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2847 Dudley Ave, Bronx, NY 10461, Stati Uniti
Christopher Columbus High School, 925 Astor Ave, Bronx, NY 10469, Stati Uniti
Mohawk Valley Community College, 1101 Sherman Dr, Utica, NY 13501, Stati Uniti
Christine Jorgensen (May 30, 1926 – May 3, 1989) was an American trans
woman who was the first person to become widely known in the United States for
having sex reassignment surgery. Jorgensen grew up in the Bronx, New York
City. Shortly after graduating from high school in 1945, she was drafted into
the U.S. Army for World War II. After her service she attended several
schools, worked, and around this time heard about sex reassignment surgery.
She traveled to Europe and in Copenhagen, Denmark, obtained special permission
to undergo a series of operations starting in 1951.[1]
She returned to the United States in the early 1950s and her transition was
the subject of a New York Daily News front-page story. She became an
instant celebrity, using the platform to advocate for transgender people and
became known for her directness and polished wit. She also worked as an
actress and nightclub entertainer and recorded several songs.
Returning to New York after military service and increasingly concerned
over (as one obituary later called it) a "lack of male physical development",[4]
Jorgensen heard about sex reassignment surgery. She began taking estrogen in
the form of ethinylestradiol and researching the surgery with the help of Dr.
Joseph Angelo, the husband of a classmate at the Manhattan Medical and Dental
Assistant School.[4]
Jorgensen intended to go to Sweden, where the only doctors in the world who
then performed the surgery were located. During a stopover in Copenhagen to
visit relatives, she met Dr. Christian Hamburger, a Danish endocrinologist and
specialist in rehabilitative hormonal therapy. Jorgensen stayed in Denmark and
underwent hormone replacement therapy under Dr. Hamburger's direction. She
chose the name Christine in honor of Dr. Hamburger.
She obtained special permission from the Danish Minister of Justice to
undergo a series of operations in that country. On September 24, 1951,
surgeons at Gentofte Hospital in Copenhagen performed an orchiectomy on
Jorgensen.[5]
In a letter to friends on October 8, 1951, she referred to how the surgery
affected her:
As you can see by the enclosed photos, taken just before the operation,
I have changed a great deal. But it is the other changes that are so much
more important. Remember the shy, miserable person who left America? Well,
that person is no more and, as you can see, I'm in marvelous spirits.[5]
In November 1952, doctors at Copenhagen University Hospital performed a
penectomy. In Jorgensen's words, "My second operation, as the previous one,
was not such a major work of surgery as it may imply."[5]
She then returned to the United States and eventually obtained a
vaginoplasty when the procedure became available there. The vaginoplasty was
performed under the direction of Dr. Angelo, with Harry Benjamin as a medical
adviser.[4]
Later, in the preface of Jorgensen's autobiography, Harry Benjamin gave her
credit for the advancement of his studies. He wrote, "Indeed Christine,
without you, probably none of this would have happened; the grant, my
publications, lectures, etc."[6]
After her vaginoplasty, Jorgensen planned to marry labor union statistician
John Traub, but the engagement was called off. In 1959 she announced her
engagement to typist Howard J. Knox in Massapequa Park, New York, where her
father had built her a house in Massapequa, NY after her reassignment surgery.
However, the couple was unable to obtain a marriage license because
Jorgensen's birth certificate listed her as male. In a report about the broken
engagement, The New York Times noted that Knox had lost his job in
Washington, D.C. when his engagement to Jorgensen became known.[8][9]
In 1967, Jorgensen moved to California after her parents passed away. She
left behind the ranch home built by her father in Massapequa and settled at
the Chateau Marmont in Los Angeles, California for a period of time. It was
also during this same year that Jorgensen published her autobiography
Christine Jorgensen: A Personal Autobiography, which chronicled her life
experiences as a trans woman and included her own personal perspectives on
major events in her life.[10]
During the 1970s and 1980s, Jorgensen toured university campuses and other
venues to speak about her experiences. She was known for her directness and
polished wit. She once demanded an apology from Vice President Spiro T. Agnew
when he called another politician "the Christine Jorgensen of the Republican
Party" (Agnew refused her request).[11]
Jorgensen also worked as an actress and nightclub entertainer and recorded
several songs.[12]
In summer stock, she played Madame Rosepettle in the play Oh Dad, Poor Dad,
Mamma's Hung You in the Closet and I'm Feelin' So Sad. In her nightclub
act, she sang several songs, including "I Enjoy Being a Girl", and at the end
made a quick change into a Wonder Woman costume. She later recalled that
Warner Communications, owners of the Wonder Woman character's copyright,
demanded that she stop using the character; she did so and instead used a new
character of her own invention, Superwoman, who was marked by the inclusion of
a large letter S on her cape. Jorgensen continued her act, performing
at Freddy's Supper Club on the Upper East Side of Manhattan until at least
1982, when she performed twice in the Hollywood area: once at the Backlot
Theatre, adjacent to the discothèque Studio One, and later at The Frog Pond
restaurant. This performance was recorded and has been made available as an
album on iTunes. In 1984, Jorgensen returned to Copenhagen to perform her show
and was featured in Teit Ritzau's Danish transsexual documentary film
Paradiset er ikke til salg (Paradise Is Not for Sale). Jorgensen
was the first and only known trans woman to perform at Oscar's Delmonico
Restaurant in downtown New York, for which owners Oscar and Mario Tucci
received criticism.[12]
Jorgensen said in 1989, the year of her death, that she had given the
sexual revolution a "good swift kick in the pants". She died of bladder and
lung cancer four weeks short of her 63rd birthday. Her ashes were scattered
off Dana Point, California.[13]
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