Below is a list of approximately sixty individuals who were assigned female at birth and lived as men from the 1870s to the 1930s in the United States. Whenever possible, we have linked both primary and secondary sources on the individual, although in some cases there are no relevant published (or internet) secondary sources. We have included as much information as possible in the short introductory paragraphs so that future researchers can use this list as a jumping-off point to do further research. To that end, we have included multiple names for most of the individuals—in most cases, the birth name and the individual’s chosen name. The purpose of the inclusion of dead names is to make these individuals more accessible for future researchers, as 19th and early 20th century newspapers often insisted on using birth names rather than chosen names. We have chosen to use they/them pronouns because these are people who transed gender, but we cannot know how they understood or experienced their gender; in order to avoid placing later identity categories upon them, we have opted to refer to the individuals as they/them. Prepared by Marissa Brameyer and Emily Skidmore, Spring 2022.

Joseph Lobdell: also previously known as Lucy Lodbell; Lucy Slater. Lobdell lived a fairly transient life in upstate New York, Pennsylvania, and Minnesota before being committed to the Willard Asylum in 1883, where they were studied by Dr. P.M. Wise. Wise’s article on Lobdell, published in the medical journal, The Alienist and Neurologist, in January 1883.

• Primary Sources
  • “Romantic Paupers,” New York Herald-Tribune, August 25, 1871, p. 8.
  • P. M. Wise, "Case of Sexual Perversion," The Alienist and Neurologist 4, no. 1 (January 1883): 87-91. Available here.
• Secondary Sources
  
  • Bambi Lobdell, “A Strange Sort of Being”: The Transgender Life of Lucy Ann/Joseph Israel Lobdell, 1829-1912 (Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2011).

Jennie Bonnet: “The French Female-Boy” of San Francisco. Bonnet was a somewhat notorious figure in San Francisco in the 1870s, often getting arresting for dressing in men’s clothing, which they argued was necessary to facilitate their occupation of “frog catching.” Bonnet was killed in their early twenties in 1876 after being struck by a stray bullet while staying near San Miguel Station (near Stockton, California). Given that Bonnet had frequently appeared in the San Francisco press (as a result of their various run-ins with the law), local papers covered their death with great interest.

• Primary Sources
  • “Police Court,” Daily Alta California, August 1, 1874, p. 1.
  • “Jennie Bonnet, Murder of the Notorious Female Frog Catcher,” San Francisco Chronicle, September 16, 1876, p. 3.
• Secondary Sources
  
  • Leila Rupp, A Desired Past: A Short History of Same-Sex Love in America (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999), 59-60.
  • Clare Sears, Arresting Dress: Cross-Dressing, Law and Fascination in Nineteenth-Century San Francisco (Durham: Duke University Press, 2014).
  • Inspiration behind Emma Donoghue’s novel, Frog Music (New York: Little, Brown, 2014).

Samuel Pollard: also previously known as Sarah Pollard. Born in upstate New York in 1856 and moved to Nevada around 1870 in order to work in the mines near Tuscarora. Married Marancy Hughes in 1877, although legal issues ensued after their anatomy was revealed in local newspapers.  After the legal issues were ironed out, Pollard went on a lecture tour, appearing as Sarah for the first part of the lecture and Samuel in the second half.

• Primary Sources
  • “Such a Dilemma,” The National Police Gazette, June 8, 1878, p. 32.
• Secondary Sources
  • Case briefly discussed in Marie Coady’s Woburn: Hidden Tales of a Tannery Town (Charleston, SC: The History Press, 2008).

Charlie/Charley Parkhurst: Assigned female at birth, left New England at a young age, assumed the name Charlie/Charley, and earned renown and the nickname “One-Eyed Charlie” from their work as a stagecoach driver during the Gold Rush. They eventually tired of the labor of stagecoach driving and took a more stationary posting as a station agent whereupon they were granted a substantial tract of land. Their “true sex” was only discovered posthumously.

• Primary Sources 
  • “A Woman’s Double Life,” Detroit Free Press, May  2, 1886, p. 5.
• Secondary Sources
  
  • Inspired Karen Kondazian’s novel The Whip (East Brunswick, NJ: Hansen, 2011).

Frank DuBois: also known previously as Delia Derthick; Delia Hudson. In 1883, DuBois made headlines in newspapers around the country when neighbors in the small town of Waupun, Wisconsin discovered that the newlywed had been assigned female at birth, and had previously married Samuel J. Hudson of Belvidere, Wisconsin. 

• Primary Sources
  • “What is It?,” Waupun Times, October 30, 1883, p. 1.
  • “A Domestic Puzzle,” Milwaukee Journal, October 30, 1883, p. 1.
  • “Woman Married to Woman,” New York Herald, October 30, 1883, p. 6.
  • “A Remarkable Case,” Chicago Daily Tribune, October 31, 1883, p. 3. 
  • See also the eight article collection related to Dubois in the Digital Transgender Archive
• Secondary Sources
  
  • Emily Skidmore, True Sex: The Lives of Trans Men at the Turn of the Twentieth Century (New York: NYU Press, 2017), 15-42. 
  • Jen Manion, Jen Manion, Female Husbands: A Trans History (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2020); see also their “Public Seminar” essay, featuring Dubois, here)

Frank Gray: also previously known as Mary B. Wolcott. They were a businessperson of some renown in Kansas City. They left home at the age of 17 and assumed the male identity of Frank Gray. They worked various jobs and married twice before settling down in Kansas City. Once there, they negotiated a deal in which they acquired a saloon under the name Mary Wolcott and then “transferred” the property to Frank Gray under the guise of an owed debt. They were eventually outed due to a family quarrel over a dowry that Gray refused to pay. Their son-in-law exposed Gray in retaliation.

• Primary Sources
  • “Masquerading as a Man,” Kansas City Star, November 6, 1885, p. 2.
  • “It Beats the World,” Kansas City Times, November 7, 1885, p. 10. 
  • “Sabbath Strolls,” Kansas City Times, November 7, 1885, p. 8.

