Timothy Stewart-Winter

@timothysw.bsky.social

Queer historian and professor at Rutgers-Newark. New book OUTED: LBJ’S CONFIDANT AND THE ARREST THAT TRANSFORMED A PRESIDENCY coming Oct 2026 (@uchicagopress.bsky.social).

NEW: Before marriage, there was the nearly 20-year fight over sodomy laws. In 2003, the Supreme Court overturned its 1986 decision upholding sodomy laws. Both cases have a lot to teach us in and about this moment. Today, at Law Dork:

Before marriage, there was the nearly 20-year fight over sodomy laws

In 2003, the Supreme Court overturned its 1986 decision upholding sodomy laws. Both cases have a lot to teach us in and about this moment.

lawdork.com

Everyone should be alarmed by the censorship Texas Tech University is imposing on students and faculty. The details are appalling. This kind of ideologically motivated suppression of scholarship on gender and sexuality has happened before in Russia and Hungary. www.fox4news.com/news/texas-t...

Texas Tech to drop courses 'centered on' sex, gender studies

Texas Tech university has been given two months to close courses the focus on sex and gender studies, expanding on new policies that redefined how and when those issues can be discussed.

fox4news.com

I'm excited for Tim's deeply researched book about Walter Jenkins, LBJ's friend and de facto Chief of Staff who resigned after he was arrested for soliciting sex with a man in a YMCA restroom. Pre-order your copy today!

Timothy Stewart-Winter@timothysw.bsky.social · 4mo ago

Very excited to share the cover of my forthcoming book, OUTED: LBJ’S CONFIDANT AND THE ARREST THAT TRANSFORMED A PRESIDENCY. Coming October 13 from University of Chicago Press! press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/bo...

Book cover with b&w photo of a man whispering in LBJ’s ear backstage under lights

I know the talk here is about other stuff today, but I've been meaning to write more about my passions. HUGE credit to my dear friend, @timothysw.bsky.social, an Assoc. Prof. of History at Rutgers, who wrote "Queer Clout: Chicago and the Rise of Gay Politics", for his help on the historical notes.

This year I wanted to do more. I consulted with a historian and educator friend to come up with some history notes—just 3 cards to be added to the set, including one covering an aspect of Black, queer, Chicago history. It is on the Red Line, after all and I want to make sure more are represented.

A history card from the CTA pride train reads:

Historical notes
Finding community across the city

Some of Chicago’s earliest queer community formed around the bohemian Towertown area (near Water Tower), the downtown Levee district and at South Side drag balls and cabarets.

Notably, Finnie’s Halloween Ball, a legendary multiracial drag competition, began in the 1930s on the South Side and thrived for decades, gaining wide attention through publications who wrote about the event, such as Ebony.

While North Side neighborhoods like Lakeview and Andersonville are now prominent LGBTQ+ hubs, people have connected and shared culture, art and ideas across the city.

(Then, a pull-quote from Ebony Magazine reads:)

“More than 1,500 spectators milled around outside Chicago’s Pershing Ballroom to get a glimpse of the bejeweled impersonators who arrived in limousines, taxis, Fords and even by streetcar.”
–Ebony, 1953, regarding a Finnie’s Halloween Ball in transit-friendly WoodlawnA history card from the CTA pride train reads:

Historical notes
Finding community across the city

Nationwide, LGBTQ+ individuals faced widespread scrutiny, harassment, discrimination and even raids on social spaces. New York's Stonewall uprising in 1969 became a flashpoint that ignited a national era of activism and was emblematic of the struggles the community faced across the country.

Chicago has a strong activist tradition. Notably, it was home to America’s first gay rights organization, The Society for Human Rights, founded by Henry Gerber in 1924, but it was at the turn of the 1970s where a critical mass of activism for liberation gelled.

Groups like Chicago Gay Liberation (which included Women's and Black caucuses) formed and worked with other groups like Mattachine Midwest and countless others, and the city's first Pride march occurred in 1970.A history card from the CTA pride train reads:

Historical notes
Chicago’s First Pride

One year after the Stonewall uprising in New York, Chicago's first Pride event began 1970 and with a 150-200 person rally at Bughouse Square, known for public debate, followed by a march to the Civic Center (Daley Plaza). Within a few years, it had grown into to an annual event attended by thousands marching for freedom.

Reflecting significant progress, the modern Pride Parade is a large celebration, widely supported by the city, elected officials and, of course, friends, family and allies of the diverse LGBTQ+ community and has become one of Chicago’s most attended annual events.

We’re proud to welcome you aboard–no matter who you are, who you love, how you identify or where you’re from. When we say “All aboard,” we mean all!

Been meaning to write about this... I’ve had the privilege to be allowed by my employer to be behind and see to fruition our Pride Train. Every year it’s meant to be a showing of welcoming and inclusion, though started as just a train wrap and mean to run from June 1 thru at least Market Days.

The 2018 Pride Train with a wavy pattern of the classic six pride colors and the words "Ride with pride!" below the window line as people exit the train at the Wilson station. Bonus detail: my partner and family are in the foreground since we were taking the Red Line together!The 2022 pride train stopped at Howard at the end of a northbound trip, which had bold stripes of both the classic pride flag, plus Black and brown in front and then the full set of trans flag stripes at the other end of the car to represent broader aspects of the community as designs progressed.The 2024 Pride Train had a wavy, almost 60s- or 70s-like pattern of stripes that swooped up at one end and down at the other, creating bold horizontal stripes across the car body and inverted rainbow shapes at each end. The design was conscious to put Black and brown and trans colors at the cab ends of each reversible train, so no matter which way the cars were facing, those colors would be seen first as the train comes into view or enters a station.A picture of the 2025 CTA Pride Train with bold, wavy stripes of color, again aligned to put the Black and brown stripes and trans stripes at the front end of each train by ensuring they appear at the cab ends of each car and thus are forward no matter which way the train is rolling along the tracks, with the classic pride colors right in step behind them.

Theo Von had Thomas Massie on his podcast. Nonstop criticism of US support for Israel, AIPAC. Quote: "America is just a shell company, an LLC for Israel" Nobody calling them antisemitic or threatening to cancel or arrest them. Complete right-left asymmetry on this. www.mediaite.com/media/podcas...

Thomas Massie Tells Theo Von U.S. Gets ‘a Lot of Countries That Hate Us’ in Exchange for Support for Israel

Thomas Massie told podcaster and comedian Theo Von that the United States gets "a lot of countries that hate us" in exchange for its support of Israel.

mediaite.com