Christine Jorgensen

surgery.

One of the famous examples you have in the book, and I think a name that people who are listening could also know, is Christine Jorgensen.

Can you tell a bit about that story?

Yeah, it's really fascinating because she was a former GI with a Danish family, and she had already started estrogen therapy in New York.

And I mean, after getting the surgery, she also says, I refuse to call this castration.

I really like kind of this strategic way she interacts with the medical system.

And it seems to me that this story has like implications beyond Christine Jorgensen, right? Like with the research of people like Hamburger and others, how do these like different cases kind of I mean, to me, this is also like the kind of part where we can talk about the agency of trans people in this whole medicalized history.

And you also do something really wonderful in the book, which is also kind of, you conduct these oral history interviews with people.

As we document this period of history, there are also trans soldiers today defending America, and they have to make a decision about serving or living as their authentic selves.

I'm reminded of Christine Jorgensen, often known as the first public American trans woman.

She transitioned after her service in World War II.

She came to Boston to perform and to talk about her life in a similar way to how Deborah Sampson gave lectures about her military experience.

But because of anti-cross-dressing laws in Boston, she was not allowed to perform.

And so instead, Christine Jorgensen took a walk and a photo shoot on the Freedom Trail, where she visited sites like Paul Revere's house.

And how amazing is it that we're talking about Paul Revere standing up and supporting Deborah Sampson's petition for a pension in 1804, and in the 1950s, Christine Jorgensen, this trans woman, is coming and literally asserting her place in American history on the Freedom Trail.

Even as we make progress,

This is not in the book, but it's an interesting incident in, in 1970 in which he, um, there's a Republican, Charles Goodell, running for the Senate.

[laughs] And, um, and Nixon actually says, "He is the Christine Jorgensen of the Rep-" Uh, I'm sorry, Agnew was Nixon's attack dog.

Spiro Agnew was his vice president at the time, and they attack Charles Goodell, and they basically make sure that Goodell loses and a guy named James Buckley from the Conservative Party in New York is actually the s- wins the Senate seat in 1970.

But typically, with that, with that exception, Nixon was moving to the middle.