Anna Heming (1913 - 1981) sailor, retailer, pioneer

Heming, despite early feelings that she should be female, worked as a sailor, was tattooed and married in the 1940s, and had children.   

After an auto-orchiectomy Anna Heming had completion surgery in Switzerland in 1959.   She and her wife remained married, but eventually divorced in 1971.

Anna combined both stereotypical masculine and feminine occupations.   She made her own clothes, and built a house, brick by brick.  She set up an electrical and second-hand goods shop in Bristol.   She also made electronic organs (the musical kind), and was known for spending time and energy helping younger transsexuals.

After she retired, she suffered badly from depression, and took her own life at age 68.   As she had never had her birth certificate re-issued, she was listed as male on her death certificate.

· Liz Hodgkinson,. Bodyshock: the truth about changing sex. Columbus, 1987. Virgin 1991:121-3.

-------------

If not for the happenstance of Anna meeting Liz Hodgkinson, her story would have been lost.

Who did her surgery in Switzerland is not stated.   We should note that it was a year earlier than April Ashley's surgery in Casablanca.

   

Arlette-Irène Leber (1912 - ?) first Swiss gender surgery

Original version: October 2009.

Arnold-Lèon Leber was Swiss although born in Germany. Leber’s father disappeared during the Great War, and was replaced by a step-father given to drunkenness who in turn disappeared when Leber was 11.

By then Leber was already praying, to God and to the fairies, to be turned into a girl.

Leber completed high school and became a clothing salesman (a position that required an apprenticeship). In 1932 Leber was called up to do military service and was pleased to be assigned to be a nurse. However rheumatic fever brought this to an end, and Leber returned to selling women’s clothing. This facilitated cross-dressing although it remained very private.

With the depression Leber was no longer able to earn enough, and was arrested 22 times for non-payment of debts and petty larceny. After release he worked for some time in Germany. On return he was arrested as a spy and served 18 months in gaol.

After unsatisfactory sexual affairs with both men and woman, Leber was admitted to a psychiatric clinic in Berne. He threatened suicide if they did not turn him into a woman. He had read about such changes in a Prague newspaper – he read up on the scientific literature of the day about sex changes. The doctors regarded him as a morally defective transvestite, and were considering committing him to an institution. Warned of this he escaped to Geneva.

A psychiatrist there treated Leber with psychotherapy supplemented with ovarian hormones, but without success. In 1941, he referred the patient to Dr Charles Wolf, the noted surgeon in La Chaux-de-Fonds. Leber threatened suicide if not changed into a woman. Dr Wolf was struck by Leber’s feminine contour of the body and her developed breasts. He agreed to operate. He did an orchiectomy in October 1941, a penectomy in January 1942 and a vaginoplasty in October 1942. The method was a variation on that of Dr WF Sneguireff of Paris who had created a vagina for a cis woman in 1898 using a segment of her rectum – Wolf used a segment of Leber’s intestine. The last operation did not go well and Leber had to spend five weeks in hospital and then another five weeks under close medical supervision at home.

Leber, now using the name Arlette-Irène, quickly applied to the legal authorities that she be able to call herself a woman, and to dress so. Her psychiatrist formally supported this request. The court appointed two experts to study and to decide the matter. They were Dr Jean Clerc, Professor of Legal Medicine at the University of Neuchâtel, and Dr Otto Riggenbach, Psychiatric Consultant to the Physician-in-Chief of the Swiss Army. They took two years. They considered the precedent of Margrith Businger who was able to change her civic status in 1931 after only an orchiectomy.

Clerc described Leber as a constitutional invert. As surgical changes were complete, the bearing of a masculine name was likely to be a source of continual trouble and a change of civic status was justified.

Riggenbach found that Leber was a psychopathic personality with little moral sense, hysterical and masochistic tendencies, but would not have pursued a change of sex unless a powerful biological urge had driven him to do so. However he seemed much happier and calmer since assuming the role of a woman. Riggenbach said that Leber should be permitted to change civic status, but be kept under constant supervision and be forbidden to marry.

The Cantonal Court decided that the issue was medical and not legal. By a majority of one, Leber’s request was granted (despite the refusal of the judge to sign the verdict). Riggenbach’s constraints were not imposed. Leber’s civic status was changed to female, she was removed from the voters’ roll (Swiss women did not get the vote until 1971), and she got a partial tax refund.

For two years she was unemployed, but then found a full-time job in Biel/Bienne.

In 1956, Riggenbach evaluated her and concluded: ‘The operation, on the one part, combined with the permission of the authorities to change her civic status, on the other, has turned an unstable and unhappy individual into a useful and contented member of society’.

 It is not known what happened to Mme Leber after that.

• Eugene de Savitsch. Homosexuality, Transvestism and Change of Sex. Springfield Ill: Charles C. Thomas 1958: Chp 10, 11.
• Katrina C Rose. “Desperately Seeking Arlette (and the Precedent She Set)”. Christielee.net. Online.
• Annette Runte. Biographische Operationen: Diskurse der Transsexualität. Wilhelm Fink Verlag, 1996: 528-9, 569, 573, 579. 

Phoebe Smith (1939–) Part I: retail worker

(Phoebe transitioned in Atlanta in the 1960s.   In those days she had great difficulty in finding out about other transsexuals, and in finding any professionals who even knew where to point her, let alone to actually help.   If she were in New York or Paris, she would have had more information even in the 1960s – but she did not know that. Fortunately she was determined.)


James Smith was born to a family of sharecroppers in Irwin County, US Georgia. His relatives referred to him as a ‘sissy’ from an early age, and he was bullied at school, more so because of his disinterest in sports.

In September 1953, the family pickup was hit by a flatbed truck. The father had his left arm crushed and had to give up farming; the mother was in constant pain afterwards. They moved to Atlanta. At the new school Smith was called ‘queer’.

In 1955 a neighbor showed him a magazine article about someone who had a sex-change operation, and asked him why he did not have it also. Smith wrote to a preacher on the radio that he had been listening to, and later phoned him. This was the first time that he ever told someone that he wanted to change sex. The preacher said that he saw nothing wrong or sinful in Smith’s desire, but couldn’t offer any help. In September 1956 Smith attempted suicide by taking his mother’s pain pills. After recovery he insisted on quitting school – he was then seventeen.

After temporary and part-time work, Smith found a position at Rich’s Department Store where he stayed for ten years. Every now and then there would be an article in the news about a transsexual, but when Smith attempted to correspond with a doctor or psychiatrist, he was told that a change of sex was impossible.

In November 1961 Smith was called to report to the Draft Board. He explained himself and was classified 4-F. If questioned he said that this was because of a bad back resulting from the 1953 road crash. Around this time, his father driving a cement mixer was hit by a train on a crossing. Smith’s younger brother joined the US Marines, but was discharged after being diagnosed with chronic bronchitis.

By 1964 Smith had rented a mailbox and was writing letters prolifically: to doctors, to medical universities, to politicians. Many were not answered; some were rudely answered. One, who was helpful, was Amy Larkin, the agony aunt at the Atlanta Constitution (actually a pseudonym for Olive Ann Burns (1924 – 1990) who later became renowned for her novel Cold Sassy Tree). Larkin passed anonymous information about Smith to Harry Benjamin in New York (who was then working with John Money so that the Johns Hopkins Gender Identity Clinic would open the next year). Benjamin wrote back that “there seems very little doubt that this patient is a transsexual”.

Larkin arranged an appointment with a local endocrinologist, but he, despite the letter from Benjamin, maintained that what was wanted could not be done.

Smith wrote to the Governor of Georgia who passed the letter to the Dean of the Medical College of Georgia who replied that the surgery was illegal within Georgia.

Smith contacted Atlanta Constitution journalist, Dick Herbert, who became interested and wrote a sympathetic story (by the standards of the time) using a pseudonym: “Long-Ill Tim Gets New Hope to Solve Endocrine Malady”.

