In 1962, Jess Stearn, an associated editors of Newsweek, received an invitation from the Daughters of Bilitis, a lesbian civil-rights organization founded in 1955, to participate in its upcoming national convention in Los Angeles. Stearn had authored a bestselling book about male homosexuality, The Sixth Man: A Startling Investigation of the Spread of Homosexuality in America, and the Daughters of Bilitis, alarmed by the book's sensationalistic approach, hoped that by participating in the convention the journalist would gain a more objective view of homosexuality. -Introduction, Reclaiming the "Lost Sex," The Lesvian in Cold War Culture

In the final scene of the Academy Award-winning film All About Eve (Joseph L. Mankiewicz, 1950), Eve Harrington (Anne Baxter), the film's manipulative and duplicitous villain, is startled to find a female intruder (Barbara Bates) asleep in an armchair in her living room when she returns from the Sarah Siddons Award ceremony where she has won an award for her "distinguished achievement in the theater," despite the fact that she had appeared in only one play. -Chapter One, Representing the Femme, All About Eve