Robin Pinnel is a publicist at Joseph Henry Press, the publishing arm of the National Academies Press.

On 2 April 2003, Pinnel sent out a message publicizing Bailey, including the following attachment. Pinnel created these "significant moments" in transgender history for the press kit. Pinnel had the audacity to cast the Bailey book among positive moments in our history.

Original document: timeline [PDF file: requires reader]

Timeline of Significant Moments in Transgender History

In recent years, transgender people have grown from a marginalized population to an increasingly major part of our mainstream culture. Slowly but surely, transgender, transsexual, and intersexed individuals have claimed not only their legal rights, but their place in the public eye. Below is a timeline of some significant moments in transgender history during the past 10+ years.

1992: Release of The Crying Game

Veronica Vera opens Miss Vera’s Finishing School for Boys Who Want to Be Girls

1993: The first appearance of RuPaul on MTV

Minnesota passes the first law prohibiting discrimination against transgender people. The Minnesota statute establishes protections for transgender people under the rubric of sexual orientation.

Cheryl Chase founds the Intersex Society of North America (ISNA)

1994: Release of The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert

1995: Release of To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar

1996: Release of The Birdcage

1998: Theater debut of Hedwig and the Angry Inch

California becomes the second state to amend its state hate crimes law to include transgender and transsexual people. The California legislation adds “gender” to the list of protected categories. Since then, Vermont, Missouri, and Pennsylvania have also amended their state hate crimes statutes to include transgender people.

1999: PBS debuts the documentary You Don't Know Dick: Courageous Hearts of Transsexual Men.

1999: Release of Boys Don’t Cry

The first annual Transgender Day of Remembrance to memorialize those who were killed due to anti-transgender hatred or prejudice.

2001: Release of the movie version of Hedwig and the Angry Inch

CBS debuts The Education of Max Bickford, a drama about a college professor going through a midlife crisis. Included in the cast of regulars is Erica, who used to be the title character’s best friend, Steve. This is the first transgender person to appear regularly on a major network television program.

Rhode Island becomes the second state with a non-discrimination law explicitly protecting transgender people. The state’s non-discrimination statute isamended to explicitly include “gender identity or expression” as a protected category.

Two transgender-themed movies (Hedwig and Southern Comfort) receive awards at the Sundance Film Festival. Southern Comfort wins top honors for best documentary and Hedwig’s director, John Cameron Mitchell, wins the dramatic directing award.

2002: Dame Edna becomes a regular on Ally McBeal

A new WB program, Everwood, features a male child who was born a hermaphrodite, neither a boy nor a girl.

Jeffrey Eugenides writes Middlesex, in which the main character (Calliope Stephanides) is a hermaphrodite.

2003: A Florida judge awards custody of two children to a transgender father, a man who was born and started out in life as a female.

The California Assembly honors the first transgender recipient of its “woman of the year” award.

HBO airs Normal, in which Oscar nominee Tom Wilkinson plays a middle-age Midwest factory foreman who’s celebrating his 25th anniversary with wife Jessica Lange when he blurts that he can only continue living if he can live as a woman.

Joseph Henry Press, trade publisher for the National Academies, publishes The Man Who Would Be Queen: The Science of Gender-Bending and Transsexualism by J. Michael Bailey

Showtime debuts its fact-based A Soldier’s Girl, in which a male Army recruit falls for a transgender nightclub performer who is living as a woman.

The fact that Pinnel would sandwich the Bailey book between Normal and Soldier's Girl shows she's either utterly clueless or willfully distorting our history to sell books.

See also:

"controversial ideas" by J. Michael Bailey

controversial ideas [PDF file: requires reader]

"praise" compiled by Ann Merchant

praise [PDF file: requires reader]

"timeline" by Robin Pinnel

timeline [PDF file: requires reader]