Smith applied to Georgia Vocational Rehabilitation and Georgia Mental Health Institute. They responded with a mixture of ignoring him, giving a run-around and even rudeness. In 1968 Smith saw Christine Jorgensen on the Merv Griffin television show, and wrote to ask for Christine’s address. Christine put Smith in touch with a doctor, who in turn gave the names and addresses of two surgeons: Dr Burou in Casablanca and Dr Barbosa in Tijuana. Smith decided on the latter.

In January 1969, Smith moved out of the family home to stay with a friend; resigned his job; sent a letter to his parents saying for the first time that he was transsexual and asking them to borrow $4,200 against their house to lend to him. Smith paid $200 for a flight to Los Angeles, and then took a train to San Diego, crossed the border into Mexico at 2am. After resting in a hotel, Smith arrived at Dr Barbosa’s office – still in male clothes.

Dr Barbosa examined Smith and then explained that he required a full year of hormone therapy prior to surgery. Further examination discovered a thyroid problem. Dr Barbosa compromised and treatment for the thyroid condition was provided as well as an orchiectomy. While in the clinic, Smith contemplated a female name and decided on Phoebe.

She had brought a mail-order catalogue with her and made her first purchases of female clothing. On return to Atlanta, Phoebe was welcomed by her family and relatives. The mail-order purchases had arrived, and from that day on, she never wore male clothing again.

Continued in Part II.

Victor Barker: Part II - husband, actor, manager

Part I: origins: daughter, wife, mother
Part II: husband, actor, manager
Part III: the trial
Part IV: reactions and afterwards


Sir Victor Barker DSO settled in at the Grand Hotel, Brighton. He visited a gentleman’s outfitters and purchased two or three suits, including a dress suit for evening wear, shirts, collars ties, etc. The asset sales from the farm and the sale of his mother’s jewellery, and his small annuity would carry him for the time being. His three-year-old son was cared for elsewhere in Brighton. He participated in tennis, swimming and horse riding with the other hotel residents.

Elfrida Haward arrived on the second day. Barker had explained:

“I told Miss Haward that I was not what she thought I was; I told her that I was a man who had been injured in the war; that I was really a man acting as a woman for family reasons. I made some excuse about it being my mother’s wish, and she believed it.”

The son was explained as with a first wife who had died, and the daughter was of Peace Crouch and his wife from whom he was now separated. Barker did concede though that

“I think that she had some doubt as to my being a baronet. I explained that I had dropped the title while living on my farm, but had assumed it again in the hope that it might help me get a job. I don’t think she swallowed this tale, though she never said much.”

Elfrida would later claim that she did not know that he was a woman until the trial and she understood that Victor could not have 'normal relations' because of an abdominal wound received during the war.

However Victor's previous persona, Mrs Peace-Crouch, had patronized the shop. Victor Barker was able to convince Elfrida's father that he had lived much of his life as a woman because his mother had always wanted a girl and had taken advantage of the death of the father to impose this whim. However he had also been an army Colonel, had served with the British Expeditionary Force in France, and had been awarded a DSO.

However, once this tale was digested, a new problem arose. The young man – albeit supposedly a woman – had spent a night with Elfrida in her bedroom. To avoid scandal they must marry. For Elfrida, this was a good match: a tradesman’s daughter and a knighted military man. However her parents, while permitting the marriage did not care for Sir Victor. They cancelled their plans to settle a sum of money on Elfrida at marriage.

Because the parents did not care to wait through the customary reading of banns on three consecutive Sundays, Victor applied for a marriage license. To do this he had to produce both their birth certificates, and make a sworn affidavit that

“he believeth that there is no impediment of any kindred or alliance or of any other lawful cause, or any suit commenced in any Ecclesiastical Court to bar or hinder the proceeding of the said Matrimony according to the Tenor of such licence”.

The impediment of alliance was not mentioned, nor was his biological sex; and a forged birth certificate was produced. Victor and Elfrida were married 14 November 1923 at St Peter’s, the parish church of Brighton. The ceremony was performed by the curate as the vicar collapsed and died while running for a bus that very morning.

From a meeting at the Grand Hotel, Barker became involved in the Brighton Repertory Company where he was paid 10/- a week. However his lifestyle required more. He opened an antiques and second hand furniture shop in Andover, Hampshire. He also bought a .32 Webley pistol and obtained a certificate for it. He sang in the Andover choir and played with the local cricket club. However he did not know much about antiques, they left town owing £457 to a fellow officer.

Barker did have some success as an actor. Using the stage name of Ivor Gauntlet, he obtained parts in touring productions playing against famous actresses such as Mrs Patrick Campbell and Dolores. However his voice broke down after the strain of singing in a low register.

And Ivor Gauntlet soon had creditors. A tailor in Birmingham was claiming £40/13/-. An actor was public and easy to trace. Victor Barker resorted to paid employment: farm manager (3 months), kennel manager (1 month) and labourer in a brick works where he contracted chicken pox. Elfrida nursed him back to health.

However by this time she had had enough and went back to her parents, and working in the chemist shop. Barker took rooms in Soho.

the boxer

Either because of a misdelivered letter, or on the suggestion of a fellow resident, in late 1926 Barker came into contact with Colonel Henry Rippon Seymour, the leader of the National Fascisti, a splinter group from the British Fascists. He became the live-in secretary of the group and gained the flat above their offices at 5a Hogarth Road, Earls Court. At that time the National Fascisti had a membership of less than 400.

Barker was in his element. He often wore his medals (actually those of Pearce-Crough), gave fencing and boxing lessons to the young recruits, and advised them of the folly of getting mixed up with women.

On 8 March 1927 a small group of fascisti, mainly from the Croydon branch, dissatisfied with Seymour’s usurpation of leadership, burst into the offices. Seymour grabbed his sword, and the Webley pistol from the drawer of the desk and threatened to shoot the first man.

The police arrived. They took possession of the pistol. Seymour appeared at the West London Police Court the next day and pleaded guilty to common assault and possessing a firearm. However the magistrate directed that the second plea be withdrawn when it was clarified that the gun was Barker’s. It was a Webley pistol, but not the same one as on Barker’s certificate from Andover. He was charged with “uttering a forged firearm certificate”.

At the trial in July Barker presented with his eyes swathed. His counsel explained that ‘temporary blindness owing to war wounds’ had flared up. He was found not guilty and discharged.

His firearms certificate was cancelled; he quit the National Fascisti; the Public Prosecution Office wrote to the War Office to ascertain Colonel Barker’s war record; they discovered rumours from Andover about a woman masquerading as a man. However the Prosecutor’s Office dismissed the rumours about a woman, and did not proceed.

Also in July 1927, Tom Barker died of tuberculosis, age 28. He left £1,000 to his sister Valerie. This enabled Barker, and a second Mrs Barker, to rent an expensive flat (£295 per annum) in Mayfair, and employed a valet. His son came to visit regularly, but the current Mrs Barker was always sent away on these occasions.

Barker often held dinner parties for officers whom he had met while in the National Fascisti. From this grew the idea of a fellowship for the British survivors of the Battle of Mons, August 1914. The inaugural dinner was held in Barker’s flat 17 December 1927 with fourteen veterans. However the events proved so successful, that they had to be moved to a hotel.

This was done in association with Colonel Neave, who in fact had been present at Valerie's wedding to Harold Arkell-Smith, but who was completely convinced by Colonel Barker's knowledge of military manoeuvres. Some thought that Barker looked a bit odd, but when he talked about his experiences in the war, he was completely convincing.

With of the success of the Mons dinners, Barker felt that he could run a restaurant. In February 1928, he found one to lease just off Charing Cross Rd, and renamed it Mascot Café. The Daily Sketch received an anonymous tipoff that Colonel Barker was really a woman, and sent a reporter. Twice he engaged Barker in conversation, but was unable to fault his manhood.


However the café did not thrive. He owed a considerable sum in back-rent and the landlady was losing patience. He surrendered the café, moved to cheaper accommodation and found a job as reception clerk at the Regent Palace Hotel.


