J edgar hoover. Two images come to mind. The first is the long serving fbi director with his vaunted files. Targeting communists and leftists. Using his files to get his way with politicians. Image is of a secretive man wearing a black cocktail dress and a feather boa and high heels with his secret lover, clyde tolson. One of those is verifiable. The other is not. An irrepressible cultural meme with innuendos and suppositions. They capture the two major hoover of sessions of communism and gays. The fbis preoccupation with gays, has not been very well documented and examined only in limited ways. Public discourse over the fbi and gays often center on the idea of a gay hoover targeting his own through some kind of overcompensation. The fact of the matter is we dont know. We cannot know what his sexuality was. Unless were willing to use stereotyping somehow as evidence. Not knowing and having no convincing evidence means hoovers sexuality is a causal factor in why the fbi targeted gays for 40 years it simply isnt helpful to a historical understanding of what the fbi actually did. Let me take you on a whirlwind tour of my book. I cannot cover everything of course. But your claim time to read it. At 400 pages, you will need the time. The obsession with gays and politics from the 1930s to the mid1990s. Why did start the 1930s . It started then because americans reassessed gender roles. It also reassessed its perception of those gender roles. Particular games to those attracted to members of the same sex. Homosexuality was not regarded as a serious threat it was regarded as an individual sinful act and nothing overly concerning. After the stock market crash in 1929. Americans reassessed of those views. In patriarchal masculine American Culture as the previously valued husbands and fathers and heads of households suddenly failed to fulfill theirs assigned roles, to pay bills,s and pay the americans changed their views about gender. If the ideal heterosexual men was failing, gays who already stood outside expectations for men were suddenly regarded as a serious threat. After a series of child kidnappings and murders in the mid1930s, game and in particular were singled out as dangerous and predatory animals. For the fbi, started just after madison wasarles kidnapped abuse and murder. Depression era child kidnappings were nothing new. Familiar with all the Charles Lindbergh kidnapping. Had been a reevaluation of gender roles. Hoover had declared an end to child kidnapping in 1935. Shocked americans from coast to coast and even led president Franklin Roosevelt publicly promise that the fbi would never stop until it sure was captured. Bureaucratervative holdover from the republican Calvin Coolidge and Herbert Hoover administrations now had to react because his liberal boss had publicly demanded it and he wanted to retain his job, and he had to rectify the specious claims about child kidnapping. Significantly mobilized an assault on this particular case. Fbi agents went after a sex offender. Popular perception had it that gay men targeted children. There she focused on hobos. Hobos were the most visible and iconic symbol of the Great Depression. Almost forgotten today at the thatit was widely believed sexual perversion was common in the hobo community. Hobos commonly traded sexual favors for food or money. Fbi agents narrowly focused on hobos they went after exconvicts. A population were among those believe that homosexuality was common. They also focused on mental patients even the view that homosexuality was a psychiatric disorder. A significant thing happened. The fbi began systematic monitoring of gays. To fit a larger pattern of the federal government during the new deal coming to discover homosexuality and attempting to regulate it. The first time because new deal programs and bureaucrats working directly with common americans. They found themselves weeding gays out of those programs. Those programs always had a family focus. The fbi failed to solve the case. Thus failing to solve president roosevelt public promise. And nevertheless collected volumes of information about sex offenders. Successve some level of hoover use that information in educational campaign. If he couldnt solve the murder, he could warn and educate the American Public about the threat of gays. This also fits the. Hoovers fbi created its own Public Relations arm that famously propagated the idea that morally upstanding professional fbi agents used scientific investigative techniques and always capture their prey. That36, the fbi shifted and began focusing on educating americans about the threat from communists and homosexuals and other subversive influences. It was only a few years after 1937 when the fbis perception of targeting of gays came to the four. With the advent of world war ii, suddenly the perception of gays evolved from being perceived as a criminal threat to children to being a National Security threat. If a gay man or woman was found in government, securely holding an influential position, they could be targeted at subversive elements into betraying wartime secrets. We see for the second world war. The fbi investigating homosexuality among top government officials either because of stories of sexual improprieties or because they