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The other Harry Benjamin

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In today's Gender Trender Gallus Mag claims that the endocrinologist Harry Benjamin published a book in 1929 called Better Sight Without Glasses.  


The book is online at www.scribd.com/doc/117918118/Better-Sight-Without-Glasses-Harry-Benjamin and here is the title page: 


Note ;
a)  This is Harry Benjamin N.D.  (not M.D.),  i.e. he is a naturist
b) It is a British book
c) Other works by the same author are:  Everybody's Guide to Nature Cure, Your Diet in Health and Disease, Commonsense Vegetarianism, How to become 100% Healthy.

Later in life this Harry Benjamin wrote Basic self-knowledge : an introduction to esoteric psychology. Based on the Gurdjieff system of esoteric development, with some references to the writings of Krishnamurti and Everyone's guide to theosophy : a simple explanation of the theosophical teachings for the new student.

Definitely a different Harry Benjamin.

There are two web sites that put out the disinformation that Harry Benjamin, the endrocrinologist wrote Better Sight Without Glasses.  One is No.Wikipedia(Harry Benjamin) - the other 10 Wikipedia Harry Benjamin sites do not make this mistake.  The other is Andrea James' Harry Benjamin page (which is probably where Gallus Mag got it from)


20 trans persons in Germany/Austria/Switzerland who changed things by example and/or achievement.

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See also US, Canada, UK, France, Italy, Australia/NZ, Americans in Europe, Europeans in the Americas, Africa.
  1. Emil Vacano (1840 – 1892) circus equestrian as Signora Sangumeta, and later a novelist. GVWWDE.WIKIPEDIA
  2. Daniel Paul Schreber (1842 – 1911) Senatspräsident of the Superior Court in Dresden, became convinced that he was being transformed into a woman, and that he was to be the wife of God. Analysed by Sigmund Freud. GVWWEN.WIKIPEDIA
  3. Herman von Teschenberg (1866 – 1911) barrister, translator. Photos in DieTransvestiten. GVWWEN.WIKIPEDIA

  4. Karl Baer (1885 – 1956) social worker, feminist, first ftm surgical change, accountant. EN.WIKIPEDIA
  5. Dörchen Richter (1891 - 1933) maid at Hirschfeld's Institute, world's first surgical mtf change. GVWW
  6. Dora Ratjen (1918 – 2008) high-jumper in the 1936 Olympics. GVWWEN.WIKIPEDIA      
  7. Jeanette Schmid (1924 – 2005) performed as Baroness Lips von Lipstrill, whistler. GVWW

  8. Charlotte von Mahlsdorf (1928 – 2002) curator of the Gründerzeit Museum, biography filmed by Rosa von Praunheim. GVWWEN.WIKIPEDIA.

  9. Jean Lessenich ( 1942 - ) artist. GVWWDE.WIKIPEDIA

  10. Romy Haag (1951 - ) Dutch performer, nightclub owner in Berlin. GVWWEN.WIKIPEDIA.

  11. Anna-Varney Cantodea ( 1952 - ) Darkwave musician. GVWW  EN.WIKIPEDIA  

  12. Christian Schenk (1952 - ) physicist, politician. GVWW   DE.WIKIPEDIA 

  13. Lilo Wanders (1955 - ) television personality. GVWW     DE.WIKIPEDIA  

  14. Michaela Lindner (1958 - ) politician, theatrical agent. GVWW   DE.WIKIPEDIA  

  15. Andreas Krieger (1966 - ) shotput champion, anti-doping activist. GVWWDE.WIKIPEDIA  

  16. Nadia Brönimann (1969 - ) steward, performer, 2 autobiographies. GVWW  

  17. Gloria Gray (1970 - ) performer. GVWWDE.WIKIPEDIA  

  18. Monika Strub (1975 - ) nurse, photographer, political candidate. GVWW

  19. Balian Buschbaum (1980 - ) pole vaulter. DE.WIKIPEDIA  

  20. Kim Petras (1992 - ) musician. EN.WIKIPEDIA

George Miller (1850 – 1928) tightrope performer, railroad worker

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George Miller was best known a tight rope performer from the age of 18. From 1871 he was with the newly formed P. T. Barnum's Grand Traveling Museum, Menagerie, Caravan & Hippodrome.

In later years he also worked as a railroad night-watchman, farmhand and section hand on the Chicago Great Western Railway.
 
It did come out that he was female-bodied, and he was once quoted: "Men have an easier time than women, and get all the breaks".

He continued as a man for sixty years until his death at age 78.
  • F. Michael Moore. Drag!: Male and Female Impersonators on Stage, Screen, and Television : an Illustrated World History. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland, 1994: 123.

Vern Leroy Bullough (1928 – 2006). Historian and sexologist.

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Original February 2008. Revised September 2013. 

Vern Bullough was born and raised in Salt Lake City.  He and his high-school sweetheart, Bonnie Uckerman (1927 - 1996), left the Mormon Church as teenagers in protest against its then exclusion of black people.  Bonnie's mother left her family to live with a woman, Berry Berryman.  Vern found this fascinating and asked many questions and met their gay and lesbian friends.  Vern and Bonnie married in 1947, and had two children. 

After being in the US Army, Vern did a BA in history at the University of Utah and an MA and PhD in 1954 at Chicago University, using GI Bill Benefits. He specialized in the Middle Ages and did a dissertation on medical education.  He was hired the same year to teach at Youngstown University in Ohio. 

In 1959 he became a professor of history at San Fernando Valley State College  (which later became California State University at Northridge), and Bonnie, already a nurse, completed a PhD in Sociology.  Shortly afterwards Vern became associated with Virginia Prince.   He also became involved with the homophile organization, ONE, Inc and became head of the San Fernando Valley chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). 


Vern and Bonnie became friends with Prince and visited Virginia and Doreen at home.  They attended the second meeting of the Hose and Heel Club in 1960.  Having published several articles and books on the early history of medicine and nursing, Vern felt that he could look at sex, and published The History of Prostitution in 1964.  Working with ONE, Inc, where he came to know Harry Hay, Jim Kepner and Don Slater, Vern was successful in getting the San Fernando Valley chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) to adopt a policy of protection of homosexuals, transvestites and transsexuals.  He was chairman when the local ACLU was very involved in the struggle to desegregate Los Angeles City schools.  

In 1965 ONE, Inc split into two competing factions, and Vern Bullough was one of only two people who were able to maintain working relationships with both sides.  In 1966 the national ACLU adopted a national policy re homosexuals, transvestites and transsexuals based on Bullough's draft.  He rode in an early gay parade in Hollywood in 1966 that Slater organized to demand that gays be drafted to serve in the Vietnam War. Bullough opposed the war but supported gays' rights to serve in the military.  That same year Vern was able to visit West Asia on a Fulbright scholarship.   However the trip was marred when his son David was killed in a hit-and-run accident in Jerusalem.  The Bulloughs subsequently adopted three children of different races, two of whom are gay.
Vern allied himself with gay causes, and was a founder of gay caucuses in the American Historical Association and the American Sociological Association. He was a charter member of the original Parents, Families, and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG), which was founded in Los Angeles.  He established the Vern and Bonnie Bullough Collection on Sex and Gender, housed at the campus' Oviatt Library.  He “halfway encouraged” John Brown to do transsexual surgery, as he admits with chagrin.

In 1974 Vern and Bonnie organized a conference in Los Angeles under the auspices of the Institute for the Study of Human Resources (ISHR, associated with ONE and sponsored by Reed Erickson) which brought together Virginia Prince, Christine Jorgensen, Zelda Suplee, Laud Humphries, Christopher Isherwood and Evelyn Hooker.  The same year he and Bonnie published, The Subordinate Sex, 1974. This was his first book sponsored by the millionaire trans man Reed Erickson, and the one in which he made the claim that Islam is a sex-positive religion.

In 1976 Vern Bullough, Dorr Legg and other members of ONE, Inc finally published their An Annotated Bibliography of Homosexuality: In Two Volumes, which also contained the largest bibliography of transvestite and transsexual material available at that time.  His Sexual Variance  of the same year was again sponsored by Reed Erickson.  It contains many examples of gay and transgendered behavior showing that it is differs across time and between cultures.

Bonnie progressed from sociology instructor to professor of nursing, chair of primary care and coordinator of the graduate nursing program.

