Time Line 1850
- 1854, Feb. 16
Birth of English writer Horatio Forbes Brown. When he died in 1926 his executors burned most of his unpublished works, attempting to hide his taste for sailors, footmen and other strapping members of the lower orders. One of his surviving poems depicts a boring society musicale in which every stanza ends with the line, "But I liked their footman John the best." [Greif 82]
- 1856, May 6
Birth of Sigmund Freud in Freiberg, Austria. [wd]
- 1857
French physician B. A. Borel champions the concept of physical and mental "degeneration" that is also used to explain "incorrect sexual behavior". The concept will dominate psychiatric thinking until Freud. [wd]
- 1857, Feb. 22
The birth, in London, of Robert Stephenson Smyth Baden-Powell, founder of the Boy Scouts, army officer, and homosexual.
- 1858, June 12
Birth of Henry Scott Tuke, British painter and grand master of romantic boy painting. He was an athlete who took great pride in his splendid body and was obsessed with painting nude boys and experimented, and succeeded , in developing a special technique for capturing on canvas the effect of sunlight on naked skin. [Greif 82]
- 1861
England eliminates the death penalty for male homosexual acts; offenders are now subject to imprisonment for ten years to life. [AA]
- 1862, Aug. 6
Birth of Goldsworthy Lowes Dickinson, professor of classics at Cambridge where the students were only too happy to satisfy his tastes as a boot-fetishist. He wrote of one young man, "I liked him to stand upon me when we met." [Greif 82]
- 1864, Sept. 1
Birth of Roger Casement in Ireland. In the course of British consular service, he exposed the atrocious conditions imposed on gatherers of wild rubber in the Congo and similar conditions in South America. He was knighted for his services. But, though an Ulster protestant, he became an ardent Irish nationalist. He was arrested and tried for treason. What sealed his doom was the admission as evidence of his diaries which recorded all of his sexual encounters, itemizing both the amount of the transaction (if the stud was for hire) and the size of his equipment. It made for sensational evidence in 1916: "Stanley Weeks, 20, stripped, huge one, circumcised; swelled and hung quite." "Enormous 19 about 7" and 4 thick; into me." Casement was hanged on Aug. 6, 1916, a martyr for more than Ireland.
- 1865, July 15
Death of James Miranda Barry (1795-1865) a Major General and Surgeon in the British Army with a highly distinguished career and a reputation as a rake who was known to flirt openly with the best looking women in the room. When a charwoman was preparing the body for burial it was discovered that the Major General was female. [Greif 82]
- 1866
Superstition & Force by Henry Charles Lea published in Britain. Edited and republished as The Ordeal by Edward Peters in 1973.
- 1867, Aug. 29
While speaking to a conference of jurists in Munich, Karl Ulrichs becomes the first known person in modern times to publicly declare himself a homosexual (though not using that word) and to speak out in favor of gay rights (obviously, not using those words). He was pleading at the Congress of German Jurists in Munich for a resolution urging the repeal of anti-homosexual laws. He was shouted down. [AA]
- 1869
Karl Maria Kertbeny, writing anonymously, uses the term AHomosexual@ in a pamphlet calling for repeal of Prussia's sodomy laws. This is the earliest know use of this term. It began appearing in US medical journals in the 1890's and in general usage during the 1920's.
- 1869, Dec. 8
In Austria Leopold von Sacher-Masoch begins correspondence with Fanny Pistor, aka Baroness Bogdonoff, aka Mistress Wanda, his Venus in Furs.
- 1870
The first American novel to touch on gay themes, Joseph and His Friend, by Bayard Taylor, is published. But the homosexual emements are so subtle that a nongay reader could easily miss them. [AA]
- 1871
Homosexuality is criminalized throughout Germany by Paragraph 175 of the Reich Criminal Code
- 1872, Aug. 21
Birth of artist Aubrey Beardsley, who drew many men with gigantic phalluses and many asses being caned. Beardsley's professional affiliation with Oscar Wilde ruined him and he died from tuberculosis less than three years after Wilde's famous trial. It is believed that Beardsley was not himself gay and that his ruin was largely a case of "guilt by association". [Greif 82]
- 1872
The newly formed German empire adopts a penal code that includes the infamous Paragraph 175, outlawing male homosexuality. The new law becomes a catalyst for the nascent German homophile movement. [AA]
- 1873, Jan. 28
In France the birth of writer Sidomie-Gabrielle Colette (d. 1954), who wore a bracelet engraved "I belong to Missy."
- 1874
For the Term of His Natural Life by Marcus Clarke published in Australia. US edition in 1973.
- 1875, March 7
Birth of Maurice Ravel, French composer. Gay but no record of his being into leather. However, his Bolero is among the best dungeon music possible, talk about slow build up to an exciting crescendo!