_____________________________________________________

Rose Collis' biography of Barker, the most reliable source, definitely states that the two guns were Webleys.   However the EN.Wikipedia on the National Fascisti insists it was a colt,   It does not cite Collis at all, but relies on Martin Pugh's Hurrah For The Blackshirts!: Fascists and Fascism in Britain Between the Wars, 2006, but this merely says 'revolver'.  (Pugh, for some reason refuses to be polite, and uses female pronouns throughout). This EN.Wikipedia article summarizes Barker's involvement:  "In 1927 a leading member was "Colonel Victor Barker", who was actually a cross-dresser by the name Valerie Arkell-Smith. Her fellow National Fascisti members did not know she was a woman and treated her as a man and she became secretary to Rippon-Seymour as well as training members in the boxing and fencing clubs."  This of course distorts the issue and misses the point.

Surely Seymour could have pleaded self-defence.

The EN.Wikipedia page on English Fascists includes Valerie Arkell-Smith but not Victor Barker.

Clara Miller (1899 - ?) fur merchant, office worker

Ralph was born in London, the 11^th of 13 children to Jewish parents, The father was a fur merchant of varying success, and also a Yiddish language novelist and playwright, although without any success.

At age five, Ralph contracted diphtheria, and for nine weeks was on the verge of death. From then on an older sister encouraged him to wear girls’ clothes and took him for walks so dressed. Even dressed as a boy he was regarded as effeminate, and would be beaten up by the boys at school.

The father refused a bar mitzvah for Ralph because of his effeminacy. At 15 he was taken from school and went to work for a friend of the father. One night, working late, he was raped by two co-workers, a boy and a girl. He told his father, who called the police and both assailants were sentenced to five years in prison. The girl died there.

Ralph, as Clara, went out at night, and found a sweetheart who kissed and held hands. However Clara finally had to tell the truth and the relationship ended. At 16 Clara asked the family doctor that her male organs be removed. The doctor called in the parents, and the father gave Ralph a good beating.

At 17 he was sent to New York to help a brother run the business. The brother let Ralph be Clara and even took her to parties. In 1918 Ralph enlisted in the US Army to make a man of himself. However he could not take it and deserted.

In 1921 he returned to London, as his father was dying. With his mother he took over the business, but the stress made him ill-tempered and he flew into rages. Despite this the business prospered. Clara met another who also aspired to become a woman. In 1923 Ralph met May, a young woman, 17. Under pressure from his mother, Ralph and May became engaged and then married. He could perform sexually, only underneath and when wearing something feminine. They managed to have a son and a daughter in the first three years, and then discontinued sexual activity.

They returned to New York, where Ralph became an office worker. He wore female clothing at home, and sometimes went out so dressed, against May’s objections, and later the children’s strong objections.

Ralph served in the US Army in the Second World War in North Africa, and admitted his earlier desertion. Early in 1945 he found work at the Veterans Administration as a clerk. He was also elected president of his local Veterans of Foreign Wars branch.

At the end of 1944, his daughter Barby and her husband set up a small business, and moved in with Ralph and May to save expenses. Barby nagged him constantly that he was not to be seen in female clothing. This got worse after the birth of a grandchild.

In spring 1947, after a late-night scene with Barby, Ralph dressed quickly and went out. He encountered a rookie policemen keen to make an arrest, and was charged with male prostitution. He was lucky to get a considerate judge, who required only a psychiatric report, after which he was released.

The fights with Barby got worse, and Ralph made a suicide attempt. Shortly afterwards, Barby, her husband and child moved to California. Ralph was able to be Clara more often.

She she became a patient of Harry Benjamin, and had surgery in 1957. Three years later she started living with a man, fifteen years younger, who was separated but could not obtain a divorce because he was Catholic.

Clara reports that they have excellent sex, and that the man has no idea about her earlier life. For a while she had associated with two other trans women, but broke away in case they gave away her secret. She reported being happier and better adjusted than before, and has no regrets about transition.

• Harry Benjamin. The Transsexual Phenomenon. Julian Press, 1966. Warner Books Edition 1977: 256-272, 289-298. PDF: 118-128, 136-8.

________________________________________________________________________________

In "The Transsexual Operation" by Tom Buckly, Esquire. April 1967,  we find:

Is this Clara?

Betty (?1938 - ?) female impersonator, salesgirl, model

Betty was raised in the US Northwest, one of five children. He was initially permitted to dress as a girl, but his parents divorced when he was five, and the step-father objected to the cross-dressing.

At 15, Betty was raped. At 16 she read about Christine Jorgensen and knew what she wanted. She had seen the Jewel Box Review when it came to town, and a close friend had obtained a position there as a chorus boy. After winning first prize at a local Halloween ball she sent photographs to the friend at Jewel Box Review, and got back a wire from the manager offering a job.

She grew her hair to shoulder length, which led to complications when out in male guise – this being over a decade before men began growing their hair long. After a two-month club residency, the troupe played Betty’s home town, and then she was laid off.

She asked her parents to permit that she have a sex change – she being a minor – but they refused, and at their request she visited a psychiatrist. The psychiatrist discovered what Betty already knew: she was androphilic and desperately wanted to become a woman. She continued to find find work as a female impersonator.

At age 20, after a period of despondency at not having a female body, he decided to return to being a man, cut his hair short and then volunteered to join the US Navy. He was almost rejected when the medical inspection discovered the old rape, but he asserted that he had been a victim, and was accepted. He was assigned to record keeping, and deployed to Japan, where he quickly discovered the gay bars, and then a male geisha house. Citing his female impersonator experience, he was taken on as a male geisha. She had a thrill when several of her shipmates came into the bar, but they did not recognize her. Back in the US he had an affair with a man in Oklahoma City.

One day after being honorably discharged she was back on the stage as a female impersonator. During a nine-month engagement at a “well-known club” in New York, she met two performers who had transitioned, and knew instantly that she wanted to do the same. She grew her hair again, and started going out as a woman, quite successfully even before starting female hormones. When her show went on tour, she stayed in New York to continue hormone treatment. She found another job as an impersonator-dancer at a “major nightspot”.

Late in 1961 she was invited to the table of a man, an ambassador of a Latin American country, who invited her first to have a drink, and then offered to pay for her transformation. He “took me to an internationally famous endocrinologist, whose prices I could never have afforded”. She also underwent electrolysis to eliminate her facial hair.

A year later, July 1962, she was ready for surgery, and the ambassador arranged a trip to Casablanca. In Paris she was joined by another impersonator making the same journey. The cost at the Casablanca clinic was US$1250. The operation apparently went well. However a week later when she was back in Paris, she suffered continual vaginal bleeding, and went to a US hospital. A week of douching fixed the problem. On return to the US, Betty felt obliged to explain to immigration why she had only female clothes in her suitcase: that she was a professional female impersonator.

For a few months she worked as a prostitute, “to prove to myself that I was really a woman”, but then found such work distasteful. She worked as a salesgirl, and as a fashion model. She finally won acceptance from her mother and step-father. She started writing, with the aid of professional writer, her autobiography. During the mid-1960s she acted as a confessor and adviser to other transsexuals in the city.

• Harry Benjamin. The Transsexual Phenomenon. Julian Press, 1966. Warner Books Edition 1977: 239-255, 308-313.

________________________________

The Transsexual Lives Appendix to Harry Benjamin’s book by REL Masters says that “Betty” is a pseudonym, although she uses it for herself in her autobiographical segment. Other than that we do not have a name for her.

It is a problem for the historian that Betty does not give the name of the clubs where she works, or the doctors that she went to, although the “internationally famous endocrinologist, whose prices I could never have afforded” is obviously Benjamin and the surgeon in Casablanca is obviously Dr Burou. If there is any information about her after 1966, it is not found in that we do not have her name. Is the “well-known club” in New York the 82 Club?

Jan Morris also had need of further medical attention after returning from Dr Burou’s clinic.

