To Marry After Sex Change" 1968 Press Photo Archive of Trans Woman Dawn Langley Simmons

[LGBTQ][Transgender] Archive of 5 photographs of trans author and socialite Dawn Langley Simmons (nee Hall) press photo archive, including her transition, public appearances, and interracial marriage to John Paul Simmons. Silver gelatin black and white press photos with news agency captions and stamps. Each measuring approx. 8" x 10"
This exceptional archive captures the national media's coverage of Dawn Langley Hall, one of the first trans women in the United States to undergo gender confirmation surgery, and her marriage to a Black man, John Paul Simmons, during the apex of the civil rights era. In 1968, Hall became one of the first trans women (truncated) in the United States to undergo gender confirmation surgery. One photo shows Hall, pre-transition, in a tuxedo, reading amid towering bookshelves in her Charleston home. Hall is surrounded by books, underscoring her literary life—she authored numerous biographies and a memoir—and her place in Charleston society as a figure both insider and outsider. The original news caption attached to the image is titled TO MARRY AFTER SEX CHANGE, referencing Hall’s then-recent transition and her forthcoming marriage to Simmons. The language reflects the era’s racial and gender prejudices, describing Simmons as a “South Carolina Negro,” and Hall’s transition as a “sex change.” Another press image depicts Hall after transition, dressed in floral attire and earrings, her gaze composed and confident, as the caption states her plans to marry Simmons. A third photograph captures Hall and Simmons on their wedding day in Charleston, she in a white bridal gown and veil, he in a tuxedo, presenting a rare visual record of an interracial transgender wedding in the Jim Crow South. The fourth photo features a reflective Hall applying lipstick at a mirror in a hotel room, with cosmetics and a publication titled The Antique Girl visible—subtly linking her femininity with her literary identity. The final photograph, taken in Hastings, England, shows the couple after a church ceremony blessing their marriage. Typed captions document Hall’s former identity as Gordon Langley Hall and her literary credentials, noting her biographies of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, Princess Margaret, and Lady Bird Johnson.

Verso annotations include manuscript notations such as “Mrs. John Paul Simmons” and stampings from Field Enterprises and UPI New York Bureau, situating the photographs within the institutional press apparatus that shaped public understanding of gender and racial transgression. The language used in the captions reflects both the fascination and the prejudice of the era—highlighting Hall’s “sex change,” her husband’s race, and her status as a former aristocrat and adopted child of actress Dame Margaret Rutherford. Light toning and edge wear to several images, minor handling creases. One print shows a light vertical fold near margin, otherwise overall very good condition. A rare and powerful photo archive chronicling one of the most publicly visible trans women of the 20th century, whose interracial and transgender marriage provoked national controversy and challenged deeply entrenched norms of race, gender, and respectability in American society. (Inventory #: 21793)