Early Chevalier Publications and Trans Interest News and Gender Confirming Advertising Periodicals, 1960s-70s

Femme Mirror Trans Periodicals

Periodical

Virginia Prince’s Chevalier Publications and allied mail order networks connected cross dressing and female impersonator readers through fiction, editorials, newsletters, product advertising, book notices, and society formation notices at moments when public gender variance carried social, legal, and medical risk. This archive preserves two 1962 issues of Femme Mirror, both issued by Chevalier Publications, alongside a 1970s Female Impersonator Newsletter issue centered on Suzy’s U.T.T.S. organization and a Queens Publications catalog advertising gender confirming products such as wigs, clothing, femme shape-wear, informational books, and magazines. The group traces a movement from early mimeographed reader fiction and moral instruction to a more developed 1970s market of periodicals, social clubs, apparel, cosmetics, and body-form products.

Trans interest publications archive. Los Angeles and New York: Chevalier Publications, Queens Publications, and others, 1962 to 1975. Archive of 4 publications: Femme Mirror Nos. 3 and 7, Female Impersonator Newsletter Vol. Two, No. Eight, and From Queens Publications 74-75.

[1] Prince, Virginia, ed. Femme Mirror. Number Three. Los Angeles: Chevalier Publications, March 1962. Early Chevalier periodical with cover text reading “reflections of FemmePersonators,” “publishers of Transvestia magazine,” and “Number Three.” The issue opens with Prince’s “It’s March, Girls...” and includes fiction and personal writing such as “The Living Window” by Joyce Lane, “That One Life” by Lee Joyce, and “Martha’s Path” by Lee Joyce.

[2] Prince, Virginia, ed. Femme Mirror. Number Seven. Los Angeles: Chevalier Publications, July 1962. Early issue with Prince’s editorial “People Who Live in Glass Houses...” and fiction including “Good Ole Julienne,” with language addressed to “girls” and “F.P.s.” Prince’s editorial discusses “those heterosexual persons who do enjoy clothing and other expressions of the opposite sex,” and argues for tolerance, understanding, and assimilation while distancing the publication from homosexuality and public scandal.

[3] Female Impersonator Newsletter. Vol. Two, No. Eight. 1970s. Issue priced one dollar, with front page columns headed “Suzy Sez...” and “T.V. of the Month,” naming Karen Rigg. Suzy’s column states that the newsletter began in October 1973, refers to the “United Transvestite and Transsexual Society,” describes a first group meeting in Minneapolis in September, and announces “A New TV/TS Society Formed,” with proposed services including a newsletter, reviews, group listings, entertainment notices, and commercial listings for clothing, hotels, photo studios, lawyers, and related services.

[4] From Queens Publications 74-75. New York: Queens Publications, 1974 to 1975. Mail order catalog advertising Drag magazine and related publications, with interior listings for Transvestia issues, Man, Woman & Girl by Jean Roberts, Sex and Gender by Robert J. Stoller, M.D., Regiment of Women by Thomas Berger, Conundrum by Jan Morris, wigs, false eyelashes, makeup, party pants, stretch lace lingerie, boots, and “Treasure Chest” latex forms. The catalog preserves the commercial side of 1970s transvestite and female impersonator culture, where reading material, appearance products, and body-shaping goods circulated through the same mail order channels.

These four publications record the infrastructure behind mid century and 1970s cross dressing culture aimed at people who often relied on postal exchange for privacy and continuity. The 1962 Femme Mirror issues carry Prince’s reflections and observations on gender and sexuality, while the other materials add the language of “TV/TS,” group meetings, catalog shopping, and a broader marketplace around gender presentation and popular culture. Light toning, fold lines, handling wear, minor edge wear; overall very good condition. A compact archive linking early Chevalier Publications to the later commercial and social networks that served cross dressing, female impersonator, and transvestite readers.

Item #23534

Price: $2,800.00