One wonders if the unnamed ambassador asked for anything, sexual of otherwise in return. However we have come across another rich man, Rex/Gloria who paid for younger trans women to go to Dr Burou without such requests.

The information about Betty is in two parts. An excerpt from her unpublished autobiography, and a clinical overview by Masters. Despite having her account to consult, Masters is sloppy with facts. He puts her first attempt at surgery, which was vetoed by the parents, before the first period of working as an impersonator; he says that Betty joined the Army rather than the Navy. Also he continues to refer to Betty as ‘he’ even after surgery.

We have no information about Betty after Benjamin's book in 1966.

Peter Stirling (1936–2000) shoe retailer

Jean Webb was raised in Melbourne. She was in the Women's Royal Australian Air Force, and afterwards worked in shoe retailing, and in both had a number of crushes on and from women – one of whom later said to her:

"like it or not, you are more male than female" (p62).

However Jean desired to be normal, she married a man, became Mrs Dent and had a daughter, although she was uncomfortable with the female sexual role.

She explained all this to a psychiatrist who accused her of being a fantasist. A later doctor referred her to Dr Nuffield who was much more sympathetic. However he said to her:

"Why don't you just dress yourself in men's clothes?"

Jean did not relate to this suggestion.

“Don't you feel like a man?'
“How do I know? How does a man feel? I certainly do know that a change of clothes will not change what I feel.”
“You have never thought that perhaps you should have been born a boy?”
“Oh yes, I've thought that all right”. (p85-6).

So Dr Nuffield advised that she travel to the UK, as appropriate specialists were not then found in Australia - although he did not provide a referral. He did provide the address of Guys Hospital, London, and as an alternative, that of Professor Hamburger in Copenhagen.

Jean left in December 1962 leaving her daughter with her mother. In London, she found a flat and a job in shoe retailing. She was able to talk herself into becoming a patient at the Endocrine Clinic, Guy’s Hospital, London, where her primary contact was social worker Margaret Branch.

A psychiatrist, Dr Marks evaluated her and concluded, as Jean phrased it:

"He also explained that as far as he could ascertain from the facts he had I must have grown up with a rather masculine outlook, particularly when my independence and aggressiveness were taken into account, for my history showed a distinct inclination to lead rather than to follow" (p109).

A physical examination led to a rather different conclusion. She was told her that her chromosomes were 47 XXY, and she was becoming more male and that if she had waited another couple of years, she would not have been able to have a child. They explained that this extra chromosome altered her hormones and caused non-lesbian women to fall for her. They proposed surgery and hormones to turn her into a man, but they would not start doing this until she was divorced from her husband.

An ironic event in September 1965 was that she was arrested on Westminster Bridge by two police constables who assumed that she was a man in drag, an assumption quickly dropped when they arrived at the well-lit Canon Row Police Station.

After a long wait, during which she worked as a bus conductor and a store detective, in December 1967 and early 1968, her divorce became final, she had her hysterectomy, started taking male hormones, started wearing male clothes. He took the name 'Peter' which his mother had said would have been his name if born male.

The hospital arranged for a national insurance card, medical card and tax form in his new name, and also arranged for the Australian High Commission to issue a new passport, but the High Commission informed them that birth certificates were never altered. Mrs Branch commented:

“[This] I think is the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard! It's a pity you weren't British, there would be no hassle here.” (p203).

Peter married co-worker Jennifer in an Anglican Church.

In January 1970 Guy's Hospital hosted an international convention, and Peter agreed to be interviewed by a panel of doctors.

“'Don't you get a thrill wearing men's clothes?' 

“Not at all', I replied. ….
'What drugs did you take during that time?'
'Drugs?' 
'Yes, narcotics, hash, that type of thing.'
'I've never taken drugs, except for my fags.'
'Never!' came the surprised remark.” (p224)

Peter worked mainly in shoe retailing after transition, rising to branch manager.

In 1974 Peter returned to Australia with his wife and started to reconnect to his original family, especially his mother and daughter. Again he mainly worked in shoe retailing.

One problem was that when he renewed his passport, “they stamped 'F' for female on my new passport right beside a picture of my bearded face”. (p249) This took months to sort out, and again Peter had to call on the assistance of staff at Guy's Hospital.

++Peter died at age 64 in 2000.

* not the biochemist, nor the lawyer, nor the golfer

• Peter Stirling. So Different: an Extraordinary Autobiography. Sydney: Simon & Schuster 256pp 1989.
  
• Joe Berger. "This man gave birth to a 7-lb. baby girl!" Weekly World News, 26 Sep 1989: 3. GoogleBooks
  

__________________________________________________________________________

Apart from Peter's autobiography, I could find no discussion of him except for the article in Weekly World News which is obviously based on his book. As he is apparently the first Australian surgical FTM, in fact the first Australian to have transgender surgery (Carlotta and a few others did so in 1972), and the first Australian to get a revised passport, I am surprised that there is no mention of Peter at FTMAustralia, Gender Centre or at OII Australia.

The Australian doctor in 1961 advised that there were no suitable specialists in Australia. An Endocrine Society of Australia had been founded in 1958. Perhaps Dr Nuffield was not aware of it, or perhaps he was aware that they had no members dealing with gender variance. Here is a history of the ESA.

A journey to Dr Hamburger in Copenhagen would have been futile in that the Danish Parliament had reacted to the Jorgensen affair by restricting sex-change operations to Danish nationals, as Charlotte McLeod had found in 1953.

“He also explained that as far as he could ascertain from the facts he had I must have grown up with a rather masculine outlook, particularly when my independence and aggressiveness were taken into account, for my history showed a distinct inclination to lead rather than to follow". Not disagreeing with the path that Jean/Peter took, but the reasons in this quote are not at all reasons to pursue a change of gender. Throughout the time that Jean was in London and attending the Clinic at Guy's, second wave feminism was building. Independence, aggressiveness and an inclination to lead were becoming valued traits in the women's movement.

Jean arrived in England in December 1962, and achieved a divorce in December 1967. It is not explained on what grounds. Five years was the period of separation to obtain a contested divorce following the 1969 Divorce Reform Act. It was not grounds under the 1937 Matrimonial Causes Act, which was until then in effect. Mrs Dent surely could not apply for divorce on grounds of desertion as she was the deserter. History of divorce in England.

Margaret Branch's comment re the Australians refusing to reissue a birth certificate is in retrospect quite ironic as she made it in 1968, only a short while before the start of the Corbett v Corbett trial which would close the reissue of UK birth certificates for transsexuals and some intersex persons until 2004.

Social Worker Margaret Branch apparently helped a lot of transsexuals in the 1960s and 1970s and has an amazing life story of her own. One of her relatives is working on a biography, but very little has been published.

There is no mention in Stirling's book of any of the prominent transsexuals in either the UK or in Australia. The lack of mention of Corbett v Corbett is particularly germane as he was in London as it happened.

A medical postscript confirms that Jean/Peter was born with a female-phenotype “Kleinfelters type syndrome”. It is often assumed that all Kleinfelters persons are male, and that therefore persons like Peter Stirling do not exist. There are alternate opinions – obviously as such persons do exist. The odd thing is that Peter is never mentioned in the discussion. Here is a recent article in OII Australia on female XXY persons, which yet again does not mention Peter.

Violette Morris (Gouraud) (1893 - 1944) Part I: sports champion.

Emilie Paule Marie Violette Morris was born into a family with military connections on her father's side back to the Revolution.

Her paternal grandfather was Louis Michel Morris (1803–1867), a cavalry officer who rose to General for his part in the French conquest of Algeria, and was made a grand officer in the Légion d'honneur. He married a Jewess from the Algerian city of Constantine after already having three children with her. Altogether they had two daughters and three sons:

Paul Louis Morris (1846-1901) who like his father became a General and a chevalier in the Légion d'honneur;

Louis Napoléon Morris (1865-1935) who never knew his father;

Jacques Pierre Morris (1849-1918) who also was a cavalry officer, mainly serving in the colonies, but never rising above the rank of Captain. He was a prisoner-of-war during the Franco-Prussian War of 1870, and later suffered from what might have been epilepsy, as well as from yellow fever. He was also cautioned and served 30 days hard labour for gambling. In 1888 he was put on sick leave, and effectively retired. In 1889 he married the 20-year younger Elisabeth Sakakini (of the prominent Levantine family) in Belgium. Elizabeth brought a significant dowry to supplement Jacques' army pension.