were gay baited by public enemies. These included under secretary of state Sumner Welles who famously got drunk on a train and solicited sex from a male africanamerican train porter. David walsh, chair of the committee and Naval Affairs who was gay baited because he didnt fit the mold of a mans man at the time. He was accused of frequenting a gay brothel in new york city that allegedly was targeted by nazi agents. The lend lease coordinator general Philip Stephenville who also didnt fit the common masculine mold of the time. He hated sports any like music. [laughter] leading his political enemies to gabe 8 00 a. M. Because he had worked successfully with the soviets. Era, the fbisr interest in gays evolved it again. It was similar to 1937 and that man Economic Disaster had led to a new perception of gays. The rise of the soviet union as a superpower and the threat led toear annihilation another focus on gays as threats. Coincided with the second child kidnapping panic in which the americans perceived children as being the targets. Gays were seen as a threat to the cold war homefront and as a subversive threat because communist agents could blackmail anyone in government to betraying secrets. Gays were seen as medical criminals and moral deviance. 1950ular Magazine Article claims to reveal the truth about homosexuality. Gays sought to recruit children into their deviancy. Not just boys but all children. The article quoted one socalled expert saying all too often we lose sight of the fact that the homosexual is an inveterate seducer of the young. He presets a social problem because he is not content with being a degenerate himself. He must have the genera companions. Another text from the time on sexuality claimed that because gays wrist shunned part of society, the homosexual will murder his victim during an active sexual frenzy and then robbed him. There quickly evolved a decidedly public witch country gays in the 1950s. One that was similar to but distinct from the witchhunt for communists. City gay witchhunt is known as the lavender scare. The state department had already begun searching purging gays from its ranks in 1947. The public witchhunt began in 1950 after senator Joseph Mccarthy singled out two cases not just for little subversion but sexual subversion in the state department. This led the department to purge itself of gays. Americans and then focused on the topic and it in gross them for years. One american wrote president truman, if the state department can acquire the file on 91 homosexualitys who had something to do with slanting information which is based the state department is capable of anything. The lavender scare actually long outlived the red scare. Over, ginger hoovers fbi responded. It had to respond. It was responsible for domestic security and for fighting subversive influence. To demonstrate to the president of the fbi was on top of the issue, in april 1950 hoover forwarded to the white house a list of 493 people arrested in the capital for sexual irregularities. Hoover created the first version of the fbis sex deviance program. This one was based upon arrest records and fingerprints. Anytime a person was arrested on the morals charge his arrest were reportedgers to the fbi who then reported them to the Civil Service commission. This limited program did not work very well. Civil servants noted many irregularities and errors in the program. This was compounded by two Senate Committees investigating the gay in government issue. Committeethe wary which only had two senators on it. The much more significant few week committee. Both popularized the lavender square. Hoover was forced to reconsider and dramatically expand the sex deviance program. He did so by june 1954. The reconfigured 60 beats beyond moved fingerprints and arrest records to include collecting any and all information about gays. Including simple allegations. The information will be collected, compiled and fbi Source Information will be added to it and then disseminated widely throughout government. To ensure gays and lesbians were fired from their jobs. Recipients outside of government were added including universities. Today is the 60th anniversary of the fbi writing a memo that we sent this memo to a university. Was not authorized by the attorney general or the president. They put hoover in the vanguard of the lavender scare. To nots careful effort say how gay related information was disseminated. When Forwarding Information to the house of representatives or the senate, fbi policy mandated use of fbi letters. These of the documents about the universities today. That is an fbi letter. Typical fbi document means different things. Fbi letters are clearly identified as being from the fbi. The fbi seal is on it the signatures on it. It is very clear where the information is coming from. That tells us something. Information,ng they make it clear where the information is coming from. When Forwarding Information to the government accounting office, the Judicial Branch of the military, fbi policy mandated the use of something called line to memos. Blind memoranda are documents with no letterhead, no signature, no watermark, no nothing. This is a blind memo that happens to be redacted. As you can see the targets name is