The FBI and the Madams
J. Edgar Hoover saw the political effectiveness of cracking down on elite brothel madams—but not their clients—in New York City.
Out of the Card Catalog Closet
Librarians gathered in 1970 to challenge Library of Congress classifications and catalog subject headings that aligned homosexuality with deviance.
Visualizing Trans Identities
Photography played an important role in determining gender categories and presentations for both scientists and trans individuals in interwar Germany.
The Battle over Drag in 1960s San Francisco
The organized struggle for rights has been shaped by debates over the relationship between gender presentation and sexuality.
The Lesbian As Villain or Victim
In Oregon in the 1960s, the debate over capital punishment hinged on shifting interpretations of the gendered female body.
Harvey Milk’s Gay Freedom Day Speech: Annotated
Five months before his assassination in 1978, Harvey Milk called on the president of the United States to defend the rights of gay and lesbian Americans.
The Year The Grammys Honored Disco
In 1980, The Grammys gave disco its own category, but the genre was already receding into invisibility.
Abortion Remedies from a Medieval Catholic Nun(!)
Hildegard von Bingen wrote medical texts describing how to prepare abortifacients.
How Wet-Nursing Stoked Class Tensions
“[N]o man can justly doubt, that a childs mind is answerable to his nurses milk and manners.”
Sex Panic at the Department Store
Were shopgirls selling more than scents at the perfume counter? Three investigators were determined to find out.