Their first child, Paul, died in his first year. They then had two daughters: Louise (1891-1986) and then Violette. Both daughters were educated at the 12^th-century convent Abbaye de Solières close to Huy in Belgium by English nuns.

Even as a teenager Violette was a notable pugilist, and also outstanding in swimming, cycling and water polo. In 1913 Morris came 5^th in the 8 km French swimming contest – she was the only female competitor.

The next year, three weeks after war was declared, Violette married Cyprien Gouraud (1886-?) the son of a paper maker. Three days later he was mobilized. In 1915 she joined the Red Cross, and later was a motorcyclist for them. However she came down with bronchitis and pleurisy and was six months in hospital.

In 1917 La Morris returned to championship athletics and set the first French record in shot put. Both her parents died in 1918, and shortly afterwards Morris started to wear male clothing, using the excuse that it was her wartime uniform. She never applied for a permission de travestissement.

Her inheritance provided a living, and gave her time to train. That year she also played in the first official women's football match in France. In goal, she played with her head bare (as men did) rather than wearing the prescribed beret. In 1919 she was admitted to the Fédération française de sports féminins (FFSF), and participated in the first Women's World Games in Monte Carlo in 1921 establishing new records for shot-put and javelin. In 1922, at the second female olympics she set records in athletics, and came second in 1,000 m swimming, and won a cycling race. She also took up motor racing, and, the only woman entered, came 4th in the Bol d'Or.

Morris in front of the shop

Cyprien and Violette were divorced in May 1923, and he remarried in October. She opened a car/motorbike accessories shop, Spécialités Violette Morris, at 6, rue Roger-Bacon, using the inheritance from her mother. The rent was 8,000 francs per annum, and the 41,000 franc valuation was all in the stock. She lived in the flat upstairs.

Morris was temporarily suspended for giving performance-enhancing drugs to her football team, for questioning the referees and for doing nothing when the referee was hit by a member of her team. In 1926 Morris was indefinitely suspended from football. She used her name to recruit female athletes for a film. She refused to transfer her licence to another club.

In 1927 the FFSF notified Morris that she was suspended for these violations, and for wearing male clothes. Her smoking and drinking did not help. The FFSF also banned shorts that were too short, playing without a bra, and costumes that were too tight.

A journalist from Paris Midi who questioned Morris apropos the new regulations thought that he must be meeting her husband or brother, "mais non, c'était bien elle, en chair plus qu'en os, habillée d'un complet veston, avec pantalon - comme vous et moi, monsieur - faux col et cravate (but no, it was her in the flesh, dressed in a full jacket with trousers - like you and me, sir - collar and tie)".

Morris in a Benjamin

In 1927 Morris won the motor-racing Bol d'Or, and practised boxing, sparring with Raoul Paoli (1887-1960), the Olympics athlete, champion boxer, wrestler, and rugby player for France.

Morris attended a meeting of the FFSF, and issued a defense of her dress style: "L'habit masculin n'a, à ce que je sache, rien de malséant. J'y suis tenue de par mes obligations professionnelles et tant que les lois de la République française ne m'en empêcheront pas, rien ni personne ne peuvent m'interdire un costume qui, vous en conviendrez, est toujours décent (There is nothing, to my knowledge, unseemly about male clothing. I am bound by my professional obligations and by the laws of the French Republic, but they do not prevent me, nothing and nobody can forbid me to dress in a way that you will agree, is still decent)". However this argument did not convince, and Morris was expelled from the FFSF, and thereby from all French championships and the French team for the Olympics where she was expected to win gold medals.

The 1928 Olympics were held in Amsterdam, although only a few women's events were included; Morris was not on the French team.

In 1929 Morris went further, and using the excuse of fitting into a racing car, publicly had a double mastectomy (what today we would call top surgery) at the clinic of Dr. Cazalis in the suburb of La Garenne-Colombes.

during the trial

Morris sued the FFSF for reinstatement and 100,000 francs in damages. While her case was against the arbitrary use of power, the trial focused on the right to wear male clothing. Her male lawyer defended the inherent decency of trousers, and questioned why trousers had been okay with the FFSF for ten years, but no longer. He contrasted Morris with Victor Barker in England who had attempted to pass as male. The FFSF had two female lawyers, one of whom, Yvonne Netter, was a noted feminist, divorced and an advocate of planned parenthood. They explained that because of their responsibility to the government (which provided grants) and to parents, they must set good examples. Morris was accused of cross-dressing to attract attention. They noted how female clothing had evolved from the long skirts and corsets of the pre-war era. They portrayed Morris as being a moral danger in female locker rooms, and criticized her in that she had never applied for a permission de travestissement. Morris' lawyer produced a letter from the Commissioner of Police giving assurance that they no longer pursued women in trousers.

The court ruled: "nous n'avons pas à nous occuper de la façon dont se vêt à la ville et dans ses autres occupations Mme Violette Morris, mais nous estimons que le fait de porter un pantalon n'étant pas d'un usage admis pour les femmes, la FFS avait parfaitement le droit de l'interdire. En conséquence, le tribunal déboute Mme Violette Morris et la condamne aux dépens"(we do not have to deal with how Mme. Volette Morris dresses in the city and in her other occupations, but we believe that to wear trousers is not permitted by custom for women, FFSF had every right to prohibit it. Accordingly, the court dismisses Mme. Violette Morris and awards costs)".

Continued in Part II.
________________________________________

EN.WIKIPEDIA says that Violette was "the youngest of six sisters", which is definitely wrong.

Genealogy sites: MyHeritage would seem to be the best on the Morris dynasty. Geneanet has Jacques Pierre as father of Violette only, but does not connect him to Louis Michel, although it traces Louis Michel's ancestors back to 1620. Webtrees denies that Jacques Pierre had any children at all. There is an FR.WIKIPEDIA page for Louis Michel Morris, but it does not mention any children.

Several of the men in the Morris dynasty were named Jacques, and they usually anglicized it to James. However there is no indication of any relationship to the Somerset/Welsh James Morris who transitioned to become Jan.

FR.WIKIPEDIA, as do most of the books, has Violette Morris as the winner of the 1927 Bol d'Or driving a Benjamin.

However the FR.WIKIPEDIA article on Bol d'Or lists the 1927 winner as "Lempereur" driving an FN. No first name is available for this mysterious winner who otherwise is unknown to history.

Did Morris and the very young Robert Cowell ever drive in the same race? Cowell did drive in the 1939 Grand Prix in Antwerp, but Morris, then 46, was no longer driving.

Almost all writers accept Morris' explanation that racing car cockpits were so tight that breasts got in the way. The transsexual perspective is that this was merely an excuse. See the photograph above of Morris in a Benjamin. It does not at all look cramped.

Like Madeleine Pelletier, we have somebody who looks, walks and talks like a trans man (and in Morris' case has had top surgery), but does not take a male name.   Morris does not attempt to pass as does Victor Barker in England, but she was already famous from her sporting achievements and thus passing was not really an option.

Morris did not care to use her first name Emilie, which she shared with her aunt, the wife of Paul Louis. The name she used, Violette, has connotations in that 'viol' means 'rape' (compare the English 'violate') and was associated with lesbians in early 20^th century France in that several were Violettes: Violette Leduc, Violet Paget (who used the pseudonym Vernon Lee), Violette Murat, Violet Trefusis, Vivienne Renée wrote of her unrequited love for Violet Shillito. There was also the convicted non-lesbian parricide, Violette Nozière (who had been violated by her father).