on their. Sexual allegations that are blacked out. Otherwise there is no indication this is from the fbi. Because we have it. The first one was actually from the fbi file. This came from the eisenhower library. In this case they set the exact document to the president and a neck she has the fbi seal on it. Is that he worked for the cia and was arrested in a park across the street from the white house for soliciting gay sex. This the fbi supervisors were directed to index from all reports and letters and memos all names of suspected sex deviance. They would underline the names with a pencil. Central to this fbi theemination was comprehensive fbi file. The 60 beats file. The sex deviance file. One was a file on sex offenders. Another was captioned sex perverts in Government Service dating from 1942. A third was called sex deviance in washington dc contained all fingerprints and arrest records. Another one was from the fbi Washington Field office. Captionedsearch file sex degenerates constituted the would use tohe fbi educate and influence the public about the threat of sex deviance. More, fbi field offices in cities with large cave populations such as San Francisco and change socalled Research Files where they kept information about gays and their particular locations. By 1977 the fbi sex deviance be hundreds ofto thousands of pages in size. The main files probably more than half a million pages. I dont have the time here to cover all government officials that were targeted. Thats where a 400 page book. Suffice it to say some included the aforementioned carmel aussie, president ial candidate ofai stevenson, president Bradley University david owen, Arthur Vandenberg junior, state Department Official charles and Nicholas Novato of the voice of america. Ande Department Official future ambassador to the soviet union charles bolin. The federal Security Agency itself, the forerunner to the department of health and human services. Three lowlevel Eisenhower White joseph andspondents stewart alsop. Among many many others associated with these individuals. Sex deviancebi file was destroyed in 1977, we can never know exactly how many but thisre targeted merely constitutes a tiny sampling. Fbi also targeted the first gay rights group, the Mattachine Society. Another group was called one of the incorporated that had an economist magazine. Daughteran magazine cells go by this. The mattachine was the first socalled humble file group to form. By 1952 mattachine had caught journalistsocal were wondering whether a communist spy could infiltrate the group and swing its political power. Public charges initiated an fbi investigation under its program of mattachine and one to see whether communists had infiltrated these groups. Sources, the fbi decided that both groups were clean. Somehow the fbi did notice that the mattachine was actually founded by former members of the communist party. By 1956 all of that changed. The magazine published an claimingte article that gays work in the fbi but hinted that hoover himself was gay. This kind of trouble charge laid hoover to target the magazine and the Mattachine Society. Using federal and types of the law in an effort to shut down the publications. And thert failed magazine did win a legal case protecting the right of gay groups to use the males. Target thee to lesbian group. They suggest the nature of the fbi effort against early gayrights groups. Were commonly perceived to be the greater threat. The greater violation of gender roles and patriarchal hyper masculine cold war culture. Gay man actually received greater scrutiny and focus than women do. That is at least on the fbi side of things. Commission wasce probably completely different story. The fbi surveilled members and try to reconstruct members with these lists. It was interested in where it opened new chapters across the country. Fbi tension was also drawn to the east coast of the United States when homosexual groups formed there. Mattachine new york and two groups in washington dc. Day rightsy of early activist Donald Webster corey. I would like to focus on Donald Webster corey. He was actually a pseudonym for a real individual by the name of edward said garin. Cori persona was something of a hero to many gays and lesbians in the early 1950s. He wrote this book, the homosexual in america. This book was the first to offer a view of homosexuality that was in a positive light. That they were repressed segment of society. Rather than some kind of moral or medical or criminal deviance. Had something of an odyssey in lgbt history. He participated in activist groups. As a middleaged man he went to college and ultimately to the phd in sociology and became an expert on deviancy. Was ag that homosexuality pathology. One historian has described him as a jekyll and hyde personality between his corey and his real persona. What the fbi files teach us is that corey in 1952 founded in early gayrights group called homosexuals anonymous. As i know we did not previously know about this group. Corey revealed the fbis use of informants. He willingly offered the fbi information about gays. We know the identity of this therapist it was dr. Alfred gross. The fbi forgot to black out his in this memo. This if youabout have the bottom of the document