In 1979 Virginia Prince gave a talk at Northridge and Vern introduced her to his colleague, Richard Docter.  Vern published his Homosexuality, a History, the final book sponsored by Reed Erickson.  Chapter 10 is called “Cross-Dressing: Transvestism, Transsexualism, and Homosexuality” in which only one real transvestite is named: his friend, the avowed non-homosexual, Virginia Prince. He also mentions the Chevalier d’Eon, Lili Elbe and Christine Jorgensen who were not homosexual either. But only these few. For some reason, even at the price of damaging the logic of his book, he chose not to mention at all any of José Sarria, Sylvia Rivera, Marsha P. Johnson, Bunny Breckinridge, Jimmy Donahue, Miss Destiny, Tamara Rees, Patricia Morgan, Norma Jackson, Hedy Jo Star, Candy Darling, Minette, Rachel Harlow, Rae Bourbon, Francis Renault, Dawn Langley Simmons, Abby Sinclair, Angela Douglas, Perry Desmond, Lee Brewster, Liz Eden, Holly Woodlawn, Carlotta. This was the first sign that he was censoring the existence of gay/androphilic trans women.

Later that year Vern and Bonnie Bullough moved to the State University of New York at Buffalo where Vern was dean of natural and social sciences, and Bonnie was dean of nursing.  In 1981 Vern earned a Batchelor of Science in Nursing from California State University, Long Beach, and proudly put his Registered Nurse license number on his CV.    In 1992 he was honored by the International Humanist and Ethical Union, and was their chairman 1995-6.  He was also on the editorial board of Paidika: The Journal of Paedophilia

In 1993 Vern and Bonnie Bullough returned to Los Angeles after their retirement. Vern again taught at Northridge as an adjunct professor until 2003. That year Vern and Bonnie, published Cross Dressing, Sex, and Gender, specifically on trans people and their doctors. In the chapter “Transsexualism” they discuss (only) 6 known transsexuals: Lili Elbe (surgery 1931), Alan Hart (1918), Roberta Cowell (1951), Michael Dillon (1949), Christine Jorgensen (1953) and Jan Morris(1972)– none of whom, incidentally, had a male partner. He does also mention Coccinelle (1958), who had three husbands after her operation, but he puts her in the “Drag Queens and Cross Dressing on the Stage” chapter rather than the “Transsexualism” chapter, and omits all mention of her husbands. There is no mention at all of April Ashley (1960) whose divorce by her husband set such an unfortunate precedent, but then she could not be mentioned without admitting that she had a husband. Almost all the people that I mentioned in the previous paragraph are still apparently unknown to the Bulloughs, as are the extra people who were in the news in the additional 14 years. Of those mentioned, only Jan Morris and Coccinelle transitioned later than Jorgensen in 1953. Thus in the 40 years prior to writing their book, the Bulloughs seem to have become aware of only two more transsexuals, although they knew of Michael Dillon from Liz Hodgkinson's 1989 biography rather than from the media kerfuffle in 1958. In the “Organized Transvestism” chapter, again, only his friend Virginia Prince is mentioned, and the equally important work by Louise Lawrence, José Sarria and Sylvia Rivera is totally ignored.  And one more thing: The Bulloughs ignore completely the organizations for female-to-males. Surely they would not omit Reed Erickson, his former sponsor? Actually they do. But the next major ftm organizer is Louis Sullivan. Okay, he is briefly mentioned (p306) as a female cross-dresser who finds men's clothing erotic. They suppress the fact that he transitioned to male, and – this fits the pattern - that he became a man to be a gay man, a role that he tragically embraced to the point of dying of Aids.

Bonnie Bullough died in 1996, just before the publication of the anthology Gender Blending edited by herself, Vern and James Elias.  Vern  quickly re-married.

In 2004 Vern encouraged Richard Docter to write and publish his biography of Virginia Prince and provided a Preface.

Helen Boyd asked Bullough to comment on rumors that he must be a cross-dresser because of his strong interests in the transgender community. Others assumed that he was gay and were disappointed to learn that he was an avowed heterosexual.
"If I was everything I wrote books about, I would probably be a very screwed-up person," he said, mentioning his works on sadomasochism, pedophilia, masturbation and other forms of sexual expression. I consider myself a sex researcher, and I will admit to having a strong interest in the way people sexually express themselves."
In his final book with Ariadne Kane, Crossing Sexual Boundaries, 2006, Bullough's Introduction again - as we now expect - fails to mention any transsexuals with male lovers/husbands, as does the book itself which contains 18 mtf and 2 ftm autobiographical essays, but not a single one in which the person has a male spouse. As Kane has said: "We tried to involve contributors from all sectors of the gender spectrum, including androgynes, non operative and post-operative, individuals, spouses and close friends of ‘T’ people" --- and they could not find a single trans person with a male partner!!!

Bullough died later in 2006, of cancer.  He was 77.  

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Apparently Bullough was uncomfortable with transsexuals or transvestites who have male partners. This would explain why he was unable to name any gay transvestites or transsexuals in his 1979 book, and why Coccinelle is put in the other chapter in the 1993 book.  However this is odd in that he worked so well both with gay organizations and with Virginia Prince.  He is even critical of Prince for proclaiming that transvestites are necessarily heterosexual.  And yet the omission is plainly there in his books.  I suspect somehow the influence of Prince, who apparently also had input into the non-presence of gay transvestites in Harry Benjamin's book and scale. 


In his Preface to Richard Docter’s biography of Virginia Prince Bullough makes the claim – that surprisingly has been ignored in the debate about social construction - that “there is no evidence in Western culture of what might be called a heterosexual transvestite consciousness before the twentieth century”, and probably not before Magnus Hirschfield maodified the term 'transvestite' in 1910. Michel Foucault is associated with the claim that there were no homosexuals before that term was coined in 1869, and this claim is wrongly taken to represent the social constructionist position. The historian Rictor Norton has written extensively against social constructionism largely by demonstrating the many homosexuals who existed and had sex before 1869.

What a shame that Bullough made this claim only in a Preface to someone else's book. Could someone pay attention to the claim and either refute it or develop it?
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Photo of Bullough, Prince, and Docter from Docter's book.
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 EN.WIKIPEDIA     AMAZON.COM     WORLDCAT   PHILOSOPEDIA    PHILOSOPEDIA(Bonnie Bullough)  BOYWIKI  

    Eleanor Schuler (1936 - ) chemical engineer, spy, entrepreneur

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    John Huminik, Jr was born and raised in Washington, DC by immigrants from the Soviet Union. He married, at 20, the only women he ever dated, and they had four children.

    He was, at 23, vice-president of an engineering firm and working on high temperature coatings for rockets, a subject on which he later published a book.

    He was also a second lieutenant in the Army Reserves for twelve years: he received a commission in the Chemical Corps Reserve and commanded the 312th Chemical Company and the 419th Chemical Biological and Radiological Center. In 1960 he was approached by Soviet agents at a scientific conference. The FBI asked him to play along, and for six years he delivered selected documents.

    In 1963 Huminik became president of Chemprox. He served as chairman of the Washington chapter of the American Society for Metals (1965-66) and of the American Welding Society ( 1961-62) , was awarded the Welding Society's meritorious certificate in 1963, and was listed in Who's Who in Commerce and Industry (13th edition).

    In 1965 he was involved in the US support of a right-wing coup in the Dominican Republic. In 1966 he was outed as an FBI asset, in the events leading to the expulsion of Valentin Revin, the Soviet embassy's third secretary and science officer. Huminik gave evidence to the Committee on Un-American Activities and published an autobiography of his years as a spy.

    His wife had by now become aware of his cross-dressing, but he didn't go beyond dressing in private.

    In the early 1970s Huminik was president of General Industrial Corp. and General Enterprises Corp. which in December 1975 were sued by the Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) for alleged defrauding of investors. Huminik agreed, without admitting or denying the SEC's allegations, to a permanent injunction barring him from making untrue statements, and otherwise defrauding investors, in the future.
    However once the espionage phase was over the inner feeling of being female became more insistent. He was diagnosed as having 'gender reversal', and the Huminiks divorced in 1975, and as Eleanor Schuler she had surgery the next year with Dr Roberto Granato, and took a job as a medical secretary.

    She wrote a second autobiography and a general book on sex-change surgery (she contended then that gender reversal occurs in the fetus, but in 1996 would contend that the reason was that her mother had taken fertility drugs), but they were never published.

    By 1989 Schuler was chairman of Printron based in Albuquerque which was pioneering a pollution-free process for manufacturing printed circuit boards. She brought together scientists and engineers, and apparently raised over $7 million to float the company. Several patents were filed, one of which included Schuler's name.

