Her name pops up in all the crap columns of the 1950s. Earl Wilson (midget showbiz smut-hound and hanger-on) and Leonard Lyons, the "gentle gossip" and proprietor of "The Lyons Den" column both reported on her at least once...anywhere her presumably equally sleazy publicist could place her name in a daily sheet. Libby was a serious lecturer, and I'm not kidding. While stripping at a club in Anytown, USA at night, she would lecture during the day at local fraternal organization luncheons and such. At one lunchtime gig in Royal Oak Michigan, she struck a blow for woman's rights by proclaiming "Up to date it has never been suggested to me that a man could do my job better than I" and this was in 1959. Take THAT early feminists. She also tried to organize a union for strippers. This COULD be a joke, but it was to be called B.A.R.E for "Benevolent Association of Revealing Entertainers"
The entertainer's bust was reported as 36" in 1959 and 41" in 1967...so she never stopped growing as an entertainer. Libby wrote two books, "Striptease: The One How To Book No Woman Should Be Without" in 1967 and "How to Undress in Front of Your Husband" a year later. One of them was translated into French (!) as "Guide Du Strip-Tease Chez Sol" which almost pays them back for all the smut they sent us. I suppose her greatest accomplishment was playing a stripper (no stretch) in the landmark Lenny Burtman film "Satan in High Heels." At least she was consistent. She had other stirring film performances. "The Case of the Stripping Wives" (1966) "Key-Hole Varieties" (1954) and a documentary titled "Tijuana after Midnight" in which she played someone playing herself as someone else...or herself. In other words, a stripper. Her non-nominated Grammy long playing record is a masterpiece of purple cover. Appearing on the extra low-prestige STRAND label (for which the term "cut-out" could have been designed) the dead on arrival vinyl stiff included strip standards like "My Heart Belongs to Daddy" and "A Pretty Girl is Like A Melody" among others. A rare record indeed, you can buy it for less than ten dollars on Ebay. Of course, like all good strippers, Libby had a nickname or two. Like The Florida Hurricane and The Park Avenue Playgirl.
Jim Linderman, author of TIMES SQUARE SMUT now available from Blurb.com in ebook and paperback.