you can see how he described sick error and that he was average looking. Dr. Gross long cooperated with the fbi when he came to gays. He worked with a group called the George W Henry foundation. A quaker group that counseled young man arrested on morals charges. They regarded them not with any have sympathy but as young man arrested who had some cap corey hadal problem invited dr. Gross to speak before his group. After doing so he decided coreys group was only interested in Political Rights and they were rude and confrontational. He probably reported all this to the fbi. Including identifying for fbi agents that corey was in reality said garin. They knew the identity of this major gayrights activist who had to hide behind a pseudonym. Briefly one to focus the fbi and gay rights activist John Richard Jack nichols junior. Here he is taking the white house. Nichols is well known because heng with Frank Campbell founded the Mattachine Society of washington dc. Famous for its militant activism and picketing the white house. What is so interesting about nichols is that he was the son of an fbi agent of the same name. , frank mustve known junior and senior. How can they not know . The bureau claimed the file the longer existed. Statened the penn archives of all places had this fbi document involving nichols. After some backandforth i got hold of it. Here it is. It was heavily redacted. Somebody telling fbi officials all about nichols junior. Was his father mentioned in this document . I didnt know to the bottom that first paragraph you can see the name richard in parentheses. This is a freedom of information act request. Why would the fbi put in parentheses richard blackout name. The sun went by jack, the father went by richard. And i strange to me thought this must be indicative of something. I followed another request with the fbi. Nicholsoving that agent was a saint, hoping to get something. If the fbi even still have the documents. They said they destroyed the suns fbi file. Who would release documents to me in any event. The fbi released this. It is the document unredacted. Technical step father was an alcoholic i was probably drunk and called the fbi and out of his stepson and effectively outed his biological father as somebody who never told the fbi that he had a gay son or told the fbi that is gay son was a major gayrights activist. Mildly, the fbi agents got into a lot of trouble. He was censured and placed on probation and transferred out of the washington dc field office. I dont know yet totally what happened to him. Hopefully we will find out someday. Chapter seven covers the politics of homosexuality. Into the nixon administration. The homophobia and concerned with gays and government continued, most famously with president johnson in the Walter Jenkins episode. Johnsons longtime aide was arrested on morals charge in washington dc ymca mens room. This incident led to a wider effort to screen. Antigay politics continue. Uniquely and unsurprisingly ticketmaster levels. Hand talk on the one on tape about being the most tolerant person in the administration we came to gays. He never hesitated to gave eight or use sexually related information against those perceived as his enemies. In november 1970 nixon asked to fbi for a rundown of homosexuals known and suspected in Washington Press corps. He also spread gay rumors about his own First Century of state william rogers, calling him a fake. G. He called someone he met a white house function and obvious ag. Ring f he also said referring to all in the family, you should not glorify homosexuality on Television Anymore than you whores. Co this was the most tolerant man in the administration. [laughter] the bookchapter of explores how the fbi dealt with Gay Liberation. Front and thetion gay activist alliance. The liberation was a departure homosexualted Home Movement of earlier days. Transformational of american sexuality. Cooperation with other radical groups such as the black panthers and a rejection of the traditional gay subculture. They would use confrontational protests unlike the homosexual movement of the past. To they are in new york city. The fbi surveillance was also used from the past. By the late 1960s fbi director hoover has restricted the use of intrusive investigative techniques like illegal breakins and wiretaps and microphones. Public protests as a result of the vietnam war heightened the concern. Hoover now found the investigative avenues to risky. Having reached the mandatory federal retirement age at the hoover could only continue to serve because johnson issued an executive order exempting hoover from mandatory retirement. Hoover not tor rock the boat and keep his job. By 1969 the Civil Service commission could no longer easily fire a gay employee based on circumstantial evidence. Making it actually more difficult under hoovers program to operate. Hoover during the next hesitated with intrusive and analytical techniques. But still provide the president with a wealth of information. Fbi agents primarily relied upon informants. They had no shortage of informants. Provided Gay Liberation pamphlets, newsletters, publications and all other sorts of information. The fbi was especially interested in any Gay Liberation protest centered on little