her marriage certificate that stated she was a woman, which was, in the court’s eyes, untrue (Notable Kentucky African Americans Database).

The prosecution provided “five doctors to testify to her legal gender, to the gender that she was assigned at birth”. Meanwhile, “Lucy's lawyers argued that she had hidden [female] organs”, within her body, and was truly a woman. “Ultimately, the jury returned a verdict of guilty… Her sentence, a small fine and 10 years probation” (Coren & Snorton, 2022).

As news spread about the discovery of the genitalia present at Lucy’s birth, both she and her husband were brought up on federal charges:

Ruben Anderson was facing a maximum of 10 years in a federal prison, and a top fine of 10,000, because he had the government send his wife $950 in allotment checks… The US Army argued that she was not legally married to her husband, since same sex marriage was illegal. And the US government didn't recognize that Lucy, being a trans woman, was a woman. (Coren & Snorton, 2022)

These charges were truly what pushed Lucy Hicks Anderson out of the life she had built for herself.

The federal courts they were "both found guilty. The court invalidated their marriage, and Ruben was sentenced to 18 months in prison. Lucy was sentenced to a year in prison at Leavenworth Penitentiary, a men's facility” (Coren & Snorton, 2022).

After finishing her sentence, Lucy Hicks Anderson left her business and her community, as “Oxnard also banned the couple for 10 years, so they took up residency in Los Angeles as husband and wife, where Lucy lived until her death in 1954” (Walker, 2018).

Conclusion

This story of success, and then the betrayal of the community that loved her, is a testament to the fact that not only transwomen have always existed, but that they can be successful, even if the community that benefits from them does not always support them entirely.

The arguments by both her lawyers, and that of the opposition show just how imbedded the idea of genitalia and physical form equalling gender is in American Society.

A woman can perform all of femininity perfectly, be an amazing cook and hostess, have flawless fashion, and be featured in Time magazine for it, not to mention being a generous benefactor to a community that loved her in response, and still be disqualified from the title of ‘woman’ for the fact that she does not have the appropriate formulation of reproductive organs.

However, Lucy Hicks Anderson’s refusal to hide away and present herself as who society wanted her to be also reminds me of the resistance that can be found in joy and being oneself. Lucy did not hide away, she simply moved to another place where she could live happily, and sometimes that's all we can do; move on, and be happy when and where we can.

This piece of art is available on my store and is a 6 x 9 inch gouache portrait. A portion of the proceeds of this piece will be donated to charity.

Bibliography

CALIFORNIA: sin & souffl [sic]. (1945, November 5). Time Magazine, XLVI(19). Retrieved January 11, 2024, from https://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,852379,00.html.

Coren, A., & Snorton, C. R. (2022, November 30). Lucy Hicks Anderson. Sidedoor. , Smithsonian. Retrieved January 11, 2024,.

Hicks, Lucy L. [Tobias Lawson]. Omeka RSS. (n.d.). https://nkaa.uky.edu/nkaa/items/show/1363

Keehnen, O. (n.d.). Lucy Hicks Anderson. Legacy Project Chicago. https://legacyprojectchicago.org/person/lucy-hicks-anderson

Walker, M. (2018, February 21). Highlight: Lucy Hicks Anderson, a Black Trans Pioneer. ACLU of Mississippi. https://www.aclu-ms.org/en/news/highlight-lucy-hicks-anderson-black-trans-pioneer