NYC Trans Oral History Project

Cecilia Gentili is the Director of Policy at Gay Men's Health Crisis (GMHC). In this wide-ranging interview, she reflects on the relationships and experiences that inform her story of struggle, resilience, and joy. Cecilia recounts her childhood and adolescence in Gálvez, Argentina, describing complex family dynamics and early experiences with gender nonconformity and transphobia. She also shares...

Jay Toole describes her experiences of queer homelessness in New York City. Born in the South Bronx, she became homeless as a child due to the circumstances of her family and identity as a stone butch. She describes her chosen queer family in Washington Square Park in the 1960-70s and their means of survival. She recalls stealing a NYC Taxi Cab and driving it to Texas, which led to her 18 month st...

Bianey Garcia is a community organizer at Make the Road New York, a non-profit organization providing services and advocacy for Latinx and working class communities. Born in Veracruz, Mexico and raised in Veracruz and Chiapas, Bianey describes the transphobic violence that forced her to relocate to Tijuana at 14 and subsequently New York City. Bianey recounts her initial experiences as an undocume...

After purchasing a house in Park Slope in the 1980's to be closer to her kids, Dr. Rusty Mae Moore and Chelsea Goodwin opened their home to homeless trans folk. Transy House, as it was called, aimed to be a place where trans people could feel safe from the objectification and harassment. To this day, the continue to live with other trans folks on Long Island, where they've discovered and forged ne...

Julian Talamantez Brolaski uses language and xirs' own pronoun paradigm to come closer to words that best express xir identity; at one time utilizing "it" as xir pronoun and appreciating the leveling impact of recognizing a unity with all things. Seeking what would feel closer to "home" both conceptually and geographically, xe sought community in Santa Cruz, San Francisco, New Mexico and New York;...

Born in NYC, Reneé Imperato, is a proud anti racist, pro union trans woman who has lived her life fighting for the rights of others. In this interview she shares her memories of growing up in New York including her childhood spent in Times Square, her friendship with Leslie Feinberg, and her memories of the legendary 220 club in New York City’s West Village. Throughout the interview Reneé weaves i...

Paris shares her experience of growing up in Atlanta and starting to “live her truth” at a young age. She recalls finding reassurance in a community of other Black trans women for the first time and getting involved with parts of the Atlanta Black Queer and Trans scene. Professionally, Paris has spoken on panels about LGBT issues, worked as a music librarian at Morehouse College, and engaged in se...

Phoenix Danger was active in the successful unionization campaign at Babeland, a NYC sex toy shop. In this interview, they recount their early life in suburban New York as the child of Filipino immigrants, facing social rejection in school and discovering an affirming online queer community. They relate their struggles in an abusive relationship during college, and their journey from estrangement...

Genevieve Tatum, a transgender woman, retells her experiences as an adolescent in The Village in New York City. She describes the aftermath of the Stonewall riot, the Civil Rights movement, and the Women's movement. Genevieve also reveals her journey in accepting her trans-identity; first as a cross-dresser, and eventually coming out as a non-operative transgender woman. She describes the pain, co...

Pauline Park is a long-time transgender activist based in New York City who led the campaign for the 2004 New York City transgender rights law. Born in Korea but adopted into a Christian evangelical family in Milwaukee, Park has dedicated decades of her life to LGBTQ, Asian-American, and Palestinian solidarity activism, viewing all human rights' struggles as distinct yet interconnected. Her life a...

Naomi Clark describes her work with the Sylvia Rivera Law Project, the on-line trans and queer community Strap-On.org, and her career in video game design. She begins her oral history with her childhood. Topics of her childhood include her first memories of Seattle, parents' marital tensions, family move to Japan, return to the United States during high school and racial justice activism there. Sh...

Octavia Leona Kohner was active in the successful unionization campaign at Babeland, a NYC sex toy shop. Here, she recounts her upbringing in a working-class family in Staten Island, and describes social isolation, friendships, and sexual encounters during adolescence. She relates her experience coming out as a trans woman while attending Hunter College, and her struggle with depression. She also...

