Angelica Ross is an American actress, businesswoman, and transgender rights advocate. A self-taught computer programmer, she went on to become founder and CEO of TransTech Social Enterprises, a firm that helps employ transgender people in the tech industry.
Listed below are 15 things women should know about Angelica Ross:
1. Angelica Ross was born on November 28, 1980 in Kenosha, Wisconsin, then raised to the north in nearby Racine. Ross, a trans woman, has said she was perceived as feminine from a young age.
2. In 1998, when she was seventeen, she came out as gay to her mother, an evangelical Christian. Her mother did not receive the news well as, according to Ross, “she told me I should commit suicide or she would, because she couldn’t have someone like me as her child.”
3. Ross considered ending her own life and overdosed on medication but survived.
4. Upon graduating high school at 17, Ross briefly attended the University of Wisconsin-Parkside before dropping out after one semester. Ross decided to join the U.S. Navy (after her parents signed a waiver so that she could join as a minor) in order to qualify for the G.I. Bill.
5. Ross moved back home, and made friends with a drag queen named Traci Ross who helped her begin her gender transition at the age of 19. Upon discovering that she was transitioning, her mother threw her out and Ross moved in with her biological father (who was slightly more accepting of her) in Roanoke, Virginia.
6. During the six years that she lived in Roanoke, Ross worked as a waitress at Applebee’s so that she could earn enough money to pay rent and attend cosmetology school. She was let go from her waitress job due to discrimination.
7. Ross then moved to Hollywood, Florida and worked as a model and escort, then web manager, until 2003. She started a web development and graphic design business and took acting classes. She later moved to Chicago to become the employment coordinator for the Trans Life Center.
8. Ross began her acting career in the web series Her Story (2016), after which she received further recognition and critical acclaim for her starring roles in the drama series Pose (2018–2021) and the anthology horror series American Horror Story (2019–present), both from FX.
9. More recently, Angelica Ross signed a deal with Pigeon to develop its television projects. Ross portrays Georgia, a transgender woman, in the 2022 film Framing Agnes.
10. Ross taught herself coding, and started her journey in the technology industry in web management. She also learned graphic design and photography using videos online, taking photos for rappers and designing backstage passes.
11. Angelica Ross was later hired by the Chicago House’s TransLife Center which caters to trans individuals seeking employment, housing and other aid. Her role focused on employment coordination program development.
12. In 2014, Ross founded the company TransTech Social Enterprises, acting as CEO.
13. She is also the president of Miss Ross, Inc. She also founded the TransTech Summit. Ross described the goals of TransTech as including to foster skills in the technology industry, especially for trans people.
14. In June 2019, to mark the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall riots, an event widely considered a watershed moment in the modern LGBTQ rights movement, Queerty named her one of the Pride50 “trailblazing individuals who actively ensure society remains moving towards equality, acceptance and dignity for all queer people”.
15. Angelica Ross was once engaged, but called off the engagement as her fiancé did not want others to know that Ross was transgender. She is a practicing Buddhist.