Henry Armstrong: Lived as a man for 25 years in Chattanogga, Tennessee. Initially assumed a male role to follow their partner during the civil war where they served together in the Confederacy until their partner died. Armstrong continued to live as a man and moved to Juno in Tennessee where they lived and worked as a farm laborer. They were only outed posthumously by an autopsy in February 1892.

• Primary Sources
  • “A Man for 23 Years Turns Out to be a Woman,” Asheville Citizen Times, February 4, 1892, p. 3. 
  • “Lived and Voted as a Man,” The Hooper Sentinel, February 26, 1892, p. 3. 

Tom King: also known as Flora Munis and Flora Quick of Oklahoma, was arrested in 1893 after being accused of stealing horses near Oklahoma City. They escaped prison, only to be recaptured and to have their assigned sex revealed.

• Primary Sources
  • “Latest News,” Western Kansas World, July 29, 1893, p. 3.
  • “Tales Told by Tom King, the Female Horse Thief of Oklahoma,” The Madisonian (Virginia City, Montana), August 24, 1895, p. 6.

Frank Blunt: Blunt ran away from home at a young age with their brother. As the two traveled around New England Frank started dressing in their brother’s attire and chose a male name. They continued to live as Frank Blunt for fifteen years before being outed as a result of being arrested in Wisconsin in 1893.

• Primary Sources
  • “A Mysterious Man,” Boston Journal, July 24, 1893, p. 3. 
  • “Passed for a Man,” Trenton Times, July 14, 1893, p. 7.

Milton Matson: also previously known as Louisa Matson. In January 1895, Matson was arrested at the home of his fiance for writing fraudulent checks. After two weeks at the Los Gatos County Jail, officials were tipped off to the fact that Matson had been assigned female at birth when a letter arrived addressed to “Louisa Matson.” This revelation was covered widely in Bay Area newspapers, and then a month later, Matson again sparked controversy when they accepted an invitation to appear in a dime museum.

• Primary Sources
  • “Her Betrothed Is a Woman,” San Francisco Examiner, January 28, 1895, p. 12.
  • “The Woman in Man’s Clothes,” San Francisco Examiner, January 29, 1895, p. 3.
  • “Will Again Don  Women’s Garb,” San Francisco Examiner, January 30, 1895, p. 3.
  • “Has No Love of Petticoats: Men Delights Not Her Nor Woman Either, Says Louisa Elizabeth Blaxton Matson,” San Francisco Examiner, February 7, 1895, p. 16.
  • “She Has Been a Man of the World for Over Twenty-Six Year,” San Francisco Examiner, February 10, 1895, p. 26.
• Secondary Sources
  • Clare Sears, “Electric Brillancy: Cross-Dressing Law and Freak Show Displays in Nineteenth Century San Francisco,” Women’s Studies Quarterly 36, no ¾ (2008): 170-187.
  • Clare Sears, Arresting Dress: Cross-Dressing, Law, and Fascination in Nineteenth-Century San Francisco (Durham: Duke University Press, 2014).

Jack Garland: previously known as Elvira Virginia Mugarrieta, Babe Bean, Jack Bean and Beebe Beam, first gained notoriety when they appeared in Stockton, California in 1898 and then claimed the identity of a woman dressed in men’s clothing. After a stint working as a guest correspondent for the Stockton Evening Mail, they stowed away aboard a troop transport ship on the way to the Philippines during the U.S. war in the Philippines, where they eventually would serve as a Spanish interpreter, going by Beebe or Jack Beam. Upon return to the United States, Garland claimed a male identity, using the name Jack Garland (Garland was their mother’s maiden name). Prior to their death,, they lived in San Francisco, California, and when they died penniless, many local newspapers published stories featuring positive accounts of Garland’s life, some even calling for them to be buried with military rites rather than in a pauper’s grave.

• Primary Sources
  • “A Woman in Male Clothing, “ Stockton Evening Mail, August 2, 1897, p. 1.
  • “Little Miss Adventure,” Stockton Evening Mail, August 23, 1897, p. 1.
  • “She’d Wear the Pants,” Stockton Evening Mail, August 24, 1897, p.
• Secondary Sources
  • Louis Sullivan, From Female To Male: The Life of Jack Bee Garland (Boston: Alyson, 1990).
  • Susan Stryker, Transgender History (New York: Seal, 2008).
  • Emily Skidmore, True Sex: The Lives of Trans Men at the Turn of the Twentieth Century (New York: NYU Press, 2017).
  • Linda Heidenreich, Nepantla Squared: Transgender Mestiz@ Histories in Times of Global Shifts (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2020).

Ellis Glenn: In 1899, Glenn appeared in Hillsboro, Illinois, and presented themself as a traveling sewing machine salesperson. They easily penetrated the social scene of the small city, and according to the Quincy Daily Whig, “was a great favorite with the ladies” and “easily moved in the best society.” After an engagement went sideways, Glenn was arrested and when  officials discovered their anatomy, Glenn claimed to be their twin sister, who had switched places with their sibling out of sisterly devotion. A lengthy trial took place in Parkersburg, West Virginia, as the state sought to determine whether Glenn’s identity.

• Primary Sources
  • “Study of Ellis Glenn,” Chicago Daily, November 29, 1899, p. 5.
  • “Ellis Glenn is Not a Man,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch, November 26, 1899, p. 1.
  • See also the collection of 91 Glenn articles in the Digital Transgder Archive
• Secondary Sources
  • Emily Skidmore, True Sex: The Lives of Trans Men at the Turn of the Twentieth Century (New York: NYU Press, 2017).
  • Christopher Sharrock, “Who was Ellis Glenn? A Man, Woman or Both?,” Medium, September 17, 2019 online

Murray Hall: A New York City politician who was a fixture in the Tammany Hall scene until their death in 1901. Hall married twice, and they and their second wife Ceceila Frances Low raised an adopted daughter named Minnie together in Manhattan. Their death sent shockwaves throughout the nation, at the idea that someone assigned female at birth could have navigated the political world so smoothly at a time when women were not even yet allowed to vote.

