One From the Vaults

Trans historian and executive producer of HBO's Legendary, Sydney Baloue, joins us to talk about the many histories of the vogue/ballroom scene, trans men in ballroom, and dance as a form of history and ancestral veneration.

https://www.sydneybaloue.com/

https://legendsofvogue.substack.com/

https://www.instagram.com/sydneybaloue/

What do witches, LSD, and aliens have to do with trans rights?? In this week's episode of One From the Vaults, we head to Miami Beach to tell the story of the largest international trans activist network of the 1970s and their larger than life leader, Angela Douglas.

Sources:

Triple Jeopardy by Angela Douglas (1983)

https://digitalcollections.detroitpubliclibrary.org/bh030020

https://digitalcollections.detroitpubliclibrary.org/bh030019

https://zagria.blogspot.com/2015/07/history-of-tao-part-3-aftermath.html

https://zagria.blogspot.com/2007/06/angela-douglas-1943-2007-musician.html#obituary

The Transsexual Empire by Janice Raymond (1979)

https://www.transadvocate.com/transphobic-radical-hate-didnt-start-with-brennan-the-sandy-stone-olivia-records-controversy_n_4112.htm

https://zagria.blogspot.com/2015/07/history-of-tao-part-2-1972-82-tao-in.html

https://www.aclufl.org/news/florida-was-once-trans-activist-hub/

Moonshadow and Mirage newsletters by TAO

AJ Lewis’s essay in Trap Door

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZRFcCfw2I_4

In this week's episode of One From the Vaults, I sit down with historian Jules Gill-Peterson — author of Histories of the Transgender Child and A Short History of Transmisogyny — to talk about the question of whether there is a history of anti-transgender discrimination, antebellum cross-dressing, and what's at stake politically in the friction between transsexual and transgender positions.

You can follow Jules' substack, The Long Transition, at https://sadbrowngirl.substack.com/

One from the Vaults is back for a Tenth Anniversary Special!

In this episode, we explore the life of tarot master, comic writer, and 1970s trans activist Rachel Pollack!

Sources:

78 Degrees of Wisdom (1980) by Rachel Pollack

“Pandora’s Bust” (1971) by Rachel Pollack

The Body of the Goddess (1997) by Rachel Pollack

Beatrix Gates (2018) by Rachel Pollack

Conversations with Roz Kaveney (2018-present)

Tranny Central (2024, 2026) by Jaye Hudson

My Life with Dali by Amanda Lear

https://rachelpollack.com/reviews/interviewwilkes.html

https://archive.org/details/transsistersjou1995unse_1/page/46/mode/2up

https://web.archive.org/web/20050626175809/http://vertigo.vurt.net/20qpolla.htm

https://web.archive.org/web/20121207105925/http://www.angelfire.com/nm/spiritualwarrier/index.562.html

https://web.archive.org/web/20060208223448/http://www.tarotforlife.com/Newsletter/TFLNewsletter_2.pdf

https://www.tcj.com/one-of-the-things-they-definitely-are-is-queer-an-interview-with-rachel-pollack/

https://fantasticmetropolis.com/i/pandoras-bust

https://theheroines.blogspot.com/2013/12/interview-with-rachel-pollack.html

https://civilianreader.com/2014/06/25/an-interview-with-rachel-pollack/

https://natfluence.com/interview/rpollack/

https://theracket.news/p/my-aunt-rachel

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2023/apr/17/rachel-pollack-obituary

https://xtramagazine.com/culture/rachel-pollack-womens-spirituality-257312

https://web.archive.org/web/20230414000409/https://lgbthealth.org.uk/blog/interview-rachel-pollack/

https://www.upstatediary.com/rachel-pollack

https://www.fifthestate.org/archive/380-spring-2009/rachel-pollack-willing-change-everything/

https://lilith.org/articles/debut-81/

A special episode LIVE from Camp Trans UK! Listen to the sounds of the wind in the trees and the smoke of a camp fire getting in my face as OFTV tells the story of the original Camp Trans.

Works Cited:

https://www.camp-trans.org/pages/ct-history.html

http://eminism.org/michigan/faq-protest.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michigan_Womyn%27s_Music_Festival

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camp_Trans#2010_festivals

https://www.transadvocate.com/how-terf-violence-inspired-camp-trans_n_14413.htm

https://www.transadvocate.com/michigan-womyns-music-festival_n_8943.htm

https://web.archive.org/web/20140117075803/http://zinelibrary.info/files/PABA6.pdf

https://web.archive.org/web/20101129014722/http://anarchistnews.org/?q=node%252F11968

http://transwomenbelonghere.blogspot.com/

http://transwomenbelonghere.blogspot.com/2013/05/envisioning-inclusive-michfest-thoughts.html

In this double-length episode, OFTV speaks to trans historian Abram J. Lewis about TAO (Transsexual Action Organization), about oral history work, and about how magic, witchcraft, and "unreason" intersect with the emergence of Gay Liberation and early trans organizations.

AJ Lewis is a post doctoral fellow at Grinnell College in Iowa, and the co-founder of the NYC Trans Oral History Project, a partnership with the New York Public Library system.

This month OFTV presents a special interview with archivist Librada González Fernández of the Cubanecuir archive! Librada is a young trans woman based in NYC and Miami who is pulling together the stories and ephemera of queer and trans Cubans, both on the island and in the diaspora! She joins OFTV to talk Cuban queer history, the ethics of archival work, being a trans person working in history.

You can follow the archive @cubanecuir on Instagram and Twitter!

To celebrate five years of One From the Vaults, this year I'll be presenting a series of interviews with artists, filmmakers, writers, and historians working on trans history. First up is the brilliant and beautiful artist Zackary Drucker, co-director of the new HBO docuseries The Lady and the Dale, which tells the wild story of 1970s icon Liz Carmichael!

This month's episode of OFTV follows the life of a gender non-conforming mystic who lead an early insurgency in the Haitian Revolution!

Works cited:

The Priest and the Prophetesse (2018) by Terry Rey

Des hommes et des dieux (2002)

Sex and the Empire That is No More (1994) by J. Lorand Matory

Mama Lola: a Vodou Priestess in Brooklyn (1991) by Karen McCarthy Brown

In this episode of OFTV, we follow Steve Dain - teacher of the year, and later mentor to Lou Sullivan - in his fight for the right to keep teaching after his sex change!

Works Cited:

http://revolution.berkeley.edu/steve-dain-teacher-transitions/

https://www.legacy.com/obituaries/eastbaytimes/obituary.aspx?n=steve-dain&pid=96301343

https://www.digitaltransgenderarchive.net/files/k930bx11b

https://vimeo.com/ondemand/whatsexami

https://www.ebar.com/news/latest_news//292479/online_extra:_emeryville_street_to_be_named_for_fired_trans_gym_teacher?fbclid=IwAR1o_L7_3dIykRc5kVijDviKC_ZsPvmInN0bLxQWMDz7kUJImLSmS2EFr-c

https://www.ebar.com/news/news//277848

http://transgroupblog.blogspot.com/2008/02/rip-steve-dain-ftm-pioneer.html

http://revolution.berkeley.edu/steve-dain-outcome-1978/#menu-main-nav