St. Louis Post-Dispatch
February 21, 1909

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© geugtit in battles with more savagery ‘ she had .never been * accustomed to playing the man that A Ona “Going t to engage ay new help ~-uhder the whip of some- —-™ body’s supposed “pull” “influence” with you—or in business-like way, through. Post- Dispatch want advertising? or the

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ST. LOUIS. SUNDAY MORNING, FEBRUARY 21. 1909. PRICE FIVE CEN TS. results almost certain. apunnaeumpmenecsnsn

HOW LILLIAN

WINTERS DECEIVE

After Nine Years in Male Attire She Is Glad to Wear Women’s G

ICTION has no monopoly of the adventures of vw emen turned men for the while by masculine garments. Some of the masculinized heroines of fiction have been charming enough, but not the finest art of the novelist could make them wholly ‘“mannish.” In real life the deception has been even more difficult, The novelist did not tejl of the mincing step. born of the high poet in weaving truth out of. lies. for there lacked the license of the - heel or’ the heavy hip made by the corset or the little ineffacable feminine tricks that are as nat- ural to Wemeu as breathing, all of which are tell-tale in real life. In the lorig. line of heroines in the flesh who have masqueraded as-men-pel®™is"so-extraord- nary as that of-Liltian Winters, who was man in all but sex (paradoxical as that may seem) for nine years, or until in a moment of weakness the feminine was revealed and she declared her- self ‘a woman when she might have remained a man to all intents and purposes. ?T is not tobe supposed that Lillian Winters in- tended “to return to the privileges or inconvcn- fences of hef sex. A detective looking at her in her character of a man through the bars of a ceil said to her jokingly ‘‘Your hands are too smal) for a man, kid. We wil! have to search you. You look like a. wolnan to me.”’ Litliian~ Winters has told no one the terror that ‘ rocked her soul in that moment of possible discovery. had doubtd her sex; she had become so unconsciously ‘had developed a masculine habit of-thought, but in that one psychologically frail moment all her man- fi8h strength fell. away and she. wailed: Tins am a woman.” ‘And then she’ could have cut her: nas out for surréndéring: her back to thé thraitdom of skirts. _ Other svomeh, to be sure, have paraded in trousers. - They have ‘tramped as men, and they have even than men; . they fiave worked in fields and An the galleys of _ ships as.men; but there always came a day of reck- No one ever before seriously “searched,”’ | ee when they went meekly back to their skirts ag their natural and only integument. But Lillian Winters was a man among men, in garments; with a career more picturesque than ever nevelist plotted. She did a man’s work as a: man * does ft ahd she pursued masculine pursuits among then without the slightest detection. ut, you who read this narration say, it is not such a very difficult accomplishment for a woman to fool & man. Trué¢, tog, but it is not so easy for a man to fool another in such essentials as make manhood. She did more than this, however, she fooled women to the top of her bent, and fooled them into falling wildly in love with her. If that was not the height of deception, what is? “In these. other cases‘ of women turned men there hia always been some anomaly of nature to aid the : r, sich as the unnatural beard, the mas- ouline voice, the mplica of the mannish, bony struc- ture. But Litiian Winters passed for a man without any of these aids and with a certain feminine lovc- lines that should have been a handicap. “Hew did she do it? None can know save herself. The only solution that occurs is that she is a con- summate. —— for fortune did not give her’ °x- »*

¥ Even Deceived an Up-to-Date Bartender By “Butch” White, Bartender. \sov can’t tell me that guy is a woman. ' Why, IL wrestled with him too often and he threw me every time. JHe’s as strong as a bull. You can’t make me believe that husky fellow’s a girl.