• Primary Sources
  • “This Woman Lived as a Man for 30 Years,” New York Journal and Advertiser, January 18, 1901, p. 1.
  • Last known residence listed on the website nyclgbtsites.org (along with newspaper clippings from death)
• Secondary Sources
  • Karen Abbott, “The Mystery of Murray Hall,” Smithsonian Magazine, July 21, 2011, online

Charles Hall: previously known as Carolina Hall. They were originally from Boston, Massachusetts, and traveled to Europe in the late 1890s where they transed gender. In Europe they met Guisseppa Boriani and the pair became inseparable. They were part of the burgeoning communities of artists in European cities such as Milan. In October 1901, upon hearing news that their father back home in Massachusetts was failing in his health, Hall and Boriani boarded a ship to the United States but unfortunately Hall themself fell ill on the ship and died. Newspaper accounts published upon their death included interviews with their wife who describe their “instantaneous attraction.”

• Primary Sources
  • “Rich Young Boston Woman Who Masqueraded as a Man,” Evening World (NYC), October 1, 1901, p. 6.
  • “Tells Strange Story of Woman Who Lived Many Years as a Man,” The Evening World, February 10, 1902, p. 4.
  • “Wife of Miss Hall, Man-Woman, Mourns Loss,” Deseret Evening News, October 12, 1901, p. 14.
  • “Boston Woman Posed as Wife,” article linked on Outhistory

George Green: lived for many years in Ettrick, Virginia with their wife, working as a farmer. They transed gender until their death in 1902, and the revelation that they had been assigned female at birth was reported in newspapers nationwide. Notably, the local articles on the case discuss Green as having been well respected by the community, and also report that their funeral was held at the Catholic Church in Petersburg, Virginia, and that their body is buried in the adjacent cemetery.

• Primary Sources
  • Eight newspaper articles about Green included in the Digital Transgender Archive
• Secondary Sources
  • Emily Skidmore, True Sex: The Lives of Trans Men at the Turn of the Twentieth Century (New York: NYU Press, 2017), chapter 3

William Howard: a few days after George Green’s story was reported in newspapers nationwide, reports of William Howard’s death were published, and the pair shared many similarities. Both died suddenly after living as a man for decades, both had wives, and both lived as farmers in rural areas (Howard was living in Canandaigua, New York).

• Primary Sources
  • “Howard Was a Woman,” Baltimore Sun, March 23, 1902, p. 2.
  • “Lived her Life as a Man,” Chicago Daily Tribune, March 23, 1902, p. 1.
  • Four newspaper articles linked in the Digital Transgender Archive
• Secondary Sources
  • Emily Skidmore, True Sex: The Lives of Trans Men at the Turn of the Twentieth Century (New York: NYU Press, 2017), chapter 3

Herman Gray Wood: Formerly known as Lotta Augustine Sawyer. Ran away from home at a young age after being sexually assaulted. They took their brother’s suit and assumed the new identity of Herman Wood. Herman had apparently earned quite the reputation as a ladies man throughout their time living as a man. They were known to write poetry for their partners of whom there were many, and most notably, none had turned them in. That is, until their wife reported them to the police when she discovered that they were assigned female at birth. After their arrest Wood would explain that the identity of Herman became second nature though they would agree to resume wearing traditional female garb.

• Primary Sources
  • “Masquerades Six Years as a Man,” The St. Paul Globe, August 24, 1902, p. 8. 
  • “Most Novel Divorce Case,” The Washington Post, June 28, 1902, p. 5. 
  • “He Proved to be a Woman,” The Washington Post, June 26, 1902, p. 2.

Harry Gorman: a hospital stay in 1902 revealed that they had been assigned female at birth, despite having lived as a man in Buffalo, New York for twenty years. When interviewed by a local paper, they said “Why I know ten women right here in Buffalo who wear men’s clothing and who hold men’s positions….Did we have an organization? No, hardly an organization, but we ran across each other once in awhile and over our beer and cigars in saloons we have had many a good hearty laugh at the expense of the men.”

• Primary Sources
  • “Give Me Trousers or Give Me Death,” The Tucson Citizen, February 25, 1903, p. 4.
  • “She was a Man for 20 Years,” Fort Worth Telegram, December 19, 1902, p. 3.
  • Two articles on Gorman included in the Digital Transgender Archive
• Secondary Sources
  • Emily Skidmore, True Sex: The Lives of Trans Men at the Turn of the Twentieth Century (New York: NYU Press, 2017)
    

Aaron Bark: previously known as Mrs. Frederick Green. A farmer in Madisonville, Kentucky, who was outed posthumously after living as a man for decades, apparently without arousing suspicion. Shortly before their death they let their neighbor know that they had assumed a male identity because they were able to make a living more easily as a man. Bark’s story was widely reported but not sensationalized.

• Primary Sources 
  • “This and That,” Mansfield News, April 21, 1903, p. 2. 
  • “‘Mr. Bark’ Was a Woman,” Hopkinsville Kentuckian, April 28, 1903, p. 8. 
  • “Was a Woman,” Hopkinsville Kentuckian, April 28, 1903, p. 6.

Willie Ray: born in Tennessee in the 1880s, Ray moved to rural Booneville, Mississippi around 1900, where they worked as a farmer’s hand. They were the subject of a court case in 1903, after Ray was accused of flirting with James Gatlin’s wife, Fannie. James had beaten Ray with a horsewhip, and Ray subsequently sued Gatlin. Upon cross-examination, Ray divulged that they had been assigned female at birth, and the court trial ground to a halt. Although national newspaper reported that after the trial, Ray was forced to wear women’s clothes, no such law existed in Mississippi at the time. What we do know for sure is that in 1910, the federal census listed Willie Ray and Fannie Gatlin as living together as “partners,” still in Booneville.