    In 1991 the SEC filed suit in that Schuler had been brought into the company by Karl Huber, a convicted felon and disbarred lawyer. Without admitting or denying the allegations, Schuler and Printron settled the charges by agreeing to a consent decree barring them from future securities law violations.

    In 1992 Printron was chosen as one of 23 new companies on its Emerging Company Marketplace (ECM) most of which would subsequently fail. One of the companies that was to make a flame retardant was run by a convicted arsonist. The blue-ribbon panel that chose the 23 companies knew about the 1991 filing but not the 1975 one. The central registry of the National Association of Securities Dealers listed John Huminik and Eleanor Schuler as two separate people.

    Printron's share price declined from $14 to 22¢. Business Week published a story in September 1994 focused on the inadequate vetting by SEC. One investor who had lost $217,000 sued claiming that the company was a fraud with himself as the target. The company was forced into bankruptcy.

    Schuler sued Business Week for libel and invasion of medical privacy, and maintained that the story caused Printron to go bankrupt. However the court granted Business Week's motion to dismiss on all counts, pointing out that Schuler had, in 1975, given interviews to The Washington Post and to People Magazine. It held that the references to her being transsexual were neither false nor defamatory:
    "If, however, the Business Week story could have been fairly read as implying that Schuler changed her sex to escape recognition as the person the business world knew as Mr. Huminik, she arguably would have had a plausible false light action. It is one thing to point out that a sex change can have career advantages but something else to imply that a sex change was prompted by an unethical and perhaps pathological desire to gain those advantages."
    ____________________________________________________________

    I suppose that after the event of recent years that few of us are surprised that the SEC’s punishment for defrauding investors is to get the accused to promise not to do it again.

    The Business Week story is not intrinsically a transsexual story.  A name change for any other reason: family, marriage, religion would have produced the same lack of a match in the central registry of the National Association of Securities Dealers.

    Nzinga Mbandi (1583 - 1663) queen.

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    Nzinga was the favourite daughter of her father Kiluanji, the ngola (chief or king) of the Ndongo. When her brother Mbande deposed their father, he also had Nzinga's child murdered, and she fled.

    In the 1620s as the Portuguese were expanding their slaving expeditions to the area, taking out ten thousand slaves a year, and the Ndonga were negotiating for their independence and to be a supplier rather than a victim tribe. In 1621 Mbande asked his sister to return and to negotiate with the invading Portuguese, represented by João Correia de Sousa. This she did, dramatically emphasizing her equality with de Sousa by sitting on one of her minions as de Sousa took the only chair.  She was also baptized as a Catholic taking the alternate name of Ana de Souza.

    However the Portuguese kept none of their promises, and Mbande either committed suicide or was poisoned by Nzinga. Nzinga became regent, but had Kaza, Mbande's son killed for impudence, and then herself reigned as ngola wearing male clothing. She renounced her Catholicism and formed an alliance with Kasanje against the Portuguese, and conquered the Jagas who were further inland.

    In a book published in 1670, a Dutch sea captain by the name of Fuller describes Nzinga:
    'In man's apparel ... hanging about her the skins of beasts, before and behind, with a Sword about her neck, an Axe at her girdle, and a Bow and Arrows in her hand, leaping to the custom, now here, now there, as nimbly as the most active among her attendants, all the while striking her Engema, that is, two Iron Bells'.
    Nzinga was by then in her 60s. Captain Fuller was the captain of her bodyguard in the late 1640s - he is describing her preparations for ritual human sacrifice.
    She kept a pool of fifty or sixty young men, instead of husbands, who were in turn allowed as many wives as they pleased. She had a smaller select group of young men whom she dressed in women's clothes. This emphasized the claim that she had been transformed by her male clothing.

    Captain Fuller, after mentioning her ritual sacrifices and cannibalism, goes on to describe her as
    'a cunning and prudent Virago, so much addicted to arms that she hardly uses other exercises; and withal so generously valiant that she never hurt a Portuguese after quarter given, and commanded all her slaves and soldiers alike'.
    As the Ndongo had moved inland, the Portuguese followed, stretched too far and the Dutch were able to capture Luanda in 1641. Nzinga formed an alliance with the Dutch, and made an agreement with them to sell her prisoners of war. Aided by a few hundred Dutch soldiers, Nzinga's forces were able to defeat the Portuguese in 1643, 1647 and 1648. However later in 1648, the Portuguese were able to recapture Luanda.

    The Ndongo retreated inland as before, but the Portuguese held Nzinga's sister and Nzinga agreed to deal with them, and to return to Catholicism. In 1659 she signed a new treaty with the Portuguese.

    The modern-day statue to Nzinga in Luanda
    She died at age 80, a remarkable age for the time.

    After her death the Portuguese were able to seize control, and restore the shipping of slaves to Brazil.

    Nzinga is honoured as a hero in modern Angola.
    EN.WIKIPEDIAPT.WIKIPEDIA

    27 trans persons in France/French Belgium/French Africa who changed things by example and/or achievement.

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    See also US, Canada, UK, Germany, Italy, Australia/NZ, Americans in Europe, Europeans in the Americas, Africa.

    A special mention of Joseph Doucé (1945 – 1990), though not trans himself, murdered by agents of the State after agitating for trans rights. GVWWFR.WIKIPEDIA.

    France is notable for a series of female-born persons before the Second World War who dressed and behaved like what we would call trans men, even having what operations were then available, but not taking a male name.
    1. Amantine Dupin (1804 – 1876) novelist as George Sand, well-known transvestite. EN.WIKIPEDIA.
    2. Rosa Bonheur (1822 – 1899) famous painter. FR.WIKIPEDIA.
    3. Camille Barbin (1838 – 1868) A school teacher as Adélaîde Herculine Barbin in Charente-Maritime. Compelled by the authorities to become a man, committed suicide. GVWWEN.WIKIPEDIA.
    4. Jane Dieulafoy (1851 – 1916) Paris. Photographer, archeologist, writer. GVWWEN.WIKIPEDIA.
    5. Mathilde de Belboeuf (1862 – 1944) Paris. Aristocrat. GVWWFR.WIKIPEDIA.
    6. Clementine Delait (1865 – 1939) Lorraine. Café owner, bearded lady. GVWWFR.WIKIPEDIA.
    7. Madeleine Pelletier (1874 – 1939) Psychiatrist, Socialist, feminist. Died in incarceration. EN.WIKIPEDIA.
    8. Si Mahmoud Essadi(1877 – 1904) From Geneva, originally called Isabelle Eberhart, converted to Islam in Algeria, became a Sufi, writer, died in a flash flood in a wadi. EN.WIKIPEDIA.
    9. Lili Elbe (1882 – 1931) Danish artist who spent most of her adulthood in Paris. She went to Berlin for experimental surgeries which she did not survive. EN.WIKIPEDIA.
    10. Georges Masasco (1890 - ?) From Brussels. Lion tamer, stigmatic. GVWW.
    11. Violette Morris (1893 – 1944) All-round athlete, rejected from French Olympic team for being too masculine, especially after her mastectomy. Assassinated by the Resistance. EN.WIKIPEDIA.
    12. Claude Cahun (1894 – 1954) Paris, Jersey. Photographer, writer. EN.WIKIPEDIA.
    13. Pierre Molinier (1900 – 1976) Bordeaux. painter, photographer, fetishist. GVWWFR.WIKIPEDIA.
    14. Michel-Marie Poulain (1906 – 1991) Paris, Alpes-Maritimes. performer, painter, stained glass artist. GVWWFR.WIKIPEDIA.
    15. Marie André Schwidenhammer (1909 – 1981) Paris. Nurse, activist, founder of AMAHO. GVWW.
    16. Frede Baule (1916 - ?) lover of Marlene Dietrich, Paris club owner. GVWW .
    17. Ovida Delect (1927 - ) Normandy. Part of Communist Résistance, sent to German concentration camp, poet. GVWW.
    18. Jacqueline Dufresnoy (1931 – 2006) star at Le Carousel as Coccinelle, film actor, 3 husbands, trans activist. GVWWFR.WIKIPEDIA.
    19. Marie-Pierre Pruvot (1935 - ) From Algiers, star at Le Carousel as Bambi, school teacher, novelist. GVWWFR.WIKIPEDIA.
    20. Amanda Lear (1939 - ) performer, singer, muse of Salvador Dali, painter, Chevalière. GVWWFR.WIKIPEDIA