What do the Wikipedia authors think that they are doing? While accepting that Morris was a life-long male-dresser who had her breasts removed, both FR.WIKIPEDIA and its almost copy EN.WIKIPEDIA choose to include a frontal photograph of Morris the swimmer that emphasises her then more than ample breasts, and a photograph of her in women's clothes – in effect in drag. There is no shortage of Morris in her preferred male clothes. So what is Wikipedia doing?

As with Madeleine Pelletier, Halberstam's Female Masculinity has nothing to say about Violette Morris. Likewise the lesbian cross-dressing set of Anglo-American expatriates that included Natalie Barney and Gertrude Stein, although they did invite a few token French women: Collette and Mathilde de Morney, did not invite Violette despite her prestigious lineage. (Obviously Pelletier was not invited for, despite being a doctor, she was a child from the slums).

Jenny O. (1862 - ?) embroiderer, book seller.

O was born in Vorarlberg, Austria. O's father, a gamekeeper and horn player, died when O was 5, of consumption, and his mother 1½ years later. O was still wearing a dress after his brother, two years younger, had switched to trousers. The aunts who took in the orphan did not permit him girls' clothing except at Shrovetide (Mardi Gras).

After a few years in an orphanage of the Sisters of Mercy, O stole some clothes from a girl of the same size and took her certificate of domicile and ran off to Switzerland, where she found work as a nanny, and taught herself embroidery. When she was 16, a man tried to force himself on her and denounced her as a 'hermaphrodite'.

O moved to France and found work as an embroiderer. She also worked for a while as a man after a friend's boyfriend threatened to report her to the police. In 1882 O emigrated to New York, and again worked as an embroiderer. A co-worker forced himself on her, and discovering her body, used threats of calling the police to make her an involuntary sex partner. One day when he was away O dressed as a man and fled to Milwaukee and worked in a timber-yard and as a cook.

In 1885 O arrived in San Francisco, where cross-dressing had been a crime since 1863. As a man O became an itinerant bookseller, invested in property and began traveling for German newspapers. Indoors O, as a woman, helped with children, and provided accommodation for dance-hall women.

In 1905 O wrote to the new German magazine Mutterschutz (Mother Protection) enclosing an article re feminine boys and men:

"If he is raised as a girl, then he will lose all doubt and will be more stable in his girlishness, so that he will then never will ever want to become a man; if he forced to behave as a boy, then he will feel destroyed and will yearn for the time when he can make a living as maid or something like that".

Despite that Mutterschutz advocated the equality of illegitimate children, legalization of abortion, and sexual education, it was not ready for this, and did not reply. O then wrote to Magnus Hirschfeld enclosing the rejected article. They corresponded and Jenny provided photographs for the 1912 supplement to Die Transvestiten.

• Magnus Hirschfeld. Die Transvestiten; ein Untersuchung uber den erotischen Verkleidungstrieb: mit umfangreichem casuistischen und historischen Material. Berlin: Pulvermacher, 1910. English translation by Michael A Lombardi-Nash. Tranvestites: The Erotic urge to Crossdress. Buffalo: Prometheus Books.  1991: s. 1991: Case 13: 83-93.
• Magnus Hirschfeld & Max Tilke. Der erotische Verkleidungstrieb (Die Transvestiten). Illustrierter Teil. A. Pulvermacher, 1912: plate XXII.
• Clare Sears. Arresting Dress: Cross-Dressing, Law, and Fascination in Nineteenth-Century San Francisco. Duke University Press, 2014: 73, 76, 78-80.

_________________________________________________________________________________

If born a century later Jenny would, quite likely, have been an early transitioner. She did as much as she did without estrogens, and probably had no way to find out that there were cities others than San Francisco that did not have such anti-cross-dressing laws.

Sandra Day (1939 – 2010) bookseller, performer.

After a childhood in Ebeltoft, Jutland, and training as a bookseller in Copenhagen, Sandra Day transitioned in 1969, and has since performed in Copenhagen nightclubs as a stripper and whip queen, and also as a singer and actress.

Sandra was cast as a transvestite in the 1978 film, Lille Spejl, and was featured in the 2004 television documentary Danmarks Marquis: Marcel de Sade.

In the last year of her life she recorded an album: Sing – don't cry.

• Thomas Aagaard.Skovmand. Sandra Day: fra bondeknøs til piskedronning. [København]: Verdens Mindste Forlag, 2007.
  
• Ole Jakobsen Huld. "71-årig transseksuel udgiver debutalbum". Kultur, 18.Aug.2010. www.dr.dk/Nyheder/Kultur/2010/08/18/152332.htm.
  
• "Sandra Day er død". Panbladet, 15.december 2010. http://panbladet.dk/2010/12/15/sandra-day-er-d%C3%B8d.
  

DA.WIKIPEDIA    IMDB

Michelle De Ville (1958–) performer, habilleuse.

19-year-old De Ville first met transsexuals in a Montréal gay bar. They were dressed as men but had obviously started on hormones. This led to a discovery of the bars that catered to transvestites and transsexuals: PJ's for English speakers and Café Cléopâtre further east for French speakers.

De Ville completed education in 1979 with a diploma from the CEGEP St Laurent in Sciences humaines.

Michelle was often found in Montréal's bars and nightclubs. Many times she was given a hard time in gay bars, or ejected, for being too feminine. She was much more accepted in disco and then New Wave clubs through the 1980s. She got to know a club owner, and became first a waitress, and then a 'door-bitch' deciding who got into the club. She did drag shows at PJ's and Cléopâtre's, starting with an impersonation of Brigitte Bardot.

This led to some small parts in movies shot in Montréal. The most significant were Or D'ur, Amour impossible and Evixion, each directed by Bashar Shbib. For Amour impossible, she introduced the film at gay film festivals across Canada and in New York. She was also in The Surrogate, 1984, a mainstream Canadian film where the major trans role went to professional impersonator Jim Bailey.

In 1989 she was working with Comité Sida Aide Montréal, but was concerned in that HIV+ trans women were being referred to by male pronouns.  Although not HIV+ herself,  she started a group specifically for HIV+ trans women.

"In my book, the trans community should be within the gay community, we should be a whole, that's what we say about LGBT rights. We're supposed to stick together, but the reality is totally different."

In 1990 she was interviewed in Fuzzbox magazine on how queens/ transsexuals had not been allowed in some gay bars even those with a drag show.

In 1994 Michelle was gratuitously insulted by two police officers. She made an official complaint, handicapped by the fact that the officers had hidden their name tags, which resulted in her being hassled by police for six days until she was stopped with her lawyer in the passenger seat. When the case finally came to court, a year later, the police insisted that there was no way to know which police officers were in which car.

Viviane Namaste`s 2005 C'était du spectacle! drew partially on Michelle`s personal archives.  

Michelle makes a living selling and renting period clothing, and also books and records.

• Interview with Michelle de Ville. Fuzzbox, 1990. np.
  
• Ki Namaste. "'Tragic Misreadings': Queer Theory's Erasure of Transgender Subjectivity". In Michele Eliason & Jim Cullen (eds). Queer Studies: A Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Anthology. New York: New York University Press, 1996: 186.
  
• Viviane K. Namaste. Invisible Lives: The Erasure of Transsexual and Transgendered People. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000: 10-11.
  
• Viviane K. Namaste. C'était du spectacle!: l'histoire des artistes transsexuelles à Montréal, 1955-1985. Montréal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 2005: xii.
  
• Viviane K Namaste. Sex Change, Social Change Reflections on Identity, Institutions, and Imperialism. Toronto: Women's Press, 2005: 210.
  
• Michelle De Ville interviewed by Viviane Namaste. "'We Paved the Way for Whatever Tolerance They Have in Their Lives': An Interview with Michelle De Ville, 'The First Door Bitch in Montreal'". In Dan Irving & Rupert Raj (eds). Trans Activism in Canada: A Reader. Women's Press, 2014.
  

