The year was 1955, and science fiction author Charles Beaumont had, by most accounts, crossed the line with his latest short story.
“The Crooked Man” depicted a dystopian future where homosexuality was the norm and heterosexuals were persecuted minorities. Even the relatively progressive Esquire magazine had rejected the piece because it was too controversial.
But Beaumont found a fan in a young Hugh Hefner, who agreed to run it in his Playboy magazine, then less than two years old.
Outraged letters poured in to Playboy. Even readers of the pioneering nude publication found Beaumont’s tale of straight people dressing in drag and sneaking into dark barrooms to find partners too offensive for their tastes.