    21. Maud Marin (1945 - ) Paris. Postal inspector, lawyer. First French trans person to change ID papers after Coccinelle's divorce. GVWW. FR.WIKIPEDIA.
    22. Marie-France Garcia (1946 - ) From Oran, lives in Paris. singer, actress, activist. GVWWEN.WIKIPEDIA.
    23. Hélène Hazera (1952 - ) Paris. Activist, actor, broadcaster. GVWWFR.WIKIPEDIA

    24. Camille Barré (1959 - ) Paris. Communist candidate married to Argentinian Monica Leon. GVWW Deleted from FR.WIKIPEDIA.
    25. Tom Reucher (196? - ) Paris. Psychologist, activist, coined Syndrome de Benjamin. GVWW

    26. Ludwig Trovato (196? - ) Reims. film maker, accused of rape. GVWW

    27. Olivier Theyskens (1977 - ) Belgian fashion designer. GVWWEN.WIKIPEDIA.

    Jasmine Goode (1976–) burglar, inmate

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    Darren Goode was born in Rhyl, Denbighshire.
     "Then, on my seventh birthday, I'd been so excited about the Barbie doll I'd asked for - but instead I'd got a teddy bear wearing an army uniform.  I'd look at my parents, confused. ‘You're a boy now called Darren,' my dad Derrick, 53, had sighed. ‘You have to start behaving like one.' Talk about a shock!"
    He was jailed for burglary several times from age 18, and once worked in a slaughterhouse. He had a son with his first wife, and then met his second wife in 2002 after release from prison. He was on incapacity benefit for depression. He spent most of his time on that motorbike that she bought for him and was into motocross racing. They had a son and a daughter.
    " I was doing everything I could to become the man my parents wanted me to be. With my short black hair and skull-and-crossbones tattoos, I looked as tough as you could get. I acted tough, too - a real hard man in prison."
    Steven Locke, while working as a gardener in Herefordshire, selected houses to burgle with Goode. They chose the homes of the elderly, including one victim aged 102. Some victims were burgled a second time. Loche and Goode were stopped by the police on the A49 in April 2005, after an operation to catch them. Goode admitted three charges of burglary, one of attempted burglary, six of conspiracy to commit burglary and one of robbery. Lock pleaded guilty to 10 counts of burglary, one of attempted burglary, nine of conspiracy to commit burglary and one of robbery. They were both sentenced to 11 years.

    The next year Goode told the prison psychiatrist that he was intersex and wanted to become a woman. After his wife's divorce in 2011 Goode was moved to an open prison. and was now addressed as Jasmine. Jasmine was allowed to visit a consultant in London's Harley Street, accompanied by a female prison officer, and on home leave had stayed at Stephanie Booth's transvestite hotel in Colwyn Bay, North Wales.

    She applied to the NHS for gender re-assignment, given permission to wear a skirt after 5pm, electrolysis and hormones. Jasmine was released from jail in 2012 and found work with a charity that helps transsexuals.

    Jasmine appeared on BBC3's Unsafe Sex in the City visiting the Manchester Centre for Sexual Health and claimed to have had more than 60 sex partners since release. This was a few days before her surgery. In September 2013 she appeared on the ITV breakfast program, This Morning.
    IMDB

    Jennifer N. Pritzker (1951 - ) scion of wealth, military officer

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    James Pritzker was born into the Chicago plutocratic family that owns the Hyatt Hotel chain, and many other corporations. Pritzker married and they had three children.


    In 1974 Pritzker joined the US Army as a private and rose through sergeant to 2nd lieutenant, with 11 years service in the US and West Germany. This was followed by 16 years in the Illinois National Guard. After retirement in 2001, Pritzker was given the honorary rank of Colonel.

    In Pritzker founded the Tawani Foundation "to enhance the awareness and understanding of the importance of the Citizen Soldier" and the Pritzker Military Library. In 2003 the Tawani Foundation made a $1.35 million donation to the University of California's Palm Center to study the feasibility of transgender people serving in the military and police and fire departments.

    In 2013 Pritzker announced a legal name change to Jennifer, and that she was starting transition. Thus she became the first trans billionaire. Forbes magazine lists her at #327 in its rich list, and estimates that she is 'worth' $1.7 billion.
    EN.WIKIPEDIA   FORBES

    Jeanne Hoff (1938 – ) psychiatrist

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    Eugene Hoff  was born in in St Louis.  He did an MD at Columbia University, College of Physicians And Surgeons 1963 followed by a doctorate in solid state chemistry at University College, London (where he also converted to Catholicism), followed by training and a residency as a psychiatrist at the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Missouri.

    He initially thought of himself as homosexual, but in exploring homosexuality found out that he was not. He was introduced to the Harry Benjamin practice, possibly by Wardell Pomeroy of the Kinsey Institute.

    Hoff was a guest on the the NBC television program Not for Women Only where he explained transsexualism from a medical viewpoint referring to trans women as 'men' as was the then practice.
    "You can say that you know that you are a woman, therefore you want to be one. But no woman I have ever asked has been able to tell me what that means, and I doubt that transsexuals will be the first to define it."
    He took over the Harry Benjamin practice in New York in 1976, after Benjamin's successor Charles Ihlenfeld resigned to begin a psychiatric residency in the Bronx.  This was his first clinic practice other than the residency in St Louis.  The practice was being managed under the aegis of the Orentreich Medical Group, a dermatology and hair restoration practice, and was located at 1 East 72nd St. It was then still administered by Benjamin's office manager and assistant Virginia Allen.

    Hoff fired Virginia, the nurse, Mary Ryan, and the physician, Agnes Nagy. He pleased Dr Orentreich by moving the practice downtown to a townhouse he had bought behind the Chelsea Hotel. In this period Dr Hoff confronted Charles Socarides and his reactionary views that homosexuality can be cured by psychoanalysis.

    Hoff transitioned to Jeanne and had surgery with Dr Granato in 1977. She was interviewed at home by Lynn Redgrave and Frank Fields immediately before surgery and two months afterwards. The resulting television program "Becoming Jeanne" won the prestigious Ohio State Broadcasting award in 1979.

    By 1980 there were few patients left in the practice, and Hoff had already taken a job in a psych ward in Brooklyn. The next year she sold the building and moved away, first to Massachusetts and then California.

    She became a psychiatrist at San Quentin prison. She was in the news in April-May 1998 when she was the only one of three psychiatrists to testify that murderer Horace Kelly might be competent to be executed, and the defense attorney attempted to impeach Hoff.

    She is now retired and in 2013 donated her archives to the Kinsey Institute.
    ____________________________________________________________________________

    Although Horace Kelly's lawyer subpoenaed Hoff's prison personnel file in an attemp to impeach her, he presumably hadn't heard rumours that she was transsexual, didn't find it in the file and didn't read her.   Otherwise he probably would have used it to defame her.   She had been in the 1978 televison special under the same name, but that was 20 years earlier.   Before the internet it was much more difficult to make connections.

      Nana (1939 - ) sex worker, performer. housewife, Place Blanche , Paris circa 1960

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      I previously, last month, featured the photographs of Nana.  It was pointed out that the 2011 edition of Christer Strömholm (1918 - 2002)'s photographs contains an interview of Nana by Hélène Hazera.   I have now obtained the book, so here is the revised version.
      _______________________

      Nana was raised in Oran, Algeria. In 1955 she met Bambi and others in the Le Carrousel cast who were on tour. Nana realized instantly that was what she wanted to do.

      There was a roundup of the queers in Oran in August 1957. However Nana had already left as her brother had told her that their parents had intended to have her locked up with the Ain SefrahWhite Fathers, a Catholic order.

      Nana arrived in Paris 5 August 1957, presenting as male but having already started female hormones. Nana and a friend took a room at the hotel Fairyland. The friend knew Fetiche who was a performer at Chez Madame Arthur, and Nana sewed for her in addition to working in a travel agency.

      Christer and Nana 1962


      Nana's mother turned up in 1958 and took a room in the same hotel. She intended to take her son back to have him locked up by the White Fathers. However a flare-up in the ongoing War for Independence closed all the Algerian airports. Mother was able to get herself home by phoning the secretary of a minister whom she knew. Only one seat was available.

      Nana was increasingly dressing as female. She left the travel-agency job, and met the Swedish photographer Christer Strömholm.

