[2][4] From a very early age, Anderson was adamant that she was not male, identifying as female in a time period before the term transgender existed,[5] and naming herself Lucy.
[8] Her marriage to Clarence lasted nine years, but during the course of the union, she saved enough money to buy property that was a boarding house front for a brothel; it also sold illegal liquor during the prohibition era.
Scholar C. Riley Snorton stated "When the sheriff arrested her one night, her double-barreled reputation paid off—Charles Donlon, the town's leading banker, promptly bailed her out [because] he had scheduled a huge dinner party which would have collapsed dismally with Lucy in jail.
[8] When the Ventura County district attorney learned from this examination that Anderson was transgender, he chose to try her for perjury, arguing that she lied about her sex on her marriage license and impersonated a woman.
[9][8] After being published in a small Pacific Coast paper, the story became widely publicized through a Time (magazine) article on November 5, 1945, where Anderson was exposed as a transgender woman.
[8] In this trial, she and Reuben were found guilty and sentenced to a men's prison, where Anderson was forbidden by court order to wear women's clothes.