the sheltered and easy life of the growing girl ac- centuate. : N HER contact with the world she took no seem- ing precautions to conceal her sex, she was as natural in her boyish ways as a boy. She shunned no one in her work nor in her sports; never did she. avoid the severest test. She drank, she swore, she courted girls, she worked as hard as her fellow, she fished and camped; she told stories with the best of them, and she did not flinch when the talk grew strong. . She even chewed tobacco, a test that would put any woman on her mettle. Her career as a man. began when her family ws Swept away in the flood that’ wiped out Galvesto. rine vears ago, and she was saved and left Texas with Richard Steren, dressed as a boy. She beat her way. across thé country into the neighborhood of the Mojave Desert, a place to try the courage of a man, to say nothing ofa tender girl. To Chief of Detectives Smith, -in the presence of policemen, detectives and.newspaper reporters, she told the story of her adventures as a man. The stories she told created amazement at her success. In keeping with her long demonstrated powers as & mimic she did not smile or. show any self-conscious pride at having béen able to fool her associates for SO long a time, relating how girls had fallen in love with her in her character of a bandsome boy or how men had taken her into fellowship on equal terms, with. like sangfroid. But she did wince when she was stripped of trou- sers and jacket and she donned for the first time in her life q pair of corsets. Then she knew she had lost her freedom. She was incased in the steel prison of feminine fashion, and she realized for the first time the comfort that was-in the clothes she had been wearing, it was as Williams Winters that. Lillian first came to St. Louis in 1902, Before that Lillian had lived with John Howard and his wife, in the capacity of their foster son,.in Quincy, Tl. There she had worked it a livery stable, in a plow factory and with other nen as & bill poster, and did all her work like 4 man. Mr. and Mrs. Howard were ignorant of her sex and treated her as they would a son. Lillian was then but 15, but well built and shrewd enough to escape detection, Shortly after coming to St. Louis the Howards moved to Kirkwood and Lillian remained in St. Louis to earn her living as a boy. She had deceived not only her adopted parents, but her sister by #40P- on as well, Miss Mary Howard, who is now Mrs. Ashlock, living with her husband in Centralia, Fl. Thrown upon her own resources again, Lilian strode forth to look for work. She was not long !9 finding it, as Bill Winters at the American Ratte® Works, where for more than a year she made chairs and baskets, rubbed elbows with fellow workme®, and chatted and lunched with them on the equal foot- ing of masculinity without ever arousing a err as to her true sex. One day, after Lillian hag turned out an excep- tionally dainty piece of werk, one of her companion® in the shop remarked at the exceeding smaliness and dexterity of her hands. ; “Gee. Bill,” said the man, “you should have been a girl.” PS “How ie you know rm bees was the audaci@ o Povo oe was this c enging,. if Sood-natured & CS 5 at TR aca :

Lendlady Was Completely - Decsived by Her Boarder By Mrs. Ear] Hanna, “Bill’s” Landlady. lik revelation has dumfounded me. My husband and | will both swear that “Bul? Winters alweys acted to perfeec- tion the part of a natural man’ The idea of “him” turning out to be a woman. I cam scarcely beeve it.

“boy” fie one that saved her from earlier exposure, was that she made no prying enemies among men or women who might have made realities of suspicions. Her ready, f00d-natured way of directing the shafts of suspicion from her saved her. for there were many who recognized the feminine (not effeminate quality) of her and remarked it, put investigation went no further. ILLIAN had driven a “snatch team’ on a gtaa- ‘ing eamp near Ste. Genevieve before going t? Quincy to live with the Howards, and it Ws there that she met Mabel Kendrick who fell in love ree pee? Seen hg! and a corresponfience f0!- low n which girl wro ‘her heron weld te agfectionateiy to” 4 2, “og oe ag, ool ag AT

Ss iron pi « hammer and lifted _— * IVER OP SNATCH" TEAM. of feminine conquests, and she muat have thought ger victims. “I don't bla@e the girls for falling in love with you,” wrote Miss Kendrick. “You are almost too pretty to be a boy.”’ | a often wish I were a girl,’ Lillian wrote in re- ply. “A fellow has to work so much harder to earn a living than a girl does.” The muscular development of the girl Lillian had by this time made her Strong where other women are not strong, and. so changed the contour of her figure somewhat,.showing that the physical differ- ence between men and women is in a measure due to the work they do. Lilian did not choose and pick to get easy work. She chose hard work, usually, that required the strength of a strong boy. There was only one thing for her, manual labor, a lack of education making clerical work impossible. “I wasn’t cut out for a clerk Or a talesman, " she said when she had changed her trousers for skirts. “I usually picked out the hardest work there was.’ I liked that kind best.”’ When she becaine a boflermaker’s apprentice she chose work as hard as any boy,may well choose for himeelf. When she became a helper in that trade she worked at driving hot raat in mane iron and what a fool ony of hem. Th Sy 7 7 os s ciated botlerm ASPB ys ae % - » *< s: < TY wee CP OES oo a ‘tossing about of ps rtd s aeess tye