      She started to solicit in the Place Pigalle. The pimps at that time left the trans women alone for they would lose status as a man by pimping them. The police frequently arrested the trans women and charged them with being dressed as a woman outside the carnival period. As she was from Algeria she was called a 'dirty Arab'.

      One summer Nana and a friend went to the South. Nana was arrested in that her ID card said that she was a man. The policeman even paid for a barber to cut her hair, and then she had to hitchhike back to Paris looking like a man in women`s clothes as those were the only clothes that she had.

      In 1959 Nana created an act and obtained work at le Fifty, a cabaret on rue Fontaine. She worked in Cabarets until she was 45, but also kept working the streets.

      One time a pimp slapped her and claimed that she owed 5,000 Fr for working on 'his' territory. Nana had to go and see the local godfather, and argue that she was not a woman.

      Gina and Nana

      Through Christer Strömholm, Nana was introduced to several artists. In 1970 Nana moved to Luxembourg to live with a boyfriend. In 1972 she had surgery with Dr Burou in Casablanca; in 1977 she met a lawyer in Lyon who was able to effect her change of Civil Status, and her name became Eva. She and her boyfriend were married in 1980.

      • Hélène Hazera interviews Nana. "Aujord'hui Nana Se Raconts". In Christer Strömholm. Les Amies De Place Blanche. Stockport: Dewi Lewis, 2011: 50-9.




      Nana 1959

      Adela Vasquez (1958–) sex worker, performer

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      Jorge Vasquez was born during the Cuban Revolution to a single mother, and raised by his grandparents in Camagüey.

      He was sexually active with men early, and especially when he was sent to a  boarding school at age 11, where he seduced both bullies and teachers.
      "But do not call me gay.  I never had gay sex.  Never will.  I'm always the girl, he's always the man."
      At 15 he was in the school drag pageant, where he stood out by being real. In 1974 Jorge was called to register for the Cuban army, but turned up in semi-drag and was ruled ineligible because 'homosexual'.   He became a teacher but was obliged to resign despite being a good teacher. He discovered the gay scene and took such jobs as supervising convict labor.

      In 1980, when Vasquez was 22, President Fidel Castro said that anybody who wanted to leave Cuba could do so, and sent mental patients and convicts with them.   Jorge joined the 'Marielitos' (as they came to be known from the name of the harbor where they left). The Marielitos were sent to Fort Chaffee in Arkansas, where Jorge found a lover the first night. In all he had 31 lovers before being sent to a gay sponsor, Rolando, in Los Angeles.

      By 1981 he had his first venereal disease, just as AIDS arrived. Rolando persuaded Jorge to start using condoms, and helped him get a job at the Neiman Marcus department Store. However he did too many drugs and was fired, but then worked doing sewing for his boyfriend who was a designer at the Ice Capades. Together they went to see the trans performers at the Cha Cha club.

      Vasquez decided that it was time to change and became Adela. After changes that come from taking hormones, Adella advertised herself as a 'She-Male' in Hollywood Connections, and a sex worker for a few years. In 1992 Adela was invited by a community worker to enter in the Ms Gay Latina contest, which she won.

      Since then Adela has been an activist against HIV. She started as a showgirl with the AtreDivas, a drag group that would donate their earnings to AIDS charities. She has become an artist and a performer and lives in San Francisco.

      In 2004 the artist Jaime Cortez developed her life story into a graphic novel.

      Gayle Sherman (1940 - ) performer.

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      Original September 2010; revised September 2013.  My original version was based simply on a reading of Gayle's autobiography.   Since then more information has emerged, particularly in the Chicago Whispers book and on Queer Music Heritage.

      _______________________________________________________________________________

      Gary Paradis, from Ohio, was raised by an aunt after both parents died in a car crash. At age 16, Gary went to live with relatives in New York, and based on appearance alone was able to get a job, using the name Gayle Sherman, in the chorus line at the Jewel Box Revue.

      Later she worked at the 82 Club and then at a small club in Toledo featuring 4 strippers and 2 female impersonators, but the club did not say which was which. A customer fell in love with Gayle, and then killed himself in a car accident when he finally realized that that she was one of the female impersonators.

      Gayle moved to Chicago and became a star at the Nite Life, Chicago's longest-running drag bar (early 1940s – 1981). She was mentored by Tony Midnite. Nightlife magazine ran with a cover photograph of Gayle in July 1963 advertising the show at the Nite Life with Vicki Marlane. She was said to be a twin for Sophia Loren.

      In 1963 the National Insider ran a 4-part series on her life that was reprinted as a Novel paperback the next year. 

      Gayle replaced Tony at the Blue Dahlia, a straight club. She was able to charge $100 just to accompany business men on dates and no more. On her own time she dated women. She was working off the books and therefore could not have a bank account. She always paid cash, even when on one occasion she bought $2,400 of furniture.

      After surgery Gayle was not allowed to work any more as a female impersonator, and so changed her name to Brandy Alexander and became a stripper. With implants her breast measurement was 48" (122 cm) and she performed as Alexandra 'The Great 48'.  She often worked between films in porn cinemas, but when Chicago Mayor Richard Daley pulled their licenses, she got a gig in Hawai'i, and was featured in Confidential Magazine three years later.

      She retired from performing at age 48.

      She became a cosmetologist.

      *Not Gayle Sherman the 1990s stuntwoman, nor the harpist, nor the wife of Pastor Paul Sherman.

      Not the Brandy Alexander of New York, also a drag performer, and mentioned on p157-8 of Randy Shilts'And the Band Played On.

       BURLESK    QUEER MUSIC HERITAGE
      __________________________________________________________

      Gayle’s autobiography is only 36 pages long.  She was not even 20 when she wrote it.  The book also contains a similarly short account by a British trans man, and an essay ‘As the Experts See It’, by the then ubiquitous hack writer Carlson Wade, which will strike modern readers as particularly badly informed.  The next year, 1965, Novel Books put out a similar collection, I Was Male: two autobiographical accounts by trans women, one in regret, and an ‘expert’ essay by Carlson Wade and George Griffith.
      I obtained I Want to be a Woman through interlibrary loan.  The copy is stamped IFGE on the title page and the side, although it is now owned by a university library.

      Joanne Meyerowitz (How Sex Changed:184) mentions Gayle merely to quote her as an example of transsexual separation: ‘I wasn’t then and I’m not now a transvestite. I don’t get sexual pleasure out of dressing as a woman.’   This has been repeated (e.g. Robert Hill, ‘As a man I exist; as a woman I live’: 141).  Whatever Gayle’s opinions may have been later in life, it is a bit much for academics to build generalizations on casual comments by persons hardly out of teenage.

      Not to question Gayle’s narrative, but the tale of a parviscient punter at a drag revue who falls in love with a drag performer and comes to a bad end is an old tale.  The classic telling is Honoré de Balzac’s Sarrasine, 1830.  This of course was over-analyzed to death by Roland Barth in S/Z, 1970.

      $2,400 in the mid 1960s would be $17,000 today.   To pay that amount in cash today would probably initiate a criminal investigation.

      Thank you  Morgan Stevens.

      Rose Venkatesan ரோஸ் வெங்கடேசன் (1980 – ) engineer, broadcaster, filmmaker.

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      Ramesh was raised in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, and graduated in mechanical engineering at Sathyabama Engineering College in 2001, and then completed a master’s degree in biomedical engineering from Louisiana Tech University in 2003, where he found people to be “aggressively homophobic”. Venkatesan has also designed web pages.

      She transitioned full time in 2004. She announced her change to a large family gathering that had intended to arrange a bride for her. They threw her out and she worked for a while in a call centre teaching US pronunciation and idioms. In 2007 she won a widely televised transgender beauty contest and in 2008 using the name of Rose became host of a television program Ippadikku Rose on Vijay TV (owned by Murdoch's Fox International).

      She had surgery in March, 2010 in Bangkok with Dr Thep Vechavisit.

      In 2012 she attempted to found a Sexual Liberation Party.

      She had a part in the film Vaaimai as a trans district collector. However when director Senthil Kumar unexpectedly announced an extended shooting to 10pm, Rose explained that she was expected at the Chennai US Embassy that evening and left. Two assistants attacked her car on the road in a dangerous fashion.

      She has since directed a film about match-fixing in cricket, with a team captain who falls for a trans women.
      EN.WIKIPEDIATA.WIKIPEDIA 

       

      Tadhg MacCrossan (1958 - ) druid.

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      Cross was raised in Calgary, New Orleans and then Dallas. Cross grew up to become a woman, Teresa Cross.