protest. The fbi had a difficult time with Gay Liberation front. It had rejected formal organization and had no elected officers, no committees, no bylaws. It was anarchistic nature. They couldnt figure out who was so. Cold. Who. The other organization was more formal leaving the fbi agents to evaluate its organization. They used information from both groups to purge gays from government jobs. The book concludes that the fbi after hoovers death and nixons political devise with watergate. It, thehoover driving sex deviance program essentially ended it. The files were destroyed in 1977. But it didnt continue its antigay employment. Ended in 1993. Woulda gay fbi agent who been fired soon we get his job back. That shocked the fbi. Frank patino won his case is a classaction lawsuit. Which forced to the fbi to and antigay employment discrimination. And then antigay employment animus. Except in the military. Filtered through the other intelligence agencies. Fbi the trailblazer in the war against gays that have become the unwilling trailblazer in ending antigay employment is given federal government. Thank you. [applause] [applause] if you have any questions please come to the microphones. It sounds like administrations representing both legal parties during the cold war era were hostile toward gays. Twice then can you attribute that to the cold war or other factors going on with both parties . Charles both parties were hostile to gays and government and gays in general. They both found them loathsome. I think that was a function of the culture of the United States. From the Great Depression onward. Actually theres is a certain irony here. All of this started in 1937 with Franklin Roosevelt and his administrations. Pastlin roosevelt in the when he was secretary of the 1920 there was a famous newport navy gay sex scandal. So there is no political affiliation that goes along with it. It crosses both of them. Hoovers obsession with eleanor roosevelt. Hinting at her being a lesbian. That was also a function of the culture of the time. To some peoplelt did not seem to fit in with expectations of what a woman should be. Having unique relationship with her husband. She was powerful, she spoke out. It is oddly similar with hoover. These are the common belief space that stereotypes. Since you are in kansas city, developed the game lesbian archives in america which aims to collect and document the history of the lgbt community. In your research did you come across any references to activism in kansas city. I ask because people arent aware, the fbi has had a long presence in the kansas city area. It had a very active Regional Office so i would be kind of curious to determine if i had any knowledge. Charles nothing that comes to mind. The activism of the 1950s and 1960s was really restricted to the west coast and aeschylus. Once we get into the Gay Liberation movement, it spread across the country on College Campuses and other places. There might have been activity in kansas city. Of fbi reportst from all kinds of cities all across the country. Field offices sending in information on gays. Other than the last example, has there been any restitution for any employees that have been fired . Any apology . Anything from the government that says this is not something we should have done . Charles no. [laughter] there has been a movement to remove jager hoovers name from the fbi building. They plan to build a new fbi headquarters outside of washington in the suburbs and i understand the name will not be on the new building. Probably appropriate. What they will do with that i still dont know. That is his close as we get i think. Can you tell us more about how and why the files were destroyed . Charles the sex deviance program file dates from 1937 of through the 1970s. When hoover died in 1972, he was the driving force behind it. Once hes out of the picture the fbi agents and fbi officials did not push it so much anymore. Times were changing anyway. The fbi as an organization is responsible not only to the. Hims of the director it also responds to the changing political climate. Why is it 1977 . The Carter Administration cames in. He is the first president to be friendly with gay groups. He is proclaiming human rights. He never really does anything proactively to help gays but there is a changed attitude at least with carter. I dont think it is surprising at all that in 1977 the files. Ere destroyed are it didnt exactly love to human rights. Live up to human rights. There was a general description left behind by the National Archives when they survey the files that gave their approval for its construction. Side, a copy documents into the text file. So that individual case files with targets can still exist in many cases. You just have to know the file number and the specific individual who was targeted. They are out there. We dont know where they are. You have to prove they are deceased to get their file through the freedom of information act. Impossible to reconstruct the entire thing. The index no longer exists. The former police chief of kansas city became the chief of the fbi. Charles after hoovers dead nothing happens with this anymore. I discussed this in the book. Anything after hoover involving gay rights it was usually