By Dr. William H. Freudenstein, Dispensary Physician. ISh8 WINTERS is a_ well woman. She was aided in d the public only by her use of ages about her chest. to her I am unable to say anything about her. | appeared from a superficial examinat be of a normal state of mind. she had a desire to be mannish.

made marshal of a division and robe’ a bi “4 2 cing steed, with all the grace of a soonetiacl ‘st ~. ing the ad@miration of the girls on the cried, “Leok at the pretty on “Ke she sent them back the sort « “glances y ed, and they were proud and happy, = . Women were not alone in their ar lian’s good looks. Men frequently ec “while ‘Bill’ was remarkably manly in his still he was extremely genteel in his apr “Bill's not ‘what you would call a r said one, “but then He's that darned can’t help feeling he’s too good to be a man,” It was not Lillian’s general habits that put & the innocent class, however, for she had all the bad oneg of the men she a She smoked, she chewed tobacco and she # could roll a cigarette as deftly as any “end,” could toss off a glass of beer as coolly as any rounder. .She was an active member of a I rth club, and bought many a keg of beer for the @ lectation of the “‘gang,”” which she helped en with noise and song. She belonged to the Kuights,”’ a ¢lub at Seventh and ( where she was host at many a revel, and was @@ teally so generous that she was dubbed a “ inc ct by the other men, to whom that title means the i it of good fellowship. es ‘Bill could put away as mubh booze as naif us,” said William’ H. Beckman, treasurer of ti Boilermakers’ Helpers aud a leading spirit int hi Happy Knights. | a “gay, every time I think of ‘Bill's’ being @ | rt feel like kicking myself. Why, I took him hem many a time when he was ‘pickled.’ ”’ it eae ILLIAN, in her physical development, be somewhat of an athlete, and she “4 sport, too. She could outrun any of her fF on a sprint; she could “kick higher, play and throw the ball overhand like a girl; was fond of football and handball, too. As @ she threw most of the club members, and t a good many husky young fellows there. a “Go on; you can't tell me ‘Bill’ Winters is a sald “Butch” White, bartender for Patrick ¢ nell at 1115 Clark avenue. “Nay,’ nay; he me that. I used“to wrestle with ‘Bill’ sown & be 6 . Bites: °

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Philosophy of Miss Winters, Who Studied Men as They / BY LILLIAN WINTERS. WOULD not take $1000 a day for the experience I have gathered during the last nine

believe I have gained a ~ more thorough knowledge in worldly: ways than I er have: in any other school. I have learned the “way of men.” | I am convinced that man is not only not woman's superior but is not and never will be her @ It is not the clothes that make a man. There are ‘some good men in the world, but they 4 and hard to find. ai — A man treats his dog better than he does the woman who thinks enough of him to be if and stave. o. AM 2 years old now and it is barely possible that some day I may find a man who will @ | vince me that he is good enough to be my husband. But it will take a long time for me te eg man, and I will have to forget a lot of things. One thing, he 2 equa I'am not a man-hater in any sense of the word. I sympathize with I am not basing my opinion on personal experience alone, but rather on t kind I was able to acquire while posing as a man. I may be called deceitful, or, methane believe me when I tell you that men are the very tne = nen tenn ‘ think a girl would choose from which to make her club, 4 live hood. at Lilian might have obtained a job as a salesman in Bob Hannon'’s a department store, where herNack of education was one of Ldjlian’s would ‘have made little difference, for she was s0 persuasive and good-looking as a boy she might have ¢ sold the women anything. , But she chose driving redhot rivets instead. yt Before that she had driven a wagon for a hard~ » ware store for a time, another heavy job, requiring ¢; the lifting Sat winttie ant ne ee anvils and such. ad she 2 eae

Lillian joined the B ‘ - me