      In her 20s Teresa was introduced to the "Irish Literary Renaissance" of the early twentieth century, and to Irish music. She was one of the members of the founding board of the Southwest Celtic Music Association in the early 1980s.

      Cross became associated with Dianic Wiccans in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, but, disappointed with Wicca, she was curious to learn about the beliefs of her Celtic ancestors. While studying English at the University of Texas in Dallas, she took courses in Linguistics, Mythology and Indo-European comparative mythology. She corresponded with Emmon Bodfish in the 1980s. She started using the Gaelic form of her name: Teresa NicanChrosain.

      She was persuaded to write The Sacred Cauldron: Secrets of the Druids
      using the pen name of Tadhg MacCrossan (which was taken by several reviewers to be a male name). This was the first Celtic Reconstructionist book. It explained the Indo-European origins of Celtic pre-Christian religion. It was criticized for not conforming to the standard feminist pagan lines, and condemned as right wing without any consideration of Cross' actual politics.

      She has exchanged ideas with Hindus and Germanicists. Teresa now lives in Fort Worth and is a student of the Vedic and Vedantic literature.
      AMAZON
      ___________________________________________________________
      The biography in Amazon (quite likely submitted by MacCrossan herself) is evasive as to when she transitioned.  I assume that it must be before she joined Zsuzsanna Budapest’s Diana Wicca which rejects both men and known trans women.  (See also Ruth Barrett).

      However several reviews and comments on Tadhg’s books are written as if the reviewer takes her to be male.

      Geraldine Portica (189? - ?) chamber maid.

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      “Geraldine Portica — This is not a girl, but a boy, who was reared by his mother as a girl and has always dressed as a girl and went to school as a girl and has never associated with any one else but girls and was employed as a chamber maid on 6th St. when arrested, he is a native of Mexico and speaks several languages, his English with the Spanish accent, he is now waiting to be deported to Mexico by the U.S. Gov. Dec. 27th, 1917.
      From the files of the San Francisco Police Department

      Leo Wollman (1914 – 1998) gynecologist, hypnotist, sexologist.

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      Original March 2007; revised October 2013.

      Leo Wollman lived almost his entire life on Mermaid Avenue, Coney Island, Brooklyn, except for his medical education in Edinburgh. He married in 1936, and he and his wife, Eleanor, frequently travelled back and forth to Scotland for a few years. Eleanor sailed home in September 1939 as war broke out, but Leo stayed in Scotland until 1942. They had one child Arthur (1943 - ) who became a urologist in San Diego. Leo became a gynecologist at the Maimonides Medical Center, Brooklyn. He was also a hypnotist and interested in psychosomatic dentistry. In some newspaper accounts he is described as a psychiatrist.

      Wollman (right) at a Hypnosis Conference in Mainz, 1970.
      On July 31, 1961 Wollman, in his role as a hypnotist, appeared in a television discussion re the use of the then new pacemaker. He was head of the New York Society of Clinical and Experimental Hypnotism.

      In the mid-1960s Wollman became an associate of Harry Benjamin, and they shared a practice. Wollman started running a group session where transsexuals could meet and exchange ideas and experiences. He also used hypnosis to determine whether a transsexual was authentic.

      In Benjamin's 1966 book, The Transsexual Phenomenon, Wollman is described as a "noted gynecologist and student of hypnosis". He is quoted and what he said is found at the bottom of this article.

      In December 1966 Dr Carl Coppolino, anesthesiologist and hypnotist, was on trial for the murder of his lover's husband. The now jilted lover claimed that Coppolino hypnotized her into injecting her husband with succinylcholine which caused a heart attack. Leo Wollman testified that under hypnosis:
      "It's impossible to have a subject do something they feel they are morally unable to do". 
      Coppolino was acquitted, but four months later he was convicted of murdering his own wife by an injection of succinylcholine. He served 12½ years.

      WBI Boston 1968 with Dr Leo Wollman.  Presenter Bob Kennedy
      In 1968 Wollman was phoned from Toronto by Dianna Boileau, and arranged for a local doctor to prescribe female hormones for her. Also that year he was in the WBI Boston television channel with Virginia Prince. On September 19, 1969 he was on the Phil Donahue television show to discuss transsexual operations.

      Wollman contributed a paper on post-operative care of the neo-vagina to Richard Green & John Money's 1969 book, Transsexualism and Sex-Reassignment.

      In 1970 he flew up to Toronto for the release of Dianna Boileau's autobiography. He rather dominated the event and predicted that transsexual women would be able to become pregnant within 10 years. At this time he claimed 110 sex change patients with only one case of regret. He estimated 5 male-to-females for each female-to-male.

      In the early 1970s he was President of TheAmerican Society of Psychosomatic Dentistry and Medicine.

      Lyn Raskin's 1971 autobiography, Diary of a Transsexual uses the pseudonym "Dr Len Williams" for Dr Wollman. He sent her to Dr Burou in Casablanca for surgery. A few years later Wollman's patients were having surgery in the New York area, at Yonkers Hospital, by plastic surgeons Benito Rish and David Wesser. Eventually both Rish and Wesser had their licenses lifted by the state medical board, although their work with transsexuals was not cited as the reason.

      Another associate of Wollman was Garrett Oppenheim, a cis-heterosexual who had previously been a journalist on the New York Herald-Tribune. He then became a hypnotist and sex counselor. He and his wife sold counseling cassette-tapes, ran an organization for transsexuals called Confide, and published an associated newsletter called Transition.

      In 1971 the Erickson Educational Foundation sponsored the production of a 28-minute documentary, I am Not This Body, which featured a discussion in the EEF office between Zelda Suplee, Leo Wollman, two trans women and actress Pamela Lincoln (who was purportedly seeking information about transsexuals). Suplee and Wollman had previously known each other through their mutual interest in hypnosis.

      In 1973 Wollman published an article advocating female circumcision as a cure for frigidity.

      Wollman was an associate of Michael Salem, the cis-heterosexual who ran a boutique in New York and a mail-order service for transvestites. Wollman advised re colors and lingerie styles. He also helped Salem write his 1973 book How to Impersonate a Woman. He then sent copies to what he called "the clown-transvestites": Milton Berle, Tony Curtis, Johnny Carson, Flip Wilson, George Burns, Jack Benny.

      In 1977 Renee Richards was obliged to go to court to establish her right to play in women's tennis. Both her surgeon Dr Roberto Granato and Dr Wollman testified on her behalf. Wollman stated that he had treated over 1,700 transsexual patients and that
      "It is his view that Dr. Richards should be considered a female... despite the fact that the chromosomes may appear to be that of a man, if she has the external genital appearance, the internal organ appearance, gonadal identity, endocrinological makeup and psychological and social development of a female, she would be considered a female by any reasonable test of sexuality."

      From 1973 Wollman had been working with Doris Wishman (1912 – 2001) one of the very few women exploitation film directors of her generation. Their joint project/film came out in 1978 under the title Born A Man... Let Me Die A Woman. It was advertised, misleadingly, as: 'All true! All real! See a man become a woman before your eyes'. In a cross between a documentary and pornography, Dr Wollman, who reminds us of his MD, his PhD and his DD, shows us scenes where a transsexual explains that she will get a womb transplant and have a baby; dramatized scenes where trans women pick up men for sex; gory close-ups of vaginoplasty; dramatized suicides and self-castrations. Incorrect biological explanations are given, e.g. that homosexuality and transsexuality are both the result of incorrect development of glands. The film contains footage from Wishman's previous films, and has continuity errors. The credits are misleading: only some of the real trans women are listed; porn star Harry Reems (who did not know that he was in the film) is listed as Tim Long; porn star Vanessa del Rio is not listed at all. It was banned in the UK. Kleinhans argues that the reels are in the wrong order, and that Wishman "constantly undermines the doctor's discourse of tolerance with footage that presents transsexuals as freaks and staged episodes that exploit transsexualism for sensationalistic effect". However there is no record of Wollman disassociating himself from the film or complaining about Wishman's final cut. Wishman was quoted in Psychotronic Video 26.:
      “I found the transsexuals to be very sad and lonely people. Because of that, I paid them more than anyone else, to ease my conscience, I guess. I didn’t want to think that I was exploiting them, although I really wasn’t. They were all very happy to be in the film.” 
      There is a paperback tie-in to the film by MJ Lucas (who may be either Wishman or Wollman).

