Billy+Tipton

 “The best of human performances between birth and death--by transvestites and non-transvestites alike--we call virtue, love and art..” – Stimpson (1998)

= = = = =**Billy Tipton **=

Billy Lee Tipton (1914 – 1989), born Dorothy Lucille Tipton, was a well-liked jazz musician from the small town of Spokane, Washington. His life was seemingly unremarkable until the day he died. Upon his passing, it was discovered that he was biologically female, though he lived the majority of his life as a man. Here is an extreme example of how sex and gender are two distinct and at times totally discontinuous concepts.

Blecha (2005) describes the rapid and widespread shock of this unusual story: The discovery that Tipton had successfully masqueraded as a man for more than 50 years was initially a local “human interest” news item, but one with enough lurid mystery that it subsequently sparked international headlines, TV news coverage, magazine essays, a biography, and countless academic and bar-room gender identity debates.

None were more surprised than his closest associates, his friends and family. Tipton was married to, but separated from Kitty Kelly and was father to three boys at the time of his death, all of who had no idea about his secret.


 * His story**:

//*Due to the nature of this topic, the pronoun “she” will be used to report on Tipton’s earlier life and “he” will be used to refer to Tipton’s life after the undertaking of his new identity.//

Tipton was born in Oklahoma City and raised in Kansas City. As Dorothy, she was daughter to George and Reginald Tipton who divorced in 1927, soon after she was born. Stimpson (1998) reported, “ Dorothy's parents sent her mixed messages about gender, which apparently helped to breed a sense of gender indeterminacy.” Stimpson went on to further explain that Tipton’s father favored a more masculine approach to child rearing, while Reginald desired Tipton to be more feminine. However, it is hard to say that this is what made Tipton decide to take on her new identity.

Tipton came from a musical family and was raised in neighborhoods that celebrated jazz music. As a child, she took music lessons and also sang well. Tipton grew up in a time where men usually ruled the music scene and recognized that she had to adapt to survive. Tipton realized that to further her musical career, she would have to take on the identity of a man.


 * The Transformation: **

So she became a he. She bound her breasts, cut her hair and dressed in men’s clothes. ). In this case, being a man afforded Tipton more opportunities, power and money. As Jurich (1999) put it, “To make it in a "man's world," she had to remain a man; praxis moved into nexus, and perhaps she discovered he was more identical to who she actually was” (p. 70). At first, it was only onstage and when she was performing. However, it soon became evident that being a man was not only a stage act.

As Goldman (1998) reported, By 1937, the changeover from Dorothy to Billy was complete. Tipton got a Social Security card identifying him as male, and was able to get a doctor to give him a statement so he'd be classified 4F for the draft. (p. 16)

By the age of 23, it is evident that Billy Tipton was dedicated fully committed to his new identity. As Billy Lee Tipton, he would build his music career, take five women as his wives, adopt and raise three boys and trust no one else with this secret. Ironically, it was Tipton’s secret that limited his musical career. Goldman (1998) reports that Tipton and his group were offered a “tempting offer to be the house band at the Holiday Hotel in Reno”, but turned it down for fear that fame would greater his chances of exposure. Not willing to risk revealing his true identity he settled for “a job as a booking agent, playing occasional lounge and club engagements”, Goldman (1998). It was Tipton’s undisclosed identity that brought him both great success and mediocrity.

Though much of the details of his life are lost with him, he was known to be a very private man, which is appropriate given the nature of his identity. His life needed to be consistently maintained and exhaustingly covert.
 * The Bare Truth: **

Stimpson (1998) highlights some of Tipton’s life that needed to be overlooked: Manhood/performing gender required constant effort: binding breasts; putting on genital harness; telling a wife that the box of sanitary pads in the trunk of their car provided the best material for filtering oil; learning and practicing masculine gestures; demanding strict privacy so that wives, children and fellow musicians could never, never see his naked body; keeping his birth family separate from his marital families; refusing to get medical help as he aged because he trusted no doctor with his secret.

In the end, it was Tipton’s secret that killed him. He died due to a bleeding ulcer and had refused to seek help because he did not want to be found out. He died at the age of 74 and it was only after his death that his life-long secret was discovered. This scandal shook the lives of everyone that knew, or thought they knew, Billy Lee Tipton. The year was 1989 and news of this shocking incident was so novel that Tipton achieved infamy almost instantaneously.

Some may judge Tipton, even call him disingenuous, but those that knew and love Billy Tipton knew him as a kind and great man. Brubach (1998) included in her article a quote from Betty, one of Billy’s ex-wives. Betty said, “I wish I could shout to the world how great Billy was as a person, friend, confidant and a love. Just cannot express the personality he was”. He was regarded as a good father, kind husband and friend to all.

Billy’s legacy is unusual and socially taboo. He was born a female, but identified as a man and lived his life in every way possible under this belief. His story is inspirational to those who believe that one is not defined by circumstances, but by how one reacts to those circumstances. As Brubach (1998) put it, “Tipton's place in history has been secured not on the basis of [his] performing career but because [his] life corroborates the post-modernist notion that gender is performance”.

** References  ** :

Blecha, P. (2005, September 17). Tipton, Billy (1914-1989): Spokane's Secretive Jazzman. . Retrieved April 9, 2011, from HistoryLinks.org

Brubach, H. (1998, June 28). Swing Time. //New York Times Book Review//. Retrieved April 11, 2011

Goldman, D. (1998, June). Shocking, lurid and true! //Boigraphy//, //2//(6), 16. Retrieved April 10, 2011, from Academic Search Premier.

Jurich, M. (2004, March 23). The Female Trickster—Known as Trickstar—As Exemplified by Two American Legendary Women, “Billy” Tipton and Mother Jones. //The Journal of American Culture//, //22//(1), 69-75. Retrieved April 10, 2011, from Wiley OnlineLibrary.

Stimpson, C. R. (1998). A self-made man. //Women's Review of Books//, //15//(12). Retrieved April 10, 2011, from EBSCOhost. = =