Georgia Black - Eli Erlick

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I almost didn’t include Georgia in Before Gender due to her feature in C. Riley Snorton’s Black on Both Sides. I had read Snorton’s monograph a few years before writing about Georgia, and completely forgot she briefly appeared in the book! She has a common name, and Black on Both Sides did not initially come up when I searched for her in libraries and Google Books to find existing texts. I was nearly finished writing her chapter when I made the connection. I decided to keep her story because I wanted to dig deeper into her history, including what was not featured in Snorton’s work. Notably, Snorton did not include a touching 1953 Ebony article from Georgia’s son defending his mother.

About the photos: There are quite a few pictures of Georgia that I couldn’t publish in Before Gender. Although the Ebony articles on Georgia are available online for free, many of their images are in an ambiguous state of copyright. In 2019, a consortium of five foundations purchased the Johnson Publishing Collection, which produced Ebony. In 2022, they transferred ownership to the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture (NMAAHC) and the Getty Research Institute. When I contacted the NMAAHC in 2024, they told me they were still processing the images and could not license the photos of Georgia as they were not taken by staff photographers, but rather Carroll Seghers (1924-2004) of the Black Star photo agency. However, no one from the agency could locate the original images (and they were charging a $200-$500 licensing fee for low-quality prints). They suggested I contact the Black Star Ephemera Collection at The Image Centre in Toronto, operated by Toronto Metropolitan University. The Image Center was created in part to hold 292,000 photos from Black Star in 2016. However, they informed me they also do not have the original images, which now appear to be lost.

I had a limited number of images I could use in Before Gender‘s gallery pages, so I realized I would rather post Georgia’s here for free as “fair use,” from the original Jun 1953 and Nov 1975 Ebony reprint of Georgia’s article:

Georgia’s featured photo in Ebony (Oct 1951). Colorized, enhanced, and restored (full article).

Georgia’s 1918 marriage certificate. I had to search through over 100 pages of marriage licenses to finally locate it (worth it!).

I almost missed Willie Sabb’s long-forgotten 1953 article defending his mother. C. Riley Snorton did not cite it in *Black on Both Sides* and *Ebony* is not indexed in most news searches. I was lucky to find this heartfelt tribute while searching Ebony’s back issues. The extremely positive commemoration is notable as an early public defense of a Black trans woman. You can read the full article on Trans Reads.

The fondness with which Willie remembers his mother after her outing is striking. I wish I was able to include these photos of Willie in *Before Gender*. They truly humanize and demystify their relationship. Although Willie halfheartedly calls his mother a “man,” he uses the correct pronouns and defends her womanhood. Declaring that “she will ‘Mom’ to me” is such a touching statement, I hope more children will write in defense of their trans parents like this.

Trans women Christine Jorgenson and Carlett Brown Angianlee also announced their transitions in 1953. Perhaps their prominence would have changed the perception of Georgia if she was outed just 2 years later.

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