Before Gender

Lost Stories from TRANS History 1850–1950
This ground-breaking book rewrites trans history, presenting the stories of thirty extraordinary trans people who lived between 1850 and 1950. Featuring kids, activists, workers and athletes, it reveals the reality of trans lives in an era before the concept of gender became an everyday term.

Discover the trailblazing lives of thirty trans people who will radically change everything you’ve been told about transgender history.

Highlighting influential individuals from 1850 to 1950 who are all but unknown today, Eli Erlick shares thirty remarkable stories from romance to rebellion and mystery to murder. These narratives chronicle the grit, joy and survival of trans people long before gender became an everyday term.

Organised into four parts, paralleling today’s controversies over gender identity – kids, activists, workers and athletes – Before Gender introduces figures whose forgotten stories transform the discussion. These ground-breaking histories include two of the first teens to access gender-affirming medical treatment, a countess who instigated an LGBTQ+ riot forty years before Stonewall and the greatest female billiards player of the 1910s.

Bold and visionary, Erlick’s debut uncovers these lost stories from the depths of the archives to narrate trans lives in a way that has never been attempted before.

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