• Primary Sources
  • “Woman Passed as a Man for 8 Years,” The World (NYC), July 14, 1903, p. 3.
  • “Supposed Man Really a Girl,” Chicago Daily Tribune, July 23, 1903, p. 5.
• Secondary Sources
  • Emily Skidmore, True Sex: The Lives of Trans Men at the Turn of the Twentieth Century (New York: NYU Press, 2017), chapter 3.

Leroy Williams: Williams served for the Union in the Civil War, and afterwards settled in California, living in a Soldier's Home for some time. They later moved to a cabin in Sawtelle, and put an ad in the paper for a wife. Matilda Smith answered the call and the two were married in 1903, but shortly afterwards Matilda discovered Williams’s assigned sex and subsequently petitioned to have the marriage annulled.

• Primary Sources
  • “Her Husband Is A Woman,” Los Angeles Times, November 3, 1903, p. A1.
  • “Will Money Change Williams’s Sex,” Los Angeles Times, November 3, 1903, p. 13.

Joe Monoghan: also previously known as Johanna or Josephine Monaghan, born in Buffalo, New York around 1850. By 1870, they had moved to Silver City, Idaho and was working as a miner. They lived and worked around Owyhee County, Idaho for the next thirty-four years. Although there is some evidence that their neighbors suspected that they may have been transing gender, there is no evidence they were harassed for doing so, and local papers reported the revelation of their anatomy upon their death in 1904 rather nonchalantly. 

• Primary Sources
  • “Concealed Her Sex for 40 years,” Silver City Nugget (Silver City, ID), January 15, 1904, p. 1.
  • “Joe Monaghan Was a Woman,” Idaho Daily Statesmen (Boise, ID), January 12, 1904, p. 1.
• Secondary Sources
  • Peter Boag, Redressing America’s Frontier Past (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2011).
  • “Girls Will Be Boys and Boys Will Be Girls,” Oregon Quarterly, April 2012, online

Eugene Follette: In 1905, Follette’s story was reported in newspapers across the United States. Follette was a “good looking, quiet young man” who worked as a trapper in the woods of Hudson Bay, Canada. However, in the winter in 1905, they were attacked by a panther and they were subsequently outed in the hospital while receiving treatment.

• Primary Sources
  • “Bold Trapper was a Woman,” Baltimore American, January 30, 1905, p. 3.
  • “The Strange Career of Eugene Follette,” Evening Statesman, March 25, 1905, p. 6.

Frank Williams: Formerly known as Frances Lamauche. Williams was born in France but later immigrated to the United States whereupon they assumed a male identity after the passing of their father. Their mother had sent them to multiple male boarding schools until they were outed and sent home. After their mother died they came upon hard times eventually giving up and seeking help from a shelter in Ohio. They died in Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1905.

• Primary Sources
  • “Can’t Wear Sex’s Duds,” The Corroll Herald, February 1, 1905, p. 6.
  • “Girl Masquerades as Boy for Fifteen Years,” Denver Post, April 1, 1905, p. 1.
• Secondary Sources
  • Appears in Harris, Sharon. Dr. Mary Walker: an American Radical (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 2009).

Ralph Carlisle Hamilton: previously known as Lilian Alma Ferguson. According to the Grand Forks Daily Herald, they admitted that they were transing gender in Mooresville, North Carolina after they were engaged to “the town’s prettiest girl.” Hamilton was also described in papers as being “the town’s popular photographer, a social leader and general favorite.”

• Primary Sources
  • “Masqueraded as a Man,” Grand Forks Daily Herald, April 27, 1905, p. 2.
  • “Quite a Mix-Up,” Long Valley Advocate, April 28, 1905, p. 1.
  • “Fools Blind God,” Billings Gazette, April 28, 1905, p. 1.

Jim McIntosh: On July 14, 1905, the Denver Post reported, “The girls on the New England circuit have gone into mourning.  Jim McIntosh, the circus rider half the New England girls have been dead in love with for five years, has turned out to be a woman.” Reportedly, the revelation happened after Frank Knapp of Buffalo, New York attended a circus to find their long-lost sibling, Florence Knapp, performing as Jim McIntosh.

• Primary Sources
  • “Sawdust Adonis Is a Woman,” Denver Post, July 14, 1905, p. 1.

Joseph (or John) Whitman: Previously known as Pauline Webster. In 1905, Whitman was arrested for vagrancy in Kansas City, Missouri, shortly after their marriage to Etta Jelley. The police then discovered that Whitman had been assigned female at birth. Whitman’s wife was distraught and blindsided but continued to behave as “a good wife would” while Whitman remained detained. Whitman was eventually released from jail as there was no law against what they did. 

• Primary Sources
  • “Her Husband A Woman,” The Fort Worth Telegram, January 22, 1906, p. 1.
  • “The Bridegroom A Woman,” SEM, January 22, 1906, p. 1.
  • “The ‘Bridegroom’ to Go Free,” The Kansas City Star, January 23, 1906, p. 1.

Michael Minch: Born in Ireland in the 1840s and migrated to the United States in the 1860s, though it is unclear when they began living as a man and using the name Michael Minch. Indeed, when Minch and his wife Margaret were detained at Ellis Island in April, 1906 upon returning to the U.S. after a visit to Europe, Margaret told newspapers that the pair had migrated to the U.S. together in 1886, but census and immigration records suggest otherwise. The name “Michael Minch” can be found nowhere in the lists of incoming passengers between 1860 and 1889,  but a Michael Minch does appear in the U.S. Census as early as 1870, living with the Dayton family of South Brunswick, New Jersey as a gardener.

