Legendary actress and singer Vanessa Williams recalled the painful aftermath of winning Miss America on the latest episode of podcast Great Company with Jamie Laing.
Williams, 62, won the title in 1983, becoming the first Black woman to do so, but resigned from the prize the following year after adult publication Penthouse published nude photos of Williams without her consent.
Following her Miss America win, the entertainer was victim to racist death threats, which were especially relentless in the South.
Around the 22-minute mark of the video below, Williams said her parents kept a box of death threats mailed to their home for the FBI to track.
"Even receiving death threats in the mail when I would do appearances, they would be like, 'Be careful when you go to Chicago,'" Williams recalled. "And I had no idea how crazy it was because they didn't want me to freak out. But I had death threats as soon as I as I won. At 20 years old."
Williams added that she would have been more "terrified" if she had known the extent of the letters. She also recalled that during a hometown parade, she saw "sharpshooters" on surrounding buildings intended to protect her.
"I live in a tiny town and I was like, 'Wow, that's unusual,'" Williams said.
She described that during another appearance in Alabama, she was meant to sit on the back of a convertible with the top down.
"Before we started, they said, 'You know what? We're going to put the roof up.' Again I thought, 'OK, that's a little unusual,'" Williams said.
Elsewhere, Williams said harassers began calling her parents, and one man was apprehended by the police after threatening to kill her mother, Helen Williams, who died in December 2024.
Williams has discussed the Miss America scandal before, telling People in 2024 that harassers thought, "You’re Black, so you’re not representing America."
"That was startling and terrifying. Thank God I had my parents supporting me," Williams continued.
Los Angeles rap duo PartyOf2 homaged Williams and her Miss America honor on 2025 song "VANESSA WILLIAMS," which they discussed in a BET interview.
"I think the idea that she was the first Black Miss America and her position was robbed feels very familiar to a lot of us, especially where we are right now in our country. I think there are a lot of times where we feel robbed of the place that we were promised," PartyOf2 member Swim told BET.