*not the Hollywood special effects person, nor the French film director

IMDB     LinkedIn      AmazonReviewer
__________________________________________________________________________________

There is a pattern whereby academics who write about trans people have a favourite person whom they mention again and again.   For Vern Bullough it was Virginia Prince.   For Richard Ekins it was Phaedra Kelly.   And for Viviane Namaste it is Michelle De Ville.

Namaste 1996, 2000, 2005 returned and returned to the 1990 Fuzzbox interview where Michelle spoke of herself and others being hassled as trans women in gay bars.   This is hardly straighforward.   Are trans women a type of women or a type of gay or both?  Should trans women want to go where cis women are not allowed?  I, also, in the 1970s and 1980s, when I was less confident of passing, would go to gay bars in Toronto where it did not matter if I were read.  Fortunately, I never had such bad experiences as Michelle talks about.  The fact that the same bars that did not welcome women (trans or cis) also had drag shows is not very germane as a trans issue.   Women who go into bars offering striptease or pole dancing are unlikely to be treated the same as the male customers.  The issue is more a feminist one of what attitude to take to men in gender segregation where women`s bodies and images are commodified.

The section on Michelle's films in the 2014 interview needed some fact checking.   Namaste spelt  Evixion as Eviction, and Michelle named The Surrogate as Blind Rage (presumably a working title, but not the release title).

You may care to browse Michelle`s Amazon Reviews.   Her dismissal of Benjamin`s Transsexual Phenomon as 'dinosaur' and 'dangerous' and her dismissal of the film Different for Girls as 'both irresponsible and offensive' sets her apart.   She is also a big fan of Jayne Mansfield.

Shonna (1947–) performer, travel agent, housewife

Shonna was raised in Singapore, and had two younger sisters. Father was a dentist who often beat his wife and put her in the hospital several times. Grandmother dressed Shonna as female, and arranged for Shonna to be adopted as a girl at the local Kwan Yin Temple.

At 7 Shonna returned home and was sent to school as a boy. However Shonna failed primary school, and later failed to obtain a school certificate. Shonna found some friends who also liked to dress as female and they would so meet in a church.

Father attempted to involve Shonna as a dental assistant, but after embarrassing comments from his patients, he banished her from his clinic. At 16 Shonna worked as a sales girl, and frequented the trans scene on Bugis Street. Her father died when she was 17. She worked as a housemaid for a European man, and had an affair with him. Subsequently she worked in a bank and then in public relations for a hotel.

She came second in the Miss Singapore Beauty Contest, which led to modelling work. In 1968 Shonna started a cabaret act using the name Mama Chan. Twice she attempted suicide by taking sleeping pills.

In 1969 Shonna approached gynaecologist S. S. Ratnam at the Singapore General Hospital and asked for transgender surgery. He sent her to a psychiatrist, but she kept returning two or three times a week. Ratnam had at that time never done sex change surgery, but he started to read the literature, and finally practised the operation on two cadavers in the mortuary. He had Shonna evaluated by a team of psychiatrists who confirmed that she was indeed transsexual. Legal clearance was sought from the ministry of health and granted. Surgery was performed 30 July 1971 at the Kandang Kerbau Hospital 竹脚妇幼医院. This was the first such operation in east Asia.

Afterwards, Shonna was prescribed female hormones. Later she married a French man and owned a travel agency in Paris. Later still she lived in England.

• S.S. Ratnam & Victor H H Goh. "Becoming Shonna and Becoming Sam". In S. S. Ratnam, Victor H. H. Goh & Wing Foo Tsoi. Cries from Within: Transsexualism, Gender Confusion and Sex Change. Singapore: Longman, 1991: 25-6.
  

SGWiki     SingaporeInfopedia

Nadia Almada (1977–) performer.

Jorge Leodoro was born in Madeira. As a teenager, he lived in South Africa with his parents and five younger brothers 1989-1992. Mother and the boys returned to Madeira, leaving the father in South Africa.

At age 19, Leodoro, then thinking of himself as a gay man, moved to Woking, England with some friends, and worked in retailing and as a bank teller. As Nadia she completed transition in 2003.

In 2004, only a few months later, Nadia competed in Channel 4’s reality show Big Brother 5. Her fellow contestants were not aware of her gender history, but viewers were informed. £4.9 million was traded on Nadia alone by bookmakers. Her personality charmed viewers and after 71 days, she placed first, with 78% of the vote, and won £63,500. She was then on cover of Heat, the "self-appointed Big Brother magazine" four times in a row. The Sun newspaper tracked down her father in South Africa to inform him that he had a daughter – he had always wanted a daughter, he said.  Later that year she released a single, which charted at number 27 in the UK.

She has since appeared in other reality shows and television shows. In Ultimate Big Brother, in August 2010, another contestant was removed after making transphobic comment, none of which were broadcast, but Nadia also was evicted after conflicts with others. She objected that the transphobic remarks were not broadcast, and chose not to attend the final with all the other contestants.

• Barbara Ellen interviews Nadia Almada. “The more people criticized, the stronger I became”. The Observer, 22 Aug 2004. www.guardian.co.uk/theobserver/2004/aug/22/features.review17.
  
• "Ultimate Big Brother: Nadia Almada in 'suicide attempt' days after being booed at eviction". The Daily Mail, 10 September 2010. www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/bigbrother/article-1310771/Ultimate-Big-Brother-Nadia-Almada-suicide-attempt-days-booed-eviction.html.
  

EN.WIKIPEDIA    IMDB 

Jordi Torremadé (1923 - ?) athlete, sales manager.

María Torremadé was raised in Barcelona. As a teenager she won Spanish and European awards in basketball and athletics and high jump. She ran 60 metres in 7.71 seconds, which was the European record and only four-tenths of a second short of the world record. She was the Spanish champion in 100 metres with 12.00 seconds, in 200 metres with 27 seconds.

In 1942 Torremadé announced that the original assignment of sex had been in error. Later that year he had surgery and announced that he, Jordi, was a man.  Maria's records were then invalidated.

Jordi married in 1952, and became a sales supervisor for a multinational corporation. He and his wife were located in Paris from 1959-69, and then returned to Barcelona.

• Julián García Candau. "La historia de María (Jorge) Torremadé" Farode Vigo, 28/09/2009. www.farodevigo.es/deportes/2009/09/28/historia-maria-jorge-torremade/372370.html.
  
• "19 anos de Maria a Jordi Torremadé". El Mundo Deportivo, 5 de noviembre de 1982. http://hemeroteca-paginas.mundodeportivo.com/EMD01/HEM/1982/11/05/MD19821105-023.pdf.
  

Thomas Walker (1842 - ?) ship's steward, porter, barman

++ Nov 2012, added material from Feòrag NicBhrìde's article.  Shorter version previously published here in June 2008.  Thank you very much Feòrag for your excellent newspaper research.

Mary Anne Walker was raised in Hertfordshire.  Her father Henry Walker was a farmer and landowner, although later in 1853 he became the licensee of a large pub in Westminster, probably The Three Johns in Little Park Street. Mary Anne had been to a first-class boarding school, and was an adept pianist.  She worked in the family pub, and "She showed a fondness for wearing male attire, first by adorning herself with a waitcoat, turn-down collar, fancy tie, and a sort of semi 'Chesterfield', and ultimately she took to the entire paraphenalia of dress adopted by the male sex, and absconded from her home". 

Henry Walker died in 1860.  The three daughters suddenly needed to find work.  One of her sisters found work as a housekeeper for a nobleman, and the other as a governess.  Mary became male full time.  He worked as a porter at Jesus College, Cambridge,  and then as  booking clerk with the London and North-Western Railway, and then an engine cleaner for the Great Northern Railway at King's Cross Station.   He worked two years as a ship's steward for the Cunard Line. He had also worked as a dock labourer and as a light porter at a cheesemongers in London.  He used the names John Walker or John Turner.   Throughout this time Walker's aunt  made repeated but ineffectual attempts to reclaim her.

