The return of the trans underground
By Janus RoseOct 14, 2025, 1:06 PM GMT+1LinkFacebookThreadsIn the early 1970s, long before social media and more than a decade before the earliest internet forums, a woman named Peggie Ames became a human rolodex for trans women in New York state.Born in Buffalo, Ames spent years working for gay rights organizations in the rural and suburban areas of Western New York. In the days before the internet, it wasn’t easy to meet other trans folks outside the densely populated boroughs of New York City. But Ames had built an extensive social network of trans women and cis allies through her work with the Erickson Educational Foundation, which funded research on trans medical care, and the Mattachine Society of the Niagara Frontier, a local offshoot of the pre-Stonewall-era gay rights group of…