• Primary Sources
  • “Man for Fifty Years,” The New Brunswick Times, April 25, 1906.
  • “Strange Discovery Made by Ellis Island Officials,” San Francisco Call, May 14, 1906, p. 4.

Nicolai De Raylan: was the personal secretary to the Russian consul in Chicago beginning in the 1890s. They died in Arizona in 1906 after suffering from tuberculosis (having traveled from Chicago to Arizona to receive dry air treatment). Their death revealed that they had been transing gender, and this revelation led to a great deal of newspaper attention, in part because they had been twice married.

• Primary Sources
  • “Woman’s Wife to Tell Story,” The Fairmont West Virginian, December 24, 1906, p. 7.
  • “De Raylan: The Mystery of the Century,” The Western News, August 21, 1907, p. 7.
• Secondary Sources
  • Dennis Rodkin, “The Invention of a Man”: The Secret Life and Memorable Death of Nicolai De Raylan, Chicago Magazine, March 5, 2018, online
  • Entry in the “Gender Benders” exhibit on Outhistory
  • Emily Skidmore, True Sex: The Lives of Trans Men at the Turn of the Twentieth Century (New York: NYU Press, 2017), chapter 4.

Charles Vosbaugh: French immigrant who traveled to the American West in the late 19th century and worked as a camp cook around mining camps in Colorado for many years. In 1905, the octogenarian was hospitalized and it was then that the person folks in Trinidad, Colorado knew as “Grandpa” had been transing gender for decades. Upon their death in 1907, their funeral was paid for by contributions from community members.

• Primary Sources
  • “Lived as Man 65 Years,” Detroit Free Press, January 6, 1908, p. 7.
  • “Woman Posed as a Man for Sixty Years,” Savannah Tribune, November 30, 1907, p. 8.
• Secondary Sources
  • Peter Boag, Redressing America’s Frontier Past (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2011).
    

August Sieb: Following the death of their husband, Sieb assumed the role of a man and was able to “readily obtain” employment as such in New York City. They lived as a man for nine years until August 1908, when they were outed after being hospitalized following a heat stroke. They were subsequently arrested and sentenced to five days in the workhouse for wearing male attire.

• Primary Sources
  • “Masqueraded as a Man,” Philadelphia Inquirer, July 6, 1908, p. 2.

Frank Woodhull: born in Canada and previously known as Mary Johnson, Woodhull was apprehended by officials at Ellis Island in 1908 when they attempted to re-enter the United States after an extended trip to Europe. Woodhull revealed to officials that they had been living as a man in the United States for over fifteen years, prompting a Board of Special Inquiry hearing. In the hearing and in newspaper articles published around in case in 1908, Woodhull explained that they began dressing as a man in order to more readily find work. Ultimately, they were allowed to enter the United States.

• Primary Sources
  • “Trouble that Clothes Make,” Washington Post, October 15, 1908, p. M2.
  • “Lived 15 Years as a Man,” New York Tribune, October 5, 1908, p. 14.
• Secondary Sources
  • Erica Rand, Ellis Island Snow Globe (Durham: Duke University Press, 2005).
  • Emily Skidmore, True Sex: The Lives of Trans Men at the Turn of the Twentieth Century (New York: NYU Press, 2017), chapter 4.

Sammy Williams: Previously known as Ingeborge Wekan. Williams lived as a man for at least fifty years without arousing suspicion and was only outed upon their death. They spent the last two decades of their life in Manhattan, Montana, where they worked as a cook in the town's lumber camps. They left a modest estate and thus local authorities spent several months working to determine their previous identity and next of kin. 

• Primary Sources
  • “Man Dies, Is Woman,” Republican Courier, December 15, 1908, p. 1. 
  • “Posed as a Man for Fifty Years, Not Suspected,” St. Louis Post, December 20, 1908, p. 4.
• Secondary Sources
  • Peter Boag, Re-Dressing America’s Frontier Past (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2011).

Del Brown/James Davis: Previously known as Mabel Davis. They were adopted from an orphanage by a farmer who made them work in the field and wear boys clothes as a matter of convenience. It seems that Davis adjusted to a male identity and kept it after leaving the farm and traveled around the country. Davis was outed after being arrested alongside William Winters for stealing some old clothes from a boarding house in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1909.

• Primary Sources
  • “Passed as a Boy for Five Years,” New York Tribune, February 14, 1909, p. 1.
  • “Girl Attired as Man,” Trenton Evening Times, February 16, 1909, p. 7.

William Winters: Previously known as Lillian Winters. Originally from Galveston, Texas, Winters had assumed a male name and identity for nine years, apparently to escape an abusive partner and find financial independence. They were outed after being arrested alongside Del Brown/James Davis in St. Louis. After the arrest Winters claimed that they wished to “return to skirts” and that they had never wanted to live as anything other than a woman.

• Primary Sources
  • “After 4 Years Finds Her Suitor Is Girl,” Fort Worth Star Telegram, February 22, 1909, p. 7. 
  • “Girl Poses Nine Years as a Boy,” Crittenden Record-Press, April 29, 1909.

James Allen: also known as Maude Allen. One of the few black, gender-transgressive individuals to appear in newspapers at the time.  Assumed the role of a man at the age of sixteen because they believed they would be able to make a better living for themself. Lived in Baltimore as a man for eight years, where they worked as a school teacher at multiple different schools and even led a Sunday school class at their local church. Newspaper reports claimed that they had grown a “rather heavy” beard. They were outed by a physician after falling ill whereupon they were arrested, charged a $50 fine, and told to stop wearing men’s clothing. 

• Primary Sources
  • “Girl Poses as Man and Grows Beard,” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, April 30, 1909, p. 3.
  • “Passed for a Man,” Columbus Enquirer-Sun, May 22, 1909, p. 5.
  • “Masqueraded as a Man,” St. Albans Messenger, August 27, 1909, p. 1.

