Headlines about George, who changed into Christine, hit newspapers all over the world: Ex-GI Becomes Blond Beauty. Christine Jorgensen, a woman trapped in the body of a man, was the first known transsexual in America. George’s first memory of wishing to be female was when he compared his Christmas present, a red truck, to his sister’s beautiful doll. George’s heart was shattered that his male sex organ seemingly made him unworthy of something so lovely.

By 1952, however, medical science had advanced enough to fulfill twenty-six-year-old George’s dreams. The name change to Christine followed shortly after George emerged from surgery as a woman. Five years later, she wrote Christine Jorgensen: A Personal Autobiography, a fascinating bestseller that I read in 1957, when most people had previously thought such a transition impossible.

My fifteen-year-old self empathized with the potentially beautiful teenage girl trapped in her despised male body. Always happy to be a girl, I thought of the nightmare I’d endure had those been my circumstances. A reclusive teenager, George was considered undefinably “different,” and was frequently taunted as a weirdo and a sissy. He was secretly attracted to boys, which, due to his religious upbringing, made him feel like a sinful homosexual, but he insisted that he’d never had a gay relationship; the thought of it sickened him, and he spurned the opportunities that had come his way.

By his twenties George weighed 110 pounds and stood at five feet six inches—a wimpy man by some standards. He insisted that he had little or no hair on his body, and had underdeveloped sex organs. He also felt that his stride wasn’t masculine enough.

In 1948, at age twenty-two, George read The Male Hormone by Paul De Kruif, which had been published just three years earlier. George’s feelings went from despair to hope that he might be able to alter his gender as had been done with rats in the mid-1930s in the Netherlands, France, and Switzerland. George concluded that he wasn’t immoral after all; he just had hormonal imbalances. He was initially confused, however, about whether he simply needed more male hormones or should transition to being female.

He researched diligently, and in 1949 learned about sex-change surgeries that had been done in Sweden. He then lost all interest in testosterone, and concluded that he should be changed into a woman. He managed to get access to female hormone pills, which would enhance his breasts over a several year period. He told only two friends about this, one of them a doctor.

By 1950 George had saved up for a one-way ticket to leave his American home for Denmark, planning to search out a Swedish doctor to help transition him. His immediate and extended Danish family—and all but two of his friends—believed he merely intended to visit relatives in Denmark and then tour more of Europe, but he discovered a capable doctor in Copenhagen.

George was taken on as a “guinea pig,” which eliminated the otherwise unaffordable medical expenses. He began a new hormone treatment and had mandatory psychiatric visits while his breasts and hips developed. Previously suicidal at times, George, about to become Christine, felt happier and more energetic. In the course of the transition, he was eventually castrated and had a penectomy.

George renamed herself Christine, after the first name of the his-to-her doctor, Christian Hamburger. The newly emerged Christine was delighted to dress in sexy, but tasteful, clothing. She had a newfound confident manner, as it felt natural to shed shy George and live as the charismatic Christine. In 1954, back in the U.S., she had a vaginal canal surgically created.

Christine’s family and closest friends were understandably flabbergasted, but came around to accept her statement: “Nature made a mistake that I have corrected.” Sadly, the transition resulted in difficulties in her life. In 1959, she and her only fiancé were denied a marriage license; also, their union caused him career damage and other problems. Regardless, the two remained friends. Christine later concluded that they weren’t meant to be a couple anyway.

Christine became a popular nightclub entertainer and had many male admirers and dates. She smoked and drank too much, however, and died of bladder and lung cancer shortly before her sixty-third birthday.

Above all, this beautiful woman paved the way for future transgendered people to gain more acceptance.