Was J. Edgar Hoover a cross-dresser?

Well, Lucas, as I told you, I didn't think that story was true, and the credible evidence seems to indicate that he was not. But read these for yourself and see what you think.

7-15-02
Did J. Edgar Hoover Really Wear Dresses?
By Ronald Kessler

"Mr. Kessler is the author of a new book on the FBI, The Bureau: The Secret History of the FBI, available from Amazon.com.

In 1993, Anthony Summers, in his book Official and Confidential: The Secret Life of J. Edgar Hoover, claimed that Hoover did not pursue organized crime because the Mafia had blackmail material on him. In support of that, Summers quoted Susan L. Rosenstiel, a former wife of Lewis S. Rosenstiel, chairman of Schenley Industries Inc., as saying that in 1958, she was at a party at the Plaza Hotel where Hoover engaged in cross-dressing in front of her then-husband and Roy Cohn, former counsel to Senator Joe McCarthy.

[snip of a couple of lurid tales]

It was episodes such as these, Summers declared, that the Mafia held over Hoover's head. "Mafia bosses obtained information about Hoover's sex life and used it for decades to keep the FBI at bay," the jacket of the book says. "Without this, the Mafia as we know it might never have gained its hold on America."

Rosenstiel, a former bootlegger during Prohibition, was well-acquainted with Mafia figures such as Frank Costello, originally Francesco Castiglia. He was also friends with Hoover, having endowed the J. Edgar Hoover Foundation in 1965 with $1 million. But Susan was Summers's primary source for the cross-dressing story, and she was not exactly a credible witness. In fact, she served time at Riker's Island for perjuring herself in a 1971 case.

[snip]

While there was always speculation about Hoover and Tolson, there were never any rumors about Hoover cross-dressing. Oliver "Buck" Revell, a former associate director of the FBI, noted that if the Mafia had had anything on Hoover, it would have been picked up in wiretaps mounted against organized crime after Appalachin. There was never a hint of such a claim, Revell said.

Hoover was more familiar to Americans than most presidents. The director of the FBI simply could not have engaged in such activity at the Plaza, with a number of witnesses present, without having it leak out. The cross-dressing allegations were as credible as McCarthy's claim that there were 205 known Communists in the State Department, yet the press widely circulated the claim without further investigation. That Hoover was a cross-dresser is now largely presumed to be fact even by sophisticated people.

Ronald Kessler, "Did J. Edgar Hoover Really Wear Dresses?" History News Network, 15 July 2002, http://hnn.us/articles/814.html (21 June 2006).

From a site called The Straight Dope:

"But as a matter of fact, the alleged transvestitism of John Edgar Hoover, director of the FBI from 1924 until his death in 1972, has never been established, and reputable historians say it's an urban legend. The story probably got its start because of much more plausible rumors that J. Edgar was gay. He and his right-hand man, Clyde Tolson, were constant companions for more than 40 years, even vacationing together, and both remained lifelong bachelors. (Hoover lived with his mom until she died in 1938.)"

"Was J. Edgar Hoover a cross-dresser?" The Straight Dope, 6 Dec 2002, http://www.straightdope.com/columns/021206.html (21 June 2006).