Harry Roberts: previously known as Lillian Meir. They were arrested in Cleveland, Ohio in 1909, where they told police that “I’d rather be in jail all my life than in these corsets and skirts any longer.”

• Primary Sources
  • “Prefers Jail to Corsets,” Trenton Evening Times, December 4, 1909, p. 4.

Mary Hamilton-Gray: was arrested in New York City in 1910 after a suspicious neighbor informed the police that they suspected Hamilton-Grey was a woman masquerading as a man. Upon arrest, Hamilton-Gray claimed that they had been transing gender for ten years, and that the reason they were reported to the police was because a certain wealthy woman from Newark Valley, New York was jealous after they would not marry her. They were released without charge.

• Primary Sources
  • “Girl in Man’s Apparel Arrested in New York” The Evening Star, January 21, 1910, p. 10.

John Coulter: of Tauton, Massachusetts. Upon their death, it was reported that they had been assigned female at birth, and the stories follow a very similar pattern to other “death-bed discoveries” of the time period. However, census records show that John was likely not assigned female at birth, and so the newspaper reports are a bit of a puzzle.

• Primary Sources
  • “Woman in Male Attire Keeps Secret Until End,” Washington Times, July 31, 1910, p. 9. 
  • “Lived 50 Years as a Man,” Baltimore American, August 2, 1910, p. 7.

Ray Leonard: Came from a poor family and assumed male attire and the name Ray at the age of 13 so that they could help provide for their family. They spent the largest part of their life as a cobbler, co-owning a shop with their father/uncle - newspaper reports are conflicting. It was noted that they rarely left the house, especially after the death of their father. Newspaper reports claimed that their mental health was affected by this solitary living and they were institutionalized after suffering from a mental health episode. It was only after they had been processed at the asylum that they were outed. After being outed Leonard expressed that they had lived as a man for so long (49 years) that they no longer had any wish to wear female clothes or associate with women. They were released from asylum two months later in November 1911 thanks to the help of an old coworker.

• Primary Sources
  • “Woman Known as Man for 49 Years,” Morning Oregonian, September 26, 1911, p. 1, 3.
  • “Masquerade is ‘Cured,’” Morning Oregonian, November 15, 1911, p. 1.
  • “Woman Keeps Secret of Her Man’s Disguise,” Morning Oregonian, November 19, 1911, p. 9.

William H. Cleery: formerly known as Eva McCleery. Born in Liverpool, England, and learned the family trade of shoemaking. After moving to the United States they continued to ply their craft and eventually assumed the dress of a man out of the ease with which they could work unburdened by a skirt. After they suspected that they had been discovered by some community members, Cleery came forward and explained their life story.

• Primary Sources
  • “Woman Passes for Years as Man,” Salt Lake Tribune, October 18, 1911, p. 16.

Alexandra Zeleski: Dressed as a man for two years trying to hunt down their missing husband. They took up work in the mines of Erie, Pennsylvania, and were outed after fainting on the job. Their story appeared in various newspapers across the country though no more than two lines about their story appeared in any newspaper. 

• Primary Sources
  • “Our Point of View,” Meriden Daily Journal, May 3, 1912, p. 6.
  • “Woman Worked in Mines,” Scranton Truth, May 3, 1912, p. 6.

Harry Allen/Harry Livingtsone: an individual who gained small fame in the press in the early 20th century (at one point was described as “only eighteen years of age, but incorrigible. The ambition of her life is to act like a man”). They also were well known to the Seattle police department.  Within the Seattle Police Court Criminal dockets which chronicle arrest and sentencing, Allen (under various alias, including “Nell Pickerell”) is listed seven times between 1899 and 1904 alone. Importantly, newspaper stories about Allen focused on their run-ins with the law, and romantic relationships with women. 

• Primary Sources
  • “Police are Puzzled Over Nell Pickerell,” Seattle Star, February 5, 1908, p. 3.
  • “Nell Pickerell Dying,” Tacoma Times, September 27, 1916, p. 1, 8.
• Secondary Sources
  • Jeannie Yandel, “Nell Pickerell, a Trans Man from Seattle’s Rough and Tumble Days,” KUOW, January 2, 2015, online
  • Peter Boag, “Past As Prologue: Harry Allen In The Northwest And The Slow History Of Trans Acceptance,” Northwest Public Radio, February 5, 2021, online
  • Peter Boag, Redressing America’s Frontier Past (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2011).

Jack Hill: also previously known as Helen Halstead. Lived as a man for two years in Meeker, CO where they earned the moniker “Handsome Jack”. They had been the apple of quite a few women’s eyes until they eventually married Anna Slifka. Hill outed themself to Anna who actually wished to keep things the way they were though her brother was upset with the revelation and outed Hill to the police. Hill was subsequently arrested and put on trial for impersonating a man. Hill and their wife both attested that Hill had lived as a man as an attempt to save up enough money for both of them to earn a college education. 

• Primary Sources
  • “‘Handsome Jack’ a Woman,” Kansas City Star, September 20, 1913, p. 2.
  • “Denver Girl, at End of Long Honeymoon, Is Shocked When Told Her Husband is Female,” Trenton Evening Times, September 25, 1913, p. 1.

Ralph Kerwineo: previously known as Cora Anderson, they moved from Chicago to Milwaukee in 1908 with their partner, Mamie White, in order to begin a new life as husband and wife. The pair lived together until 1914, when Kerwineo began to pursue other women, and legally married Dorothy Kleinowski. Mamie White reported Kerwineo to the police in retaliation, and they were arrested for disorderly conduct. The story was covered widely in the nation’s newspapers, in no small part because Kerwineo, who was of Afro-Indigenous decent, had passed a eugenic blood test in order to secure their marriage license, and thus the specter of a mixed-race gender transgressive individual legally marrying a white woman, despite Wisconsin’s then-new “Eugenic Marriage Law” was portrayed as a scandal in many papers. 

