Keystone Conference

Joseph F. Christ was born in 1927 with Klinefelter Syndrome and assigned male at birth. The seventh of eight children, Christ was placed into an orphanage during the Great Depression until the age 18. Two weeks later, Christ was drafted into the Army and fast-tracked to work in a secret German Prisoner of War camp in Richmond, Virginia due to fluency in German, Pennsylvania Dutch, and English. Following World War II, Christ got a degree in education from Moravian College, going on to teach English, German, and Social Studies.

In 1974, Christ went to Germany to teach American English on a Fulbright fellowship, and there was married a second time to, Liz, a Fulbright scholar who was in Germany teaching British English. While working there, Christ helped improve the English skills of a German cytogeneticist to allow her to participate in the World Health Organization, and it was through this connection that Christ discovered they have XXY chromosomes. Christ had occasionally started presenting as a woman before learning they were intersex following the end of their first marriage in 1973, but never formally came out, electing to present as masculine or feminine selectively. Christ expresses comfort in being able to present as either/or, while not particularly identifying with the LGBTQ+ community.

Christ passed away in 2018.

Katie Ward was born in 1952 and assigned male at birth. She was drafted after graduating from high school, and spent 22 years in military service, including active duty on a nuclear submarine in the Navy and Air Force National Guard. After Ward left active duty, she married and attended community college. She started working in the printing industry, moving up in the international printing business until 2013 when her company was bought out and she decided to retire. Ward was married twice and had one child.

Ward was a transgender activist and very active in LGBTQ+ community in Central PA. She organized and participated in numerous activities, including the Keystone Business Alliance, Central PA’s LGBT Chamber of Commerce; LGBT business mixers; local Gay Pride events; monthly Nights-Out with the Girls, and many others. She was an officer and longtime volunteer for TransCentral PA, and she helped establish the Keystone Conference, an international Trans conference held annually in Harrisburg.

Ward passed away in 2021

For more than a decade, Jeanine Ruhsam was an advocate in Central Pennsylvania’s transgender community. With the primary goal of providing support and resources for transgender people and their loved ones, she spearheaded the Trans Central Pennsylvania organization and the Keystone Conferences. Her projects have also included organizing initiatives like the Transgender Day of Remembrance, as well as political lobbying and legislation. Today she continues her career as a Women and Gender Studies Professor in New Hampshire. This interview discusses her personal experience as a trans women, her thoughts on the Central Pennsylvania LGBT community, and her insight into the future of trans people in the United States.

The Keystone Conference is a program for transgender individuals and their allies that has been held annually in Pennsylvania since 2009. The items in this collection include programs from previous conferences and vendor materials from the 2018 conference.