In 1867, using the name Thomas Walker, he was a barman in Royal Mortar Tavern in the London Road, Southwark.  He was accused of stealing monies in that marked coins were found in his possession. 

Walker was remanded.  The gaoler described Walker: a full masculine face, rather sunburnt, hair cut short and slightly curled and with a masculine voice. No-one at the prison thought they had anything other than a young man in their custody, until he was ordered to take a bath, whereupon he confessed to being female.

 Arthur Munby describes Thomas' appearance in the dock:

"a bluff and brawny young man, of four or five and twenty ... rough dark hair, short as a man's, and evidently worn in a man's fashion for a long time past. Her head was bare, and so was her strong bull neck: about the waist she wore nothing but a blue sailor's shirt, with the sleeves partly rolled up. Standing there, with broad shoulders squared and stout arms folded on the dock rail, she seemed just such a fellow as one may see drawing beer at an alehouse, or lounging about a seaport town; and it was almost impossible to believe that she was a man".

For subsequent court appearances Walker was compelled into a women's blue striped prison uniform, in which he was clearly uncomfortable.  The cheesemonger's son appeared to also accuse Walker of absconding with £30 (close to a year's wages).  Other evidence was presented:  a fiancée, Rosina, who visited him in prison, another fiancée who had had banns read in the local church causing him to flee, and a previous employment as a barmaid when she had been fired on suspicion of being a man.

Walker plead guilty to the two charges of embezzlement, and was sentenced to three month's imprisonment with hard labour.  While he was in prison, another 'female barman' was discovered.  Named as 'Jane Dixon, he had been working at the Jamaica Tavern in Sunderland for two years.

After release Walker was sent to the Elizabeth Fry Refuge in Hackney, but was rejected because of his male appearance.  Using the name Charles Arnold, he obtained work with the Great Western Railway, loading and unloading goods wagons.  One day he fell ill and his landlady sought to help by applying a mustard plaster to his chest.  Although she said that she would not tell anybody, he left the next morning, taking the property of some of the other porters.

In March 1868 Walker, busking, was arrested and charged with placing herself in a public thoroughfare, called Cable-street, Whitechapel, for the purpose of asking and collecting alms.  He was sent to the workhouse in St George-in-the-East.

However three months later he was being advertised as "Mary Walker, the Female Barman" at the Duke's Head in Norton Folgate, where he had a 12-month contract. However in August, the licensee of the pub, after a comment by Walker that was probably misconstrued, first ordered Walker to leave and then punched him in the chest when he attempted to do so.  At the subsequent court case it was ruled that the punch was not enough to be considered assault, and not enough reason to break the contract.

However the court summons that the contract be completed was later withdrawn and in November Walker sang on stage at the Marylebone Music Hall:

"She was dressed in men's clothes, and gave a sort of auto-biographical recitation to the tune of "Champagne Charley," and made a second appearance in naval uniform, and sang another song. The people were, of course, delighted to gaze upon one who has attracted so much attention, and their applause must be regarded as an expression of their pleasure at having curiosity gratified, rather than as a token of their admiration of the performer's abilities as a vocalist."

in 1870, Thomas was working as a barman at a pub in Shoreditch where it was hoped that his celebrity would bring in custom. However they became estranged over a sum of £3 10s, and the case went to court.  The publicity from this resulted in the landlord being unable to complete the transfer of his license as teh Bench felt that "they would be recognising a very immoral act if they were to grant the transfer". 

In later years Walker appeared in other towns, usually working as a barman, and often advertising for such such work: "Miss Mary Walker, the world-renowned Female Barman, begs to inform Publicans &c., she is now open to an Engagement. Terms moderate. Highest references given."  He was in Manchester in 1876, Halifax in 1877, Sheffield, Leeds and Lincoln in 1880, Leicester in 1884 (where he was mentioned in a licence renewal hearing for the Robin Hood Vaults on Gallowtreegate), Derby and possibly Colchester in 1887.  Then Harlepool and Aldershot the next year.  The last mention seems to be Derby again in 1890.
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Thomas was immortalized in the ballad, She-he Barman of Southwark:

You bonny lads and lasses gay,
Who like a bit of chaff,
I'll tell you of a She He Barman,
And I'm sure 'will make you laugh.
She did not like the petticoats,
So she slipped the trousers on,
She engaged herself as a barman,
And said her name was Tom.

At the Royal Mortar Tavern, London Road,
She served the customers all round,
The She He Barman was engaged
By Mr Frederick Brown,

She popped around the bar like steam,
The girls and chaps did wink,
When they went in for a drop of gin,
But little did they think.
That Tommy Walker was a maid,
When they together met,
Last night a costermonger said,
Who'd thought Tom's name was Bet.

In the morning she put on her shirt,
Her trousers, coat, and boots,
She He Tommy Walker
A regular swell did look;
She could drink a little drop of stout,
And smoke a mild cigar,
Tommy Walker, the female barman,
Was a clever chap, oh ! la!

She had neither beard or moustache,
And her belly was not big,
But Tom the He She barman
Turned out to be a prig;
She nailed the sixpences and shillings,
And she prigged the half-a-crown;
She three months was Tom the barman
At Mr Frederick Brown's.

She Tom had been a sailor,
Two years upon the main,
She was dropped from the Royal Mortar,
On board the ship Horsemonger Lane
Three years she doffed the petticoats,
And put the trousers on,
She served behind the counter,
And the people called her Tom.

For years she plough'd the ocean,
As steward of a ship,
She used to make the captain's bed,
Drink grog and make his flip.
She could go aloft so manfully,
This female sailor Jack,
But if she slept with a messmate,
Why of course she turned her back.

Now tired of a sailor's life,
She thought she'd be a star,
She got a crib at Mr. Brown's,
To serve behind the bar,
This pretty female barman—
Her modesty don't shock—
It is better than handling of the ropes,
To be turning on the cocks.

If you'd seen her take them in her hand,
You'd have said she was a caulker,
So nicely she handled them—
She said her name was Walker.
To see her put on a butt of beer,
And when the brewers come,
She nicely drove the spigot in,
And then out came the bung.

The ladies like the trousers,
Of that there is no doubt.
Many would be a barman,
But fear they'd be found out.
Tom was not a handsome female,
She too long had been, adrift,
Since she put on the Gurnsey,
And chucked away her shift,

*Not the crossdressing female doctor in the US also called Mary Walker.

•  See NicBhrìde for a detailed list of 19th century newspaper mentions.
• Curiosities of Street Literature, London, Reeves and Turner, 196, Strand, 1871.
• Derek Hudson. Munby, Man of Two Worlds: the Life and Diaries of Arthur J. Munby, 1828-1910. Abacus 1974: 237-8.
• Julie Wheelwright. Amazons and Military Maids: Women who dressed as men in pursuit of life, liberty and happiness. Pandora 1989: 84,114.
• Feòrag NicBhrìde.  "Thomas/Mary Anne Walker, the 'Female Barman' ". 4th Nov,2012.  http://feorag.livejournal.com/528324.html.

Noel McKay (193? - 2004?) menswear retailer, performer

Noel was born in Oamaru, on New Zealand’s South Island. He married his first wife in his twenties.

In the 1960s he worked during the week at an elegant menswear shop in Queen St, Auckland. At the weekends he was a classy female impersonator, and sang on stage for a full hour. He appeared in clubs and cabarets all over New Zealand and Australia.  He was friend of Carman Rupe.


His albums usually had a photograph of himself on drag, but his EPs entitled Party Songs: For Adults Only, were aimed at a straight audience, and included mildly risqué songs, but he also included a little drag/gay humour that the straight listener would miss.

McKay had gender surgery late in life.

• Graham Reid. “Noel McKay: Sweater Girl”. Elsewhere, Jul 9,2010. www.elsewhere.co.nz/fromthevaults/3307/noel-mckay-sweater-girl-1963.

 QUEERMUSICHERITAGE

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McKay's post-transition name is not known.