• Primary Sources
  • “Amazing Double Life of Girl Who LIved for Yeas as a Man,” Chicago Day Book, May 13, 1914, p. 1-3.
• Secondary Sources
  • Emily Skidmore, “Ralph Kerwineo’s Queer Body: Narrating the Scales of Social Membership in the Early 20th Century,” GLQ 20 1-2 (2014): 141-166.
  • Matthew Prigge, “The ‘Girl-Man’ of Milwaukee: The Lives of Cora Anderson,” Wisconsin Magazine of the History Archives 96, 3 (2012-2013) online

Ben Rosenstein: also previously known as Ida Weinstein. Was a Jewish immigrant that came to the United States to find work but was unable to find a job that paid a living wage. They moved to New York and met Pauline Rosenstein who would come to pose as their wife in an “industrial wedding” while Ben assumed the name and role of a man in order to provide for the two. They found factory work but developed tuberculosis and passed away at the age of 26. They were only outed posthumously. Newspaper reporting surrounding their story is interesting as it calls into question Rosenstein’s position as a socialist, and also recounts their last words as being “I wish it was true that ‘dead men tell no tales.’” 

• Primary Sources
  • “Girl ‘Married’ Girl to Get Man’s Wages,” Miami Herald, February 16, 1915, p. 9. 
  • “Lived as Man to Help Her Friend,” Trenton Evening Times, February 8, 1915, p. 19. 
  • “Was a ‘Man’ 7 years Living with a Wife,” The Evening Times, February 9, 1915, p. 14.

Eugene De Forest: previously known as Mary J. Bradley, born in Newton Connecticut in 1849. They attended Vassar College in the late 1860s, and by 1880 was living in San Francisco and working as a voice teacher. They were arrested in 1915, by which point they were 62 years old, and claimed to authorities that they had “certifications” from physicians and city officials in San Francisco and San Jose authorizing their male dress. 

• Primary Sources
  • “Wed, She Says, Both as Man And Woman,” New York World, September 2, 1915, p. 1.
  • “Drama Prof Proves to be Woman,” Los Angeles Herald, September 1, 1915, p. 1.
  • Two newspaper articles linked in the Digital Transgender Archive

Albert Cashier: also previously known as Jennie Hodgers. Served in the Union Army during the Civil War under the name of Albert J. Cashier. They were outed long after the war had ended while receiving surgical care at the Soldiers’ Home at Quincy. After being outed it appears that they were institutionalized at the Western Hospital for the Insane where they would reside until their death in October 1915.

• Primary Sources
  • “Woman Fought Through War in Guise of a Man,” Colorado Springs Gazette, October 12, 1915, p. 8. 
  • “Woman Who Fought as Man in Civil War Dead,” San Jose Mercury Herald, October 12, 1915, p. 1.
  • “Woman GAR Veteran Dies,” The Kansas City Times, October 13, 1915, p. 8. 
  • "Civil War Soldier a Woman,” Miami Herald Record, October 19, 1915, p. 3.
• Secondary Sources
  • Rob Sanders, The Fighting Infantryman: The Story of Albert D.J. Cashier, Transgender Civil War Soldier (New York: Little Bee, 2020). 
  • Sarah Prager, Rainbow Revolutionaries: Fifty LGBTQ+ People Who Made History (New York: Harper Collins, 2020).
  • De Anne Blanton and Lauren Cook, They Fought Like Demons: Women Soldiers in the American Civil War (Baton Rouge: LSU Press, 2002). 
  • Cashier’s Illinois home has become a historical site 
  • Outhistory exhibit

Robert Gaffney: was the subject of a 1916 “lazy husband” lawsuit in Seattle after their wife, Margaret Gaffney sued her husband for failure to support their family. As part of their defense, Gaffney revealed that they had been assigned female at birth, and was therefore not legally a husband. According to newspaper reports, Gaffney had transed gender for over twenty years, and they claimed to have first married Margaret when she found herself pregnant and alone in 1911. 

• Primary Sources
  • Four newspaper articles linked in the Digital Transgender Archive
• Secondary Sources
  • Emily Skidmore, True Sex: The Lives of Trans Men at the Turn of the Twentieth Century (New York: NYU Press, 2017), chapter 5.

Bert Schmidt: also previously known as Bertha Schmidt. They lived in St. Louis with their wife Mary Assate, who they reportedly married in 1917. In 1918, they were arrested on the suspicion of being a German spy.

• Primary Sources
  • “Masqueraded as a Man,” Evening Star (Washington D.C.), November 26, 1918, p. 14.
  • “Woman Registers in Draft, Plays Man to Get a Man’s Salary,” El Paso Herald, November 26, 1918, p. 2.
  • “Girl is Hubby of Girl; Wears Pants,” Washington Times, November 30, 1918, p. 11.

John  Bauer: previously known as Helen Seifert of Kansas City. Newspaper reports in 1919 revealed that Bauer had moved to California in 1911 and had been transing gender since. They were arrested in 1919 for evading the World War I draft.

• Primary Sources
  • “Identify Woman Evader of Draft,” San Jose Mercury Herald, January 31, 1919, p. 2.
  • “P-S-S-St! Wouldn’t You?,” Cleveland Plain Dealer, January 7, 1919, p. 1.

James Hathaway: born in Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, in 1892 with the given name of Ethel Kimball. They likely began transing gender in the 1910s and had a series of both marriages and run-ins with the law throughout the 1920s. In 1921, they married Louise Margaret Aechtler in Somerville, Massachusetts. The marriage did not last long, and in 1924 they married Pearl A. Davis in Hartford, Connecticut. This marriage was also short lived, and in 1926 they were arrested in Manchester, New Hampshire, alongside a woman named Maude Allen. Their arrests were discussed widely in the nation's newspapers.

