Whatever happened to … Norfolk’s Hula Hoop Lady?

NORFOLK

The Hula Hoop Lady of Granby Street still has it.

Pamela Brown starts hooping in the middle of her small living room, with little room to spare.

She's using her yellow "hydro" hoop.

"I can do this one inside. I can do this one outside," she said, easily keeping the hoop on her hips as she moves back and forth. "It's got water in it."

The Hula Hoop Lady has been out of the spotlight for a while. Brown, 56, settled a lawsuit for $65,000 against the Norfolk Police Department in August 2009. An officer used a stun gun and arrested Brown when he responded to a complaint about the volume of Brown's radio while she hula-hooped on a Granby Street median.

Brown lives in the same small one-bedroom apartment off Granby Street as she did then. She said she's still hula-hooping for passers-by on Granby, just not as often. She also moved a few hundred yards away from her preferred spot to make sure her radio doesn't disturb anyone.

Brown once wore an overgrown crew cut; now her hair has grown to chin length, streaked with gray and parted in the middle.

"I look antique now – not like a toddler, huh?" she said on Thursday, sitting in her living room.

On this day, Brown is wearing blue sweatpants, a green T-shirt and hiking boots.

She still has most of the money from her settlement with the police department. She keeps it in a special-needs trust while living off Social Security and disability payments.

But she's splurged a little. She bought a new mattress, recliner and table for her living room. She bought a new pair of glasses. And she took some French lessons.

"She uses it very judiciously," said Marylin Copeland, a retired brain-injury advocate who spends time with Brown.

Brown has permanent brain damage, suffered when her vehicle was hit by a tractor-trailer in 1977. She suffers from short-term memory loss and seizures.

Asked if she's had any other confrontations with police, the question stumped her.

"If I have, I can't remember," she said.

Copeland jumped in: She hasn't.

To this day, people recognize Brown as the Hula Hoop Lady.

" ‘Oh, I read about you in the paper. They should have never done that to you,’ " Copeland said. "That's the typical response."

The best thing to come from Brown's ordeal, Copeland said, is the creation of a crisis intervention team that trains Norfolk officers on how to deal with those who have behavioral or mental health problems.

"What happened to Pam was terrible, but what came of it was wonderful," Copeland said.

Brown's life is very much the same as it was six years ago. Keeping a routine is important for those with traumatic brain injuries, Copeland said.

She still goes to bed early, "after Jeopardy," and wakes up around 3 a.m.

She enjoys long walks. She shows off several pairs of worn sneakers, saying her feet are "faster than the HRT" buses.

And she's very much into staying in shape. She asks a reporter to feel her ab muscles.

"Feel this, feel this. Pinch, pinch," she said, clenching her abs. "This is from the hooping and the hiking."

Staying svelte is one of the reasons she hula-hoops.

"I want to be this," she said, using her hands to draw the figure of a shapely woman.

Follow Us