Rushed her like a herd of cattle

Tempest Storm wasn’t just a performer. She was a pioneer, pushing boundaries for what women could express on stage. Her natural curves and signature red hair became her trademarks.

But unlike many of her peers, she refused plastic surgery, saying her real beauty was enough. She didn’t smoke and avoided anything stronger than orange juice or 7-Up.

At home, she would start her mornings with a crunchy granola breakfast and spend her afternoons enjoying massages, sauna sessions, and time in the whirlpool.

Just how popular was she? A striking example comes from 1955, when she visited the University of Colorado. A crowd of 1,500 students nearly rioted, leaving damage in their wake.

“They must have been shut up for months without women, they rushed me like a herd of cattle,” Storm recalled.

Interracial marriage

Offstage, Storm’s personal life was as dramatic as her performances.

She was romantically linked to Elvis Presley, Mickey Rooney, and gangster Mickey Cohen. But it was her 1959 marriage to jazz star Herb Jeffries, the first Black singing cowboy in Hollywood, that truly made headlines.

The couple had a daughter, Patricia Ann Jeffries.

According to The New York Times, her marriage to Jeffries “broke midcentury racial taboos, costing her work.” Interracial marriage was still illegal in much of the U.S. Suddenly, public interest in Storm began to fade.

Media attention dropped, and she was almost frozen out, far fewer photographers and reporters came to her hometown to cover her story.

The marriage didn’t last, but Storm never backed down from controversy and she and Jeffries remained ”closer than ever” after the breakup.