From small town boy to ‘visible’ city cop – my journey explained

Christian Owens

In the lead up to our OUTing the Past Festival of LGBT History at the Museum of Liverpool, 23 February, we will be sharing blogs from our wonderful speakers.

Second up is Christian Owens – Read more…

Trans-Verses: Poetry themes in The Glad Rag and Cross-Talk Magazines

Cross Talk magazine

In the lead up to our OUTing the Past Festival of LGBT History at the Museum of Liverpool, 23 February, we will be sharing blogs from our wonderful speakers.

First up is Valerie Stevenson, Head of Academic Services at Liverpool John Moores University. She tells us more about her talk, Trans-Verses: Poetry themes in The Glad Rag and Cross-Talk Magazines.

“At Liverpool John Moores University we recently acquired a small archive of books, magazines and personal papers from the family of Peter Farrer, who lived in Liverpool for many years and was an authority on the history of cross-dressing. His collection of dresses was shown in the exhibition Transformation: One man’s cross-dressing wardrobe at the Walker Art Gallery and Sudley House. The archive includes runs of two magazines: The Glad Rag, published by the UK Transvestite/Transsexual Support Group and Cross-Talk, by The Northern Concord. Both magazines contain a mix of factual advice and creative writing in the form of short stories and poems.

The Glad Rag magazine

Looking through these magazines, it is clear how important they were as a means of communication in the decades before most people had access to email or the Internet. The poems stood out to me because of their intensity of feeling on themes such as identity and the pain of existence. In my paper, I will provide an introduction to the Peter Farrer Archive, which is available to anyone for research purposes, and identify the recurring themes in this group of poems. I found them extremely moving and worthy of further analysis to explore how they compare with more recent collections of trans poetry.”

If you would like to find out more you can hear Valerie speaking on the poetry themes in The Glad Rag and Cross-Talk Magazines at approx 11:30 am on 23 February at the Museum of Liverpool.

http://blog.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/2019/01/outing-the-past-festival-of-lgbt-history-2019/

Telling her story – Melanie Robson

Within the Tales from the city exhibition we have a special display case which enables us to tell different people’s stories through objects that are meaningful to them.

Our current display features items kindly loaned by Melanie Robson. Melanie is a retired teacher who lives in Bootle. Her precious items represent her life as a transwoman. Read more…

Trans Atlantic Militaries : LGBTQ rights

Caroline outside of 10 Downing Street, 2012. Courtesy of Caroline Paige.

Our fifth blog post for OUTing the Past: The 4th National Festival of LGBT History conference, 3 February, is from Caroline Paige.

Caroline, who was the first openly transgender officer in the British Armed Forces, will be exploring ‘Trans Atlantic militaries; how the UK showed the way and the USA lost it; and the implications for LGBTQ rights’. Read more…

Flying the flag for the trans community

April Ashley, Lord Mayor Councillor Erica Kemp, Kay Jones from the Museum of Liverpool and representatives of the Trans community with the first Trans Pride Flag

At a special ceremony at Liverpool Town Hall yesterday, transgender pioneer and campaigner, April Ashley MBE was presented with a Citizen of Honour Award on her 80th birthday.

As part of the ceremony, the Museum of Liverpool was presented with the first Transgender Pride Flag to be flown above Liverpool Town Hall for Transgender Day of Remembrance, 20 November 2014. Read more…