“I Made History And I Deserve To Have It Printed” Trans Model Tracey Norman Talks About Passing In The Fashion Industry

The biggest moment in Norman’s career came when she was asked to pose for a box of Clairol hair color.

“The company was looking for fresh faces to adorn the boxes of its new hair-dye line for women of color, Born Beautiful, and brought her in for a test. Under the bright lights, her hair had reddish undertones. They snapped photos and labeled her hue Dark Auburn, Box 512, and concocted a hair color to match. She had never dyed her hair, but she had done a home perm to relax her curls, and the interaction of the chemicals and the sun had naturally lightened it to a shade women would pay money to re-create. She signed a contract for two years’ use, with the agreement that she’d get paid more if they renewed, which they did, twice. “So they used my box for six years, because they said it was the hottest-selling box,” says Norman. “This is what I was told.” Thousands of Clairol customers were emulating the look, and affirming the beauty, of a transgender woman.”

But after all her success, Norman’s secret finally came out around 1980 when she was posing for a holiday issue of Essence. Norman was dressed as Cleopatra, being sprinkled with gold flakes by an assistant who stood on a ladder.

“The magazine’s then-editor-in-chief, Susan Taylor, had seemed very excited. “She even mentioned, ‘The pictures are so beautiful, Tracey, this could be a cover,’” says Norman. They were on the third roll of film when Norman noticed someone else come onto the set. It was one of [hairdresser] Andre Douglas’s assistants, the one who was always asking her questions.

The same hair people had worked on nearly all of Norman’s Essence shoots, and on every shoot this assistant would probe. Didn’t he recognize her from New Jersey? Did she know a model named Tommy Garrett who signed with Ford? “I’d say, ‘I haven’t met that person,’” says Norman. “Really, he was my best friend.” Norman thought she’d done enough to throw him off the trail of her true identity. Still, when he walked in that day, she lost her concentration. “For some reason it felt negative,” she says. “The whole situation felt negative to me.”

According to Norman, the hairdresser spoke with Taylor and then Taylor stopped the shoot, saying:

“‘I think we have enough.’” The editor untied the Egyptian cloth Norman was wearing. She was kind about it. “She was asking me was I all right; she was standing behind me, looking at me in the mirror, rubbing my shoulder, complimenting me on how soft I was,” says Norman. “That’s when I knew. The way that she looked at me through the mirror, it was different. She was looking for the person that this hairdresser told them that I was.”

Norman said her work stopped that day. Norman was never paid for that Essence job and when she asked for a copy of the pictures, Taylor said none of them were good and had been destroyed.

From there she moved to Paris where she worked consistently.

Afterward she returned home, worked a few jobs before gossip about her identity started creeping up again.

Norman eventually participated heavily in the ball culture in the “Africa House” eventually becoming a “mother.”

“At first, she’d just attend the balls and watch. But when she heard about a ball offering a grand prize of $1,000 — she was, as always, broke — she called up a designer friend and borrowed a dress to compete. Norman didn’t win that ball — she wasn’t carrying a purse, a technicality, and she still thinks she was robbed — but she was happy to be in a place where she could finally be exactly who she is. She became a member of the House of Africa, one of the teams that competes against other houses in the balls, and eventually “the mother.” She prided herself on using her modeling skills to get her “children” to walk like professionals, rather than in the flamboyant style that was in vogue before she joined. Her own personal trademark move was to walk out in just jeans and a T-shirt. When she reached the judges, she would pull out a white handkerchief from her back pocket. “And then she’d wipe it across her face and show the handkerchief to the judges [to show that she had no makeup on] and the place would go crazy,” says Garrett.

In the ballroom world, excellence and longevity are rewarded with titles like “legend” and “icon.” Norman became both, and was inducted into the ballroom hall of fame in 2001. More important, she was embraced by a community of women who finally understood her struggles. “Girlfriends to relate to, to share with,” she says. “We didn’t compete against each other. There would be no men we’d compete for. It was just true love, friendship, and respect for each other. I’ve never had that with another female, so I cherish that a lot.”

Still, Norman left an indelible mark in the game, opening the doors for countless others.

“Laverne Cox has appeared on the cover of Essence twice. She got emotional during the first shoot in 2014, she says, thinking of Norman. “I was like, ‘Oh my god, I’m doing a cover shoot for Essence and this is the magazine that 40 years ago fired a trans woman when they found out she was trans.’” She chokes up. “It just means a lot to me that history can be rewritten.”

Norman agrees.

“I was reminded that I made history and I deserve to have it printed,” she says. “And I’m still here.” 

You can read the full interview over at New York Magazine.