A Curious Eye

In a year where Elizabeth II is making history, she has done it again by appointing Britain’s first Transgender person, Ms. April Ashley, as Member of the British Empire (MBE). This is the first time a Transgender person has made the Queen’s ‘honor’s list’. Ms. Ashley is 77 years old has been a well known figure throughout the British Isles.

According to the DailyMail.com, her life started out as a seaman but she states that she knew from the age of three that ‘something was different’. As a young student, April was beaten repeatedly. As soon as she could she left for London and assumed the role of a woman. She moved to Paris in 1955 and worked as a hostess at “Le Carousel” that was frequented by Ernest Hemmingway, Jean Paul Sartre and even Bob Hope.

Finally with enough money she had the surgery in 1960 that enable her to be complete and happy.

Returning to London, in the closet about her surgery, she became a top model and appeared in “Vogue”. In 1963, she married Arthur Corbett who was the son of Lord Rowallan and became apart of British society. She was ‘outed’ by a supposed friend and her world came crashing down around her.

She fought her way back into society and became a crusader for the Gender Recognition Act that would legally recognize the rights of Transgender people. It passed in 2004 and in 2005 she obtained a new birth certificate. And this weekend, Ms. April Ashley continues to make history.