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The Jewel Box Review introduced Stormé to New York’s LGBTQ+ social scenes in both Harlem and Greenwich Village, and she became friends with other well-known performers like Dinah Washington and Billie Holiday. only saw what they wanted to see and they believed what they wanted to believe.” Of performing in drag, she humorously remarked “you know, the strange thing is, I never moved any differently than I had when I was wearing women’s clothes. Stormé identified herself as the sole drag king, donning tight pants, a loose jacket, and a fake mustache to present as male. The performers included 25 drag-queens, and the audience was tasked with guessing which one was the girl. The show was billed as “The Jewel Box Review: 25 Men and 1 Girl,” and its New York leg was based in the historic Apollo Theater in Harlem. She signed on for a six-month tenure, but when the show started traveling, six months joyously became fourteen years. She didn’t care and performed in drag anyway. Stormé expressed an interest in performing in male attire as a drag king however, the producers of the show originally tried to dissuade her from doing drag in the show. In the 1940s, Stormé was introduced to drag culture and began performing in female attire as singer “Stormy Dale.” While visiting Miami in 1946, she met Danny Brown and Doc Brenner who offered her a position as the MC for their drag variety show Danny’s Jewel Box, which would eventually travel as the famous Jewel Box Review. Fearing for her safety, she moved to Chicago at the age of 18 to explore life as an openly lesbian woman. Her mother and father raised her between Louisiana and California however, she encountered violent and traumatizing bullying during her youth for being biracial. Instead, she chose her own birthday, celebrating it each year on December 24th, Christmas Eve. Storme DeLarverie as photographed by Diane Arbus in 1961īorn to an African American mother who was a servant to a white homeowner in New Orleans, DeLarverie was never given a birth certificate because interracial marriage was illegal in Louisiana. But taking a closer look at Stormé’s life reveals a vibrant performer and outspoken protector. Whether or not she started the riot is a matter of historical debate and one that we may never truly know. Stormé has claimed to be this individual, admitting to either yelling for the crowd to do something or punching an officer herself, thus starting the days of protests and confrontations which followed. At the beginning of the riot, witnesses reported seeing a “mysterious butch lesbian” being arrested for violating a New York City law stipulating individuals must wear three pieces of clothing appropriate to their gender assigned at birth. Pronounced “Stormy De-Lah-vee-yay,” she made a name for herself as the (alleged) spark that started the pivotal Stonewall Uprising in 1969.

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Cannistraci and another friend of DeLarverie, Michele Zalopany, became her legal guardians several years before her death following a series of mental health and housing-related challenges.A self-proclaimed “gay superhero,” Stormé Delarverie (≅ Decem– May 24, 2014, Pronouns: she/her in public, he/him in performance) was a drag king, bouncer, and neighborhood activist who outspokenly protected LGBTQ+ communities in our neighborhoods and Lower Manhattan. DeLarverie’s fascinating life and drag persona have been the subject of several documentaries, including Stormé: The Lady of the Jewel Box.ĭeLarverie reportedly lived with a dancer named Diana for 25 years until the woman passed away in the ’70s.

“She was not to be messed with by any stretch of the imagination.”įor years, DeLarverie resided at the Chelsea Hotel and earned a living as a security guard at the Cubby Hole as well as for Cannistraci at Henrietta Hudson. “She literally walked the streets of downtown Manhattan like a gay superhero,” Cannistraci said. Source: Stormé DeLarverie / Stormé DeLarverieĭeLarverie, who owned a gun permit, often roamed the lower Seventh and Eighth Avenues armed and frequently checked in at lesbian bars well into her 80s in search of signs of intolerance or bullying against women.

Storme de laverie