gay rights putting pressure on the fbi to end the antigay employment discrimination. The fbi said we dont harass gays. That is basically had. The antigay employment stuff is still there. You mentioned that a big part of this had to do with the child kidnappings. Did all those kidnappings lead to deaths . What a kidnappings Public Knowledge during the depression . Was there a decrease in the amount of children kidnapped once this war began . Charles there were studies made of the crime rates during the Great Depression and there was no increase. Ofs was all a perception popular Public Perception the children were being targeted. And the belief that was not true the child kidnappings and murders had increased. It was immediate focus. It was a media focus. Kidnapped, not everyone was murdered. Some were released safely. This was a typical thing with the fbi. When children were involved people got very concerned. Summary has to be held responsible. Given the cultural dictates of that time, it was widely believed that game and targeted children. Even though there is a large category of child predators among whom gay people do not belong. Given stereotypes, that is who was targeted. For many years. Cai ask one more question . Left andn on the far fbi agent because i thought hoover had a hangup about facial hair on men . If youve been to hoovers grave . Charles two hoovers left is tolleson, who was allegedly his lover. Hungt think he was that up about facial hair. Matovich,major or who was given a medal for killing a man of throne of the air force for loving a man. And they are there together forever. [laughter] will you talk about how you first became aware of this fbi organization and their investigation . If you face any particular challenges in getting these kind of documents . Charles my doctoral dissertation was about the fbi critics of 50 yards policy. Foreign policy. I knew that Sumner Welles had been targeted. Nothing can ever be written on it. Nothing substantial. , a little bithere here. I started researching things. It was a monumental task. Because the sex deviance file was destroyed. And theres no way was ever going to be reconstituted again. So how can i explain it without having all the documents . Every extent document on this. The fact that the sex deviant file was destroyed except for some documents that indirectly referenced it. Documents and other files that say there was a sex deviance file. What is in washington dc last year, doing my last bit of research for this book, the man there, the law firm who was suing the fbi to get documents about this. I have these already. I met the guy. He showed me the fbi policy documents that we thought had been destroyed that he had a copy of it. I dont know how it survived. It is described in detail. It was just dumb luck. I said how am i going to explain the program itself. It was just good luck in many cases. The other thing was getting around the read actions. Read actions. Edactions. We know the fbi sent files to the white house. If the fbi file has been deleted, may be the one in the white house file has not been. That was a way to do it. Anyone else . Anything about hoover and truman . Charles hoover usually cultivated a close relationship with president s. The dependent on the president. Roosevelt and hoover were very close. Roosevelt and truman were not close. And so eisenhower comes in they are close again. And jfk is not close with jfk for a very good reason. Hoovers new boss would be jfks brother. And hoover had a habit of detail are bypassing the attorney general to deal with the president. He was very close with johnson. He had a strange relationship with nixon. But still fairly close. It depends on the president. He didnt like truman. He actually undermined truman in many ways. When hoover died his longtime companion destroyed a lot of his personal records. Charles theres a famous secret file of jaeger hoover. His office files. This was a clever way he got around fbi files being subject to court discovery, motions, the lawyer would ask for the fbi to release the file. Hoover would say well the official file contains nothing. That document was not in the official file. It was in his office files. And thats what was destroyed. The other one survived. That is how he operated. Thank you dr. Charles for being with us this evening. [applause] [applause] you are watching American History tv. 48 hours of programming on American History. Cspanus on twitter at history. Monday night on the communicators. John lansing discusses how u. S. Media organizations like voice of america are operating in todays media environment. Like these agencies to retool to address propaganda by russia, china and the islamic state. He is joined by ron nixon from the new york times. We started 70 years ago as a we are really no different than it every other Media Company that you and i know about. That is our mission, to shift resources, energy, focus, strategy to be more in the heretoyour conversation instead of the one i than can shift from the stodgy media to the new media. Announcer watch the communicators on monday at 8 00 p. M. The eastern. American History Channel takes you to williamsburg. Williamsburg was the capital city of virginia. Up next, we take a tour of the