At 40

[Shana A]

At 40
Transmissions
Published 04/07/2011

by Gwendolyn Ann Smith

http://www.ebar.com/columns/column.php?sec=transmissions&article=161

In 1999, a young, somewhat idealistic transgender woman had a guest opinion piece published in the Bay Area Reporter . The piece – focusing on the murders of transgender people that went virtually ignored between the much more prominent murders in 1998 of Matthew Shepard and early 1999 of Billy Jack Gaither – was the start of what would be a long partnership.

It was the fall of 2000 that the idea for this column was born. It was not the first time a transgender columnist would be in an LGBT newspaper on a regular basis: many had before, though few actually wrote about transgender specific topics, and some were even fully in the closet about their transgender status. So while I can't claim "firsties," I do know that this is the longest-running transgender column of its kind. The first Transmissions was published in the B.A.R. on November 2, 2000.