Danielle Colby Striptease Historian | The Queen of Rust

Pride Month: Stormé DeLarverie

Added 2022-06-10 13:52:09 +0000 UTC

It was a rebellion, it was an uprising, it was a civil rights disobedience – it wasn't no damn riot.— Stormé DeLarverie on Stonewall

For today's queer icon we have Stormé DeLarverie. She was born to a biracial couple in New Orleans in 1920, which is remarkable considering Loving vs Virginia wasn't passed until 1967! When Stormé was born she didn't have a birth certificate and therefore didn't know when her actual birthday was, but celebrated it on December 24th.

As a teenager she performed with the Ringling Brother's circus as a horse rider. After she left the circus she took up a job as the MC and a drag king at the Jewel Box Revue. The Jewel Box was the first integrated drag revue that performed at the Apollo Theater in Harlem. Her racially ambiguous and gender non-conforming appearance inspired lesbians of the era to take up a more androgynous look.

Not only was she a groundbreaking artist, but she was also an advocate and present at the Stonewall Uprising. She is yet another Queer Black Woman who is said to have led the charge at the Uprising at Stonewell. When the patrons of Stonewall were being carted away, Stormé was among them. She had told the officers that her cuffs were too tight and was promptly beaten on the head by an officer with his baton. It's said that as Stormé was being shoved into the back of the police vehicle she shouted, "Why don't you guys do something?" and the crowd sprang into action.

Stormé lived to the ripe old age of 93. When she passed this was posted in The New York Times as part of her obituary,

"Tall, androgynous and armed – she held a state gun permit – Ms. DeLarverie roamed lower Seventh and Eighth Avenues and points between into her 80s, patrolling the sidewalks and checking in at lesbian bars. She was on the lookout for what she called "ugliness": any form of intolerance, bullying or abuse of her "baby girls." ... "She literally walked the streets of downtown Manhattan like a gay superhero. ... She was not to be messed with by any stretch of the imagination."