- 1875, April 15
Baloonists Sivel and Croche-Spinelli die in a fall over India. Burried together in Pere-Lachaise Cemetary in Paris, their monument depicts them lying together, naked, hand in hand, partially covered by a sheet. [TOL]
- 1877, April 30
birth of Alice B. Toklas. "Throughout most of her life, this selfless woman's major occupation was the care and maintenance of Gertrude Stein." [Greif 82]
- 1879, Jan. 1
The birth of E. M. Forester, British novelist, who had as his lover for half a century a virile, handsome, married, London policeman who granted his most elemental wish: "to love a strong young man of the lower classes and be loved by him and even hurt by him." [Greif 82]
- 1879, July
The first erotic magazine, "The Pearl, a Journal of Facetiae and Voluptuous Reading", consisting of stories with flagellation themes and attributed to Algernon Charles Swinburne, is distributed among high society. It last for 18 issues until Dec. 1880. [wd]
- 1882
In Pace vs Alabama, the USA Supreme Court upholds a law that makes interracial adultery more serious than intraracial adultery, arguing that interracial couples would produce genetically inferior offspring.
- 1882, Feb. 2
Birth of James Joyce, avant-garde novelist who made his lover, Nora Barnacle, into a dominant of whom he begged beatings and floggings "in earnest." We don't know if she said yes or no. [JWB]
- 1885
The British Parliment at first tables the Criminal Law Amendment Act which made all acts of "gross indecency" between males, whether in public or private, an offence punishable by up to two years inprisonment. However a rally that the Purity Campaign orgaizes in Hyde Park attracts a crowd of thousands and on this wave of hysteria the law is rushed through parlament. It became known as "The Blackmailer's Charter" and was the law under which Oscar Wilde was later tried and convicted.
- 1885, Sept. 11
The Birth of D. H. Lawrence, a man who has come to be seen as the high-priest of heterosexual love. But it is know that at one time Lawrence had become so friendly with a handsome farm boy named William Henry that his wife Feieda adamantly refused ever to allow the young man to enter the Lawrence's house. Whatever his sexual proclivities were, his writing was the major concern of censorship in the US, and when the likes of Lady Chatterley's Lover were finally cleared by customs, the dam had really broken.
- 1886, Feb. 22
The Birth of William Seabrook (death Sept 20, 1945). This top-rated writer about exotic places (from personal experience) was equally famous among the literat for his elaborate, long-term bondage of beautiful, young women. [JWB]
- 1886
The Austrian police physician Richard von Krafft-Ebing publishes the first edition of his Psychopathia sexualis with 110 pages and 45 case histories. He creates the diagnosis of "paedophilia" and adopts "sadism" from earlier French usage. "Masochism" is not introduced until the sixth edition. [wd]
- 1886
The Criminal Law Amendment Act of 1885, outlawing sexual relations between men (but not women), is given Royal Assent by Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom
- 1887
The state of Pennsylvania raises its age of consent from 10 to 16, after a campagn by the Women's Christian Temperance Union and the White Cross Society.
- 1888, Aug 15
The birth of Thomas Edward Lawrence, Lawrence of Arabia, who was captured, caned and raped by Turkish soldiers, and who loved it so madly he hired Robert Bruce to flog him regularly after he returned to England. [Greif 82]
- 1888, Aug 16
The birth of Edgar Montillion Wolley, better known as the American actor Monty Woolley. His taste was for black men, generally supplied by an assortment of New York pimps. He fell in love with one and they lived together for years as lovers. [Greif 82]
- 1889
A male brothel is discoverd at 19 Cleveland St. in London's West End. The Scandal becomes the talk of society and many important figures, including Prince Albert Victor, second in line to the throne, are rumored to be implicated. [AA]
- 1889, July 5
Birth of Jean Cocteau, French artist, writer and filmmaker. One of the many customs regarding polite Parisian pissour manners was known as the "privilege du cape." This allowed a Frenchman who could not find a convenient pissoir to approach a gendarme and ask him to extend his cape so that he could take a leak behind it. One of Cocteau's favorite amusements was to choose a handsome young cop and pretend that he was drunk. With luck he could get his trouser buttons undone by the helpful gendarme -- and possibly more. Uncooperative victims wound up with wet shoes. [Greif 82]
- 1890's
The "gay '90's" were the time Florenz Ziegfeld started the modern commercial exploitation of muscular males in vaudeville exhibitions of strength. He made the German strongman Eugen Sandow a household name as Sandow the Magnificent. Sandow often appeared wearing only a large fig leaf. [Hooven 95]
- 1891
Publication of A Problem in Modern Ethics by John Addington Symonds, it provides a systematic review of scholarly literature on homosexuality. [AA]
- 1892
The New York Times becomes the first US newspaper to use the word "lesbian" in a news story: "Lesbian Love and Murder" about a suicide pact made by two young women after their parents forbid them to see each other. [TOL]
- 1892, June 5
Birth of Ivy Compton-Burnett, british novelist whose work has been called "morality plays for the tough-minded," and who lived most of her life in total subservience to Margaret Jourdain, a scholar and expert in 18th Century furniture. [Greif 82]
- 1893
Richard Freiherr von Krafft-Ebing first uses the term "homosexual" and attributes it to an indelible personality trait, rather than to a sexual activity. [Hooven 95]
- 1893, Feb. 20
Birth of Bill Tilden, first American to win at Wimbledon (d. 1953). He was considered one of the greatest athletes of the 20th Century, but was snubbed by the tennis world when his homosexuality became known.