• Primary Sources
  • “Girl Says Her Faith was Whole in Wedding Impersonator,” The Daily Herald (Biloxi, MS), December 22, 1921, p. 8.
  • “Ethel Kimball Arrested, Was Again Posing as Man,” Boston Daily Globe, October 30, 1923, p. 15.
  • “Ethel Kimball Held in $1000,” Boston Daily Globe, April 12, 1924, p. 2.
  • “Ethel Kimball Gets Five Months,” Boston Globe, April 12, 1924, p. 1A.
  • “ ‘James Wilson’ a Woman, Released,” Boston Daily Globe, August 12, 1926, p. 24.
• Secondary Sources
  • Emily Skidmore, True Sex: The Lives of Trans Men at the Turn of the Twentieth Century (New York: NYU Press, 2017), chapter 5.

Jerry McFarlane: arrested in Los Angeles in 1927 for “masquerading” in male attire. The Los Angeles press published short interviews with McFarlane where they discussed how much they enjoyed transing gender and flirting with women. They reported that had been living as a man since 1921 and that “​​its much more fun to be a man…besides, I get along better, too, and the life is freer and easier.” In the same article they told the Los Angeles Times, “I was going to take a frail out the night I was arrested. Its lots of fun to take a girl to a dance or a show and not have them get wise.”

• Primary Sources
  • “She Flirted With Girls,” Los Angeles Times, March 30, 1927, p. A2.

Kenneth Lisonbee: born Katherine Rowena Wing, the grandchild of Mormom pioneer Joseph Smith Wing in Utah in 1904. In the 1920s, they moved to California and began transing gender. In 1927, they married Eileen Garnet, but the marriage did not last long, as Garnet’s extended family soon learned that they were assigned female at birth and reported them to the Los Angeles police. After this run-in with the law, Lisonbee returned home to Utah were they became reacquainted with childhood friend Stella Harper. The pair later moved together to Los Angeles, where they lived together until Lisonbee was again arrested in 1929, after a neighbor suspected that Lisonbee was transing gender and that the pair were not a conventional husband and wife. This 1929 arrest was reported in newspapers nationwide, including the Los Angles Times which reported, “She’s just a tomboy ranch girl grown up and as soon as she can settle with the law about her escapade in impersonating a man and marrying another girl her she is going straight back to her 200-acre wheat ranch at Springville, Utah, where the neighbors are used to seeing he in masculine attire and think nothing of it. No more adventuring about the world, but a railroad ticket straight home to dad, who always said she was the best boy he ever had.” Lisonbee did in fact return home, but did so with Harper in tow. By the 1930s, Lisonbee and Harper were back in Los Angeles–this time with Lisonbee’s parents in tow. 

• Primary Sources
  • “Ranch Tomboy in Legal Mess,” Los Angeles Times, January 12, 1929, p. A8.
  • “‘Man Barber’ a Girl; Also Acted Husband,” Daily News (New York), January 13, 1929, p. 3.
  • “Husband Found to be a Woman,” Oakland Tribune, January 12, 1929, p. 1.
  • “Woman Barber Wins Leniency,” Los Angeles Times, May 1, 1940, p. A2.
• Secondary Sources
  • Emily Skidmore, True Sex: The Lives of Trans Men at the Turn of the Twentieth Century (New York: NYU Press, 2017), chapter 5.

Peter Stratford: born Deresley Morton in New Zealand around 1880.  They emigrated to the United States at some point before 1910, and by 1918 they were living in Manhattan as Peter Stratford. In 1925, Stratford married Elizabeth Rowland in Kansas City, Missouri, and the pair moved to California. At some point prior to their death, they became involved in Sufism, and thus when their death revealed that they had been assigned female at birth, newspaper stories about the revelation conflated their gender transgression with their participation in with their religion, occasionally referring to Sufism as a “strange cult.”  

• Primary Sources
  • “Death Betrays Married Man as a Woman,” Chicago Daily Tribune, May 3, 1929, p. 1.
  • “Man-Woman Death Bares Life Mystery,” San Mateo Times (San Mateo, CA), May 3, 1929, p. 4.
• Secondary Sources
  • Emily Skidmore, True Sex: The Lives of Trans Men at the Turn of the Twentieth Century (New York: NYU Press, 2017), chapter 5.

Dr. Victor Mayfield: previously known as Mary Mayfield, they moved to Mena, Arkansas in 1918 and became a renowned doctor in the area, especially for their treatment of cancer. The fact that they had been transing gender was revealed only by their death in 1929.

• Primary Sources
  • “Woman Who Masqueraded as Man Throughout Life, Dies in Arkansas,” The Evening Independent (St. Petersburg, FL), August 27, 1929, p. 1.
  • “Dr. Mary V. Mayfield Dies,” Morgan County Democrat, August 29, 1929, p. 1.
• Secondary Sources
  • Entry in the online Encyclopedia of Arkansas
  • “When He Turned out to be a She,” Herald Leader, April 30, 2014 online

Eugene C. Perkins: married Margaret Curren in Florida in 1908, and the pair moved to California where Perkins practiced medicine in La Jolla for many years. It was only upon their death in 1936 that neighbors and patients learned that Perkins was assigned female at birth. 

• Primary Sources
  • “A Husband Dies—He’s a Woman!” San Francisco Chronicle, October 25, 1936, p. 1.
• Secondary Sources
  • Corey Levitan, “Dr. Perkins had a Secret,” L Jolla Light, June 19, 2019, online

James W. Phipps: previously known as Minerva Phipps, was arrested in Pasadena, California in 1939 on the accusation that they were presenting as a false identity. Newspaper reports published after their arrest contend that they were twice married to women, and that their second wife Mabel Eagan Radcliffe was unaware that they had been assigned female at birth.

• Primary Sources
  • “Woman Caught Posing as Man,” Los Angeles Times, July 12, 1939, p. A1.
  • “Masquerade Charge Filed,” Los Angeles Times, July 15, 1939, p. A.
  • “Court Frees Woman Posing Long as Man,” Los Angeles Times, July 26, 1939, p. A2.