Jamie Bauer recounts their childhood and adolescence growing up in New York City’s Stuyvesant Town, resisting family pressure to conform to normative gender expressions and discovering butch femme culture in the Village. They discuss finding political and social community as a college student in Boston engaged in gay rights organizing, and, later, as part of Women’s Pentagon Action in New York Cit...

Melissa Sklarz was the first transgender elected official in New York, having been a judicial delegate since the 1990s. She has served on many trans rights legislative committees, including the Stonewall Democrats and Gay and Lesbian Independent Democrats, and was a delegate for the DNC in 2016. Yet her life before politics was marred by homelessness and substance abuse while struggling through li...

J. Soto recounts his evolving understanding of gender and identity along his eastward migration across the United States. Born and raised in the Bay Area, J. attended graduate school in Chicago, IL before moving to Brooklyn where he currently works as an artist who produces both written and performed works. J. describes the nuanced relationship he shares with his family, informed by their experien...

Rafaela Anshel is a Jewish trans woman, affiliated with the Congregation Beth Simchat Torah. This interview is a reflection of Anshel’s transition. She details accounts from youth up until present day, focusing on her struggles with self-acceptance as well as societal perceptions of trans people. The main topics discussed include rape and violence, trans safety, PTSD, gender nonconformity, queerne...

JD Davids, a writer, health activist, and communication strategist, recounts his experiences as a member of the Philadelphia HIV/AIDS activist movement and subsequent move to New York City. A Philadelphia resident until 2002, JD talks about how his time spent in anarchist collective housing led him to ACT UP Philadelphia and other direct action organizing for HIV/AIDS services. JD expands on the e...

Ei Meeker came to New York in the mid 1980's and got involved with ACT Up at the height of the AIDS crisis. He got involved with resource access for homeless LGBTQ and HIV+ people. He talks about his early brushes with feminism, activism in New York and San Francisco, the family support around gender he received growing up and his decision to become an educator. (Summary by Kirsten Adorian.)

El Roy Red is a poet who has lived in New York City for three years. Red begins the interview by discussing her self-expression through a unique sense of style and how she found her voice as a writer. They recount their global upbringing, including their earliest moments of trans awareness and their experiences living in Europe and small towns in the United States as a trans person of color. She a...

Shannon Harrington is a wig master, hair chaser, and make-up artist who has been living in New York City for over 30 years. In this interview Miss Shannon provides meaningful and nuanced insight into the 1980s and 1990s world of drag in New York City, gained from years of being involved in nightlife, theater and moving image communities as performer and behind the scenes talent. Miss Shannon speak...

In this interview, Suneela Mubayi discusses their experiences as a genderqueer person who has traveled extensively throughout the Middle East while studying for their PhD in Arabic through Columbia University. They recount being raised by their grandmother in New Delhi, India, discovering their interest in languages and in Arabic, navigating airport travel while trans, and the interplay of languag...

Photo credit: Meredith Zinner Photography. // Topher Gross is a hairstylist and former nightlife personality, performer, and poet. A lifelong New Yorker, he describes his quiet upbringing in Canarsie and early feelings of masculinity. Beginning with his time at the College of Staten Island, he discovered lesbian and trans communities through the internet and, later, through Manhattan's lesbian nig...

Librarian and author Kyle Lukoff details a life lived with and around books. He recounts his bookish childhood in Seattle, moving to New York City, coming out as a gay trans man, his struggles with anorexia, and becoming a school librarian. Much of the interview is dedicated to Kyle's thoughts and experiences surrounding books, from teaching them to children, to the state of trans children's liter...

In this short conversation, Lenni discusses their long, ongoing journey in exploring non-binary and "genderfucker" identity. They recount coming out as non-binary after many years in a "straight-passing" marriage, the importance of individuality and self-expression, and their experiences as co-founder of the TransGenerational Theatre Project. (Summary by Jamie Magyar.)

Zavé Martohardjono recounts growing up as a mixed race queer New Yorker. Having seen New York change over the past couple of decades, Zavé tells us about living in globally diverse neighborhoods, navigating New York City's competitive education system, finding solace and community in queer POC party scenes, working through racial and gender identity, the benefits of a queer workplace, and seeking...