      In 1979 Rosalyne Blumenstein, then 15 but claiming to be 16, took the bus and train out to Mermaid Avenue to see who she describes as "a sweet little old doctor" who gave her a bottle of Provera. However she never went back.

      Along with Paul A. Walker, Ph.D., Jack C. Berger, MD., Richard Green, MD., Donald R. Laub, M.D., Charles L. Reynolds, Jr., M.D., Wollman was a co-author of the first Harry Benjamin Standards of Care which was approved at the Sixth International Gender Dysphoria Symposium, San Diego,California, February 1979.

      Dr Leo Wollman died in 1998, aged 84. His widow donated his papers and other material to Transy House which established the Wollman Archives of Transgender History and Culture.

      The 1999 article by Teresi & McAuliffe claims that Wollman treated 2,800 transsexuals, and that he hormonally primed one of his patients to breastfeed his own child. The patient was still with her wife and they took turns feeding the child.


      *Not the economist

      Wollman's publications:
      • "Hypnosis in Weight Control". American Journal of Clinical Hypnosis, 4,3,1962: 177-180. DOI:10.1080/00029157.1962.10401892.
      • "How Prenancy Tests Work". Sexology: Modern Guide to Sex Knowledge, 31, March 1964.
      • "Hypnosis for the Surgical Patient". American Journal of Clinical Hypnosis, 7,1,1964: 83-5. DOI: 10.1080/00029157.1964.10402397.
      • "A Brief Note on the Origin of the Psychoprophylactic Method (PPM) in Obstetrics."American Journal of Clinical Hypnosis 7.1,1964: 85-86.
      • Quoted in Harry Benjamin. The Transsexual Phenomenon. New York: Julian Press, 1966. New York: Warner Books Edition 1977: 161-2 Online at: www2.hu-berlin.de/sexology/ECR6/benjamin and at www.mut23.de/texte/Harry%20Benjamin%20-%20The%20Transsexual%20Phenomenon.pdf.
      • "Brief statistics on female adolescents."Journal of Sex Research 2.1,1966: 25-26.
      • "In contrast to the schizoid, the normal individual maintains his unity and identity through the strength of his impulses and feelings. The difference in the two conditions can be contrasted diagrammatically in terms of impulse formation and muscular activity. Collapse of schizoid rigidity plunges the individual into a schizophrenic."Fertility and Sterility 17.2,1966: 273-277.
      • "Transsexualism: Gynecological Aspects".  Transactions of the New York Academy of Sciences, 29: 463, 1967. doi: 10.1111/j.2164-0947.1967.tb02280.x
      • "Surgery for the Transsexual."Journal of Sex Research 3.2,1967: 145-147.
      • "Abstracts of Current Literature."American Journal of Clinical Hypnosis 11.2, 1968: 132-134.
      • "Office Management of the Postoperative Male Transsexual". In Richard Green & John Money (ed). Transsexualism and Sex-Reassignment. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1969.
      • "Hooded Clitoris: Preliminary Report". Journal of American Psychosomatic Dentistry and Medicine,20, 1973: 3-4.
      • "Female Circumcision". Journal of American Psychosomatic Dentistry and Medicine, 20, 1974: 130-1.
      • "The Effect of Deviate Behavior on a Marriage". Osteopathic Physician, 41,5, 1974: 111.
      • "Nonverbal communication for prevention of mental illness." Journal of the American Society of Psychosomatic Dentistry & Medicine, 22,2,1975: 51.
      • With Paul A. Walker, Ph.D., Jack C. Berger, MD., Richard Green, MD., Donald R. Laub, M.D. & Charles L. Reynolds, Jr., M.D. Standards of Care: The hormonal and surgical sex reassignment of gender dysphoric persons. The Harry Benjamin International Gender Dysphoria Association, Inc. 1979. Online at: www.genderpsychology.org/transsexual/hbsoc_1990.html.
      • With Erwin DiCyan, George Goldberg & Arthur Hastings. "Holistic approaches to oral health and dentistry". Health for the whole person: the complete guide to holistic medicine (1980): 333.
      • With Laurence Lotner. Eating Your Way to a Better Sex Life: The Complete Guide to Sexual Nutrition. Pinnacle Books, 1983.
      Other sources:
      • "Coppolino May Take Stand: The Defense Rests". The Norwalk Hour, Dec 14, 1966. Online at: http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1898&dat=19661214&id=TuogAAAAIBAJ&sjid=qW8FAAAAIBAJ&pg=4953,3405220.
      • Kathleen Rex. "Canada's first sex-swapper asks for understanding: Doctor sees day coming when transplants will enable fathers to become mothers". The Globe and Mail. Sept 16, 1970.
      • Lyn Raskin. Diary of a Transsexual, Olympia Press, 1971.
      • Dianna as told to Felicity Cochrane, with an Introduction by Leo Wollman. Behold, I Am a Woman. New York: Pyramid Books, 1972.
      • Michael Salem. How to Impersonate a Woman; A Handbook for the Male Transvestite. NY: M. Salem Enterprises, 1973.
      • Jack O'Brien.  Schenectady Gazette, 2 Nov 1973
      • "Richards v. US Tennis Assn". Leagle, August 16, 1977. www.leagle.com/decision/197780693Misc2d713_1654.
      • Doris Wishman (dir). Born A Man... Let Me Die A Woman. Hosted by Leo Wollman, with trans persons Lisa Carmelle, Deborah Harte, Ann Zordi, Angel Spirit, and porn stars Harry Reem and Vanessa del Rio. Scientific and medical advisor: Dr Leo Wollman. US 78 mins 1978.
      • M.J. Lucas. Let Me Die A Woman: The Why and How of Sex-Change Operations. New York: Rearguard Productions. 1978. The book that goes with the film. Leo Wollman consulted.
      • Thomas Waugh. "Medical Thrills: Born A Man... Let Me Die A Woman". The Body Politic, 49, Dec 1978-Jan 1979: 41-2. Reprinted in The Fruit Machine: Twenty Years of Writings on Queer Cinema. Durham (N.C.): Duke university press, 2000.: 72-3.
      • Dick Teresi & Kathleen McAuliffe. ""Male Pregnancy"Omni, 8, 1985. Reprinted in Patrick D Hopkins (ed), Sex/Machine: Readings in Culture, Gender, and Technology. Indiana University Press, 1999. 
      • F. Hodges. "A Short History of the Institutionalization of Involuntary Sexual Mutilation in the United States" in George C. Denniston & Marilyn Fayre Milos (eds). Sexual Mutilations; A Human Tragedy. Springer, 1997: 32.
      • Joanne Meyerowitz. How Sex Changed: A History of Transsexuality in the United States. Cambridge, Ma, London: Harvard University Press, 2002: 214, 216, 222, 227, 252.
      • Rosalyne Blumenstein,. Branded T. 1st Books Library, 2003: 70.
      • Tania Modleski "Women's Cinema as Counterphobic Cinema: Doris Wishman as the Last Auteur"; Chuck Kleinhans "Pornography and Documentary: Narrating the Alibi" in Jeffrey Sconce. Sleaze Artists: Cinema at the Margins of Taste. Duke University Press, 2007:60-2, 112-4, 119.
      • SJ Parker. Emails to Zagria, 22,28 September 2013.
      EN.WIKIPEDIA   
      ______________________________________________________
        Apparently 'Wishman' is Doris' birth name, and there is no implication from it of her being transgender.

        What should we make of Dr Leo Wollman?  Was he a second Harry Benjamin who helped almost 3,000 transsexuals on their way, or was he a hypnotist conman who associated with dubious practioners and took the patients whom Benjamin was unsure about.   Or was he a mixture of the two.  His involvement with Doris Wishman in producing a film that is best regarded as camp has not helped his reputation.  Either way there were no eulogies after his death as there were for Benjamin.   His publications are mainly short, and there is no biography of him.

        The Carl Cappolino trial was in December 1966.   18 months later Robert Kennedy was assassinated, purportedly by  Sirhan Sirhan.   This assassination is frequently cited as a hypnotic subject being compelled to kill.  Philip H. Melanson's. The Robert F. Kennedy Assassination: New Revelations on the Conspiracy and Cover-Up, 1968-1991.  S.P.I. Books, 1994 actually quotes Leo Wollman on the topic as ironic background while arguing for the opposite.

        Female circumcision is, among other reasons, condemned in that it, far from curing frigidity, removes the clitoris and thus any possibility of sexual pleasure.

