Digital Transgender Archive

Guide to the Pauline Layton Papers, 1967-1999

Pauline Layton is a native Ithacan who studied mathematics at Cornell, but later became a musician, writer, and videographer. Member of Cornell's Student Homophile League, 1968-1970; member of University of Massachusetts at Amherst Student Homophile League, 1970-1972; attended meetings of Cornell's GayPAC, 1979-1981. Used local Public Access Television facilities to produce informative programming about AIDS-related services and also to campaign for local legislation in support of gay equal rights in housing and employment.

The collection contains documents from and reflections on the creation and early years of Cornell's lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered student groups and the Cornell Women's Studies Program (1968-1981), plus pamphlets, articles, bibliographies and other ephemeral publications expressing views of the women's, sexual liberation, and gay liberation movements of the late 1960's and 1970's. The collection also contains Layton's reflections on her own gender and sexual identity, including "A personal history in bi-gender mode," written 1998; pieces about transvestism and transsexualism written as she joined a bisexual support group in 1981; and an unsent letter to Janice Raymond, author of The Transsexual Empire. Also, videos of programs produced by Layton and Ben Curtis for local cable television concerning the AIDS crisis in Tompkins County, and Local Law C, which passed in December 1991, and which included sexual orientation among the characteristics that could not be discriminated against in housing, credit, and employment. This show was produced to inform the public and allay fears about the law before a public hearing held in November. A 1999 essay on teasing, gay-baiting, and violence among school children, including thoughts on the 1999 Columbine High School shooting in Littleton, Colorado.