- 1893, Oct. 30
Birth of bodybuilder Charles Atlas, who, though not gay, made a major contribution to the beauty of men.
- 1894
One of the earliest known gay organizations is formed by George Cecil Ives. The Order of Chaeronea took its name from the Greek battle of 338 BC at which the Sacred Band of Thebes was annihilated. [AA]
- 1894, Feb. 18
John Sholto Douglas, the 18th Marquis of Queensberry leaves a card at the Albermarle Club in London addressed "to Oscar Wilde posing as a somdomite" (sic) triggering the incident that was to bring about Wilde's downfall. The Marquis is better know among other circles as the compiler of the governing rules of the sport of boxing.
- 1894, June 7
"The Blackmailers", a play by John Gray and his lover Andre Raffalovich, receiveds its one and only performance at the Prince of Whales Theatre. 1895: Bom-Crioulo, "The Black Man and The Cabin Boy", by Adolfo Caninha published in Brazil.
- 1895, Jan. 1
Birth of J. Edgar Hoover, for many years head of the US Federal Bureau of Investigation. He maintained secret survelence files on individuals and organizations, including gay and other sexually identified ones. He was a homosexual and homophobe. (died: May 2, 1972)
- 1895
Oscar Wilde is convicted of committing "gross indecency" with young lower-class men and is condemned to two years of hard labor. [AA]
- 1895, Mar. 9
Official date of Leopold von Sacher-Masoch's death from heart failure as given by his family. This incorrect date is still found in a large number of texts. Actual date of death:1905, see below. [wd]
- 1895, May 6
Birth of Rudolfo Alfonzo Raffaelo Pierre Filbert Guglielmi di Balentina d'Antonguolla in Castellaneta, Italy. Better known as Rudolph Valentino, there is little argument that he enjoyed male to male sex, was dominated by his lesbian wife, and died because his macho image demanded that he fight in a boxing arena. But we love him best for the image of the captured Sheik hanging from upstretched arms to that barred window, his chest bared, his body ready for whatever we desire.
- 1896
The English researcher Havelock Ellis starts work on his monumental book, Studies in the Psychology of Sex. [wd]
- 1896
The first issue of Der Eigene appeared in Berlin; it was the first gay periodical worldwide.
- 1897
Archaeologists working in Egypt find some of the lost poetry of Sappho on papyrus scrolls used to line ancient coffins and to stuff the carcasses of mummified animals.[TOL]
- 1897, May 15
Magnus Hirschfeld and five friends founded the "Scientific-Humanitarian Committee" in Charlottenburg, then a suburb of Berlin. Their goal was to abolish the antihomosexual Paragraph 175 in German law. The committee dissolved on June 8, 1933 to avoid being banned by the Nazis. Paragraph 175 was still in force.
- 1897, May 19
Oscar Wilde is released from Prison in England.
- 1897, Nov.
Publication of the first English edition of Sexual Inversion by Havelock Ellis (1859-1939), the first book in English to treat homosexuality as neither a disease nor a crime. (Born Feb 2, 1859)
- 1898, June 5
The birth of Federico Garcia Lorca, gay Spanish playwright who has the vicious Bernarda Alba, in the play with her name, shout out to the mob dragging away the adulteress, "Hot coals in the place where she sinned!"
- 1898, July 9
Publication of "Photo Bits" begins and lasts until 1916 (1914 ??) . "Photo Bits" was part of a line of publications that merged into “London Life"? in 1926. The content of the magazine was not exclusively erotic (as in London Life) but texts, photographs and drawings of a variety of fetish and SM images filled the pages of “Photo Bits."?
Recurring topics included tight-lacing, high-heel shoe fetishism, SM topics of flagellation, female domination and trasvestism and related SM topics of petticoat discipline where men or boys were forced to wear female clothing. (Robert Bienvenu); 1898, Sept 21 The birth in Moscow of artist Pavel Tchelitchew. His cubistic painting, Figures, depicts a rape with three male nudes. [Greif 82]
- 1898
Der Eigene (The Exceptional) becomes the first gay publication destined to a long existence, until 1931! Edited by Berlin writer Adolf Brand who in 1903 founded the Community of the Exceptional, after Hirschfeld's, the second gay organization in Berlin.
- 1899
The Torture Garden, a novel by Octave Mirbeau published in France. First English edition in 1931. ReSearch edition 1989.
- 1899
Magnus Hirschfeld publishes the first issue of the Jahrbuch der sexuelle Zwischenstufen (Journal of Sexual Intermediates). [AA]
- 1899
Publication of A Marriage Below Zero, by Alfred J. Cohen, considered the first American novel in which homosexuality is a central theme. Naturally the homosexual character commits suicide. [TOL]
What links here • Contact