        The Wollman quote in Benjamin's The Transsexual Phenomenon is:
        "Before irrevocable surgery makes the transition from male to female physically permanent, it is essential that a psychiatric evaluation and a psychological examination be done. This is indicated for the protection of the physician as well as the patient. Also a period of observation under estrogen therapy to reduce libido and tension is recommended.
        It is suggested, as an avant garde technique, that hypnotic progression might be an important asset in the true evaluation of the transsexual's needs and aspirations. This projection into the future may, in some cases, dispel certain faulty attitudes and provide the faltering future female with second thoughts before definitive surgery.
        Following the preparatory estrogen hormone therapy to provide breast tissue and decrease the male libidinous feelings, the transsexual embarks upon a new life immediately after the surgical removal of the external male sexual apparatus and the creation of a functional vaginal sheath. Many varying surgical procedures have been divised and are being carried out with equivocal results. However, in those cases where medicine and surgery have successfully created a phenotypic female, the "gynecological" problems of the male-to-female individual merit special attention.
        For this patient, patient understanding and gentle treatment are necessary. The most frequent complaint after the operation, excluding the painful convalescence, is urinary frequency usually due to a urethro-cystitis. Antibiotic treatment will effect a rapid surcease from the disquieting urinary signs and symptoms.
        A rather unusual urinary complaint is the control of the direction of the urine stream flowing from the urethra. If the urethral opening remains high, the flow will run over the rim of the toilet seat. This messy condition may be prevented by adjusting the tilt of the pelvis to permit the urine to flow into the bowl.
        Another common complaint is the inability of the transsexual (now a female) to consummate sexual intercourse. This may be due to many factors. Notable among these are 1) an artistic vagina, 2) a narrow introits, 3) a thin vaginorectal septum, 4) an insufficiently lubricated vaginal canal, 5) vaginal bleeding from the apex of the freshly scarred vaginal pouch after vigorous coitus.
        Treatment for these aforementioned dyspareunic states will vary with the condition found. Simple hygienic measures, proper lubrication methods, new coital techniques, dilatation by means of a Kelly aluminum dilator or a bakelite Young's dilator or a solid plastic mold worn with a flattened superior surface to protect the urethral passage, and sensible advice usually meted out to newly-weds are some of the physical and psychophysiological treatments found effective.
        Above all, it is imperative for the gynecologist to regard his patient as a "female" - as "she" so rightly deserves to be considered after the lengthy and costly efforts to become a physical female. A great deal of research is indicated by the medical and psychological investigators before more consistent help can be offered to these male transsexuals, now ostensibly functioning females. The Harry Benjamin Foundation is now actively engaged in a research program of this type."

        Lee Si-yeon 이시연 (1979 - ) model, actress.

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        Lee dae-hak was educated at the Daejeon University Fashion Design Department, and first made a name as a male model. He was known for a feminine appearance and wearing women's clothing on the catwalk – the first model to do so in South Korea.

        Lee appeared in the films My Boss, My Hero (2001) and Sex Is Zero (2002), providing comic relief in effeminate male roles. However he felt pressured into cutting his hair and building up muscle.

        This led to several suicide attempts, and then Lee resolved the issue by deciding to become a woman. She took the given name Si-yeon, and had genital surgery in 2007.

        She returned to acting later that year in the sequel Sex Is Zero 2, with her character from the original film now also a transsexual. Lee publicly announced her change prior to the release of the film, was apprehensive about the reaction from audiences, but it went well.

        TOP 10 TRANSSEXUAL ENTERTAINERS IN ASIAEN.WIKIPEDIA    KO.WIKIPEDIA    IMDB

        Jo Clifford (1949–) playwright

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        John Clifford was born in Stoke-on-Trent. His mum died when he was young, and he was sent to a boarding school in Bristol that was sports orientated and he never fitted in, except for the school plays, where he was usually put in a girl's part. Clifford remembers getting into costume and make-up for the first time:
        "It was... wow! But the second time I got terrified. I thought I must be a sick person. I was so frightened."
        He read modern languages at St Andrews University (founded 1410) in Fife, where he met his life partner, Sue Innes, also an immigrant from England, who became a feminist historian and columnist for Scotland on Sunday. They lived in a commune in Fife and had two daughters.

        Sue was the first person with whom Clifford discussed being transgender. While Sue was a very fierce feminist, who believed that the end of capitalism was nigh, that the nuclear family was wrong, and that it was important to live differently, she said that she was heterosexual and loved Clifford as John.

        Clifford worked as bus conductor, a nurse and a yoga instructor before turning to theatre at the age of 30. In 1985 Clifford's play Losing Venice was a major hit at Edinburgh's Traverse Theatre, and was invited to 21 festivals, but made it to only two. There have been many plays since, but not until 1999 did Clifford's first play about being transgender, The Night Journey, open.

        Respecting Sue's feelings, Clifford expressed transgender by dressing androgynously and in writing plays, and came out to his friends at his 50th birthday. In 2002 he wrote God's New Frock, which was largely autobiographical.

        Sue died in 2005 at age 56 of a brain tumour. Grief-stricken as he was, Clifford was now able to make the decision that she had put off:
        “… I realised I couldn't go on living as a man. I couldn't bear people taking me for a man. I didn't want to be called Sir. I started taking hormones and a whole new life began. … I'm done and really happy. I'm not a woman but I have to pass as one because if I make it too obvious that I'm biologically male every time I walk the street I'm at risk of being insulted and abused. You wouldn't believe how appalling some people are."
        Jo has also adapted Anna Karenina, Goethe's Faust and Great Expectations for the stage. Much of her work these days deals with gender identity. In 2009 her play Jesus, Queen of Heaven was staged at Glasgay! It portrayed Jesus as a trans women, with Jo playing the role herself. It was strongly condemned by various churches, which resulted in the sale of all remaining seats.  2012 saw the first production of Sex, Chips and the Holy Ghost, which features a transsexual nun and a gay priest.

        Jo Clifford is the author of over 70 works in every Dramatic medium. Her work has been translated into many languages and has been performed all over the world.

        She lives in Edinburgh.
        "Yes, yes, I'm so lucky. The common way to look at being transgendered is to see it as a great misfortune. There is a lot of suffering and I wouldn't wish it on my own worst enemy. But there's a fantastic richness and it's enabled me to live. Since coming out, it's such fun, I can't tell you."
        DOOLLEE   IMDB   AMAZON.CO.UK


        IOS Pink List 2013

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        The Independent on Sunday Pink List of 101 LGBT persons who made a difference is just published.

        Trans persons included:


        1.  Paris Lees, Editor META magazine.

        8.  Jackie Green who entered the Miss England 2012 competition, and has since become an activist.

        13. Jennie Kermode and Helen Belcher of Trans Media Watch.

        23.  Luke Anderson, Big Brother 2012 winner, chef.    WIKIPEDIA  

        27. Sarah Brown, Cambridge Councillor and  the only out transgender politician in Britain.   WIKIPEDIA  

        40. Jane Fae, journalist.  GVWW

        41. CN Lester, musician, writer, activist.

        43.  Tara Hewitt, chair of Wirral Conservative Future and deputy chair of Conservative Future North West.

        60. Juliet Jacques, columnist and blogger,  blog longlisted for the 2011 Orwell prize.  WIKIPEDIA

        61. Roz Kaveney, writer and activist. GVWW   WIKIPEDIA 

        69. Natacha Kennedy, Lecturer, Goldsmiths College, co-chair of Camden LGBT Forum, sits on LGBT Labour’s national committee and is a founder member of London Trans Diversity and the Trans Teachers’ Association.

        79. Lewis Hancox & Raphael Fox, after appearing in Channel 4’s My Transsexual Summer in 2011, Hancox and Fox formed My Genderation Films to make documentaries about the trans community.

        96. Jay Stewart, past chair of FTM London, Co-founder, Gendered Intelligence,working on a PhD entitled “Trans on Telly: Popular Documentary and the Production of Transgender Knowledge”.

        Supplementary lists.
        National Treasures

        April Ashley         GVWW        WIKIPEDIA


        Lauren Harries   GVWW      WIKIPEDIA

        Stephen Whittle                       WIKIPEDIA

        Paul O'Grady/Lily Savage     GVWW      WIKIPEDIA

        George O'Dowd     GVWW     WIKIPEDIA


        Alice Purnell, Beaumont Society


        Ones to Watch

        Sophie Green, artist & illustrator  

        Nicole Gibson, model   

        Jo Clifford, playwright     GVWW




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