Sable Starr

Sabel Hay Shields (August 15, 1957 – April 18, 2009), better known as Sable Starr, was an American child groupie, often described as the "queen of the groupie scene" in Los Angeles during the early 1970s. She claimed during an interview published in the June 1973 edition of Star magazine that she had met Rod Stewart, Led Zeppelin, Alice Cooper, David Bowie, Mick Jagger, Elton John, and Marc Bolan.

Life as a groupie Starr first attended concerts around Los Angeles in late 1968 at the age of 11, together with older friends who had dropped out of school. She claimed to have lost her virginity when she was 12 to Spirit guitarist Randy California after a gig at Topanga, California. Starr also claimed to have had relationships with David Bowie, Robert Plant, Jimmy Page, and Johnny Thunders.

Starr became one of the first "baby groupies" who in the early 1970s frequented the Rainbow Bar and Grill, the Whisky a Go Go, and Rodney Bingenheimer's English Disco; these were trendy nightclubs on West Hollywood's Sunset Strip. The girls were named as such because of their young age. She got started after a friend invited her to the Whisky a Go Go at the age of 14. Starr later described herself at that period as having been "nuts to begin with. I always liked getting into trouble". Her closest friends in Los Angeles were fellow groupies Shray Mecham and "Queenie". She went to live with him in New York City. Their relationship did not last, mainly due to his violent jealousy and drug addiction. He had wanted to marry her after she became pregnant with their child, but she refused and instead had an abortion. Tired of the physical abuse Thunders often inflicted upon her, and unable to adjust to life in New York, Starr moved back to Los Angeles. She claimed that "he [Thunders] tried to destroy my personality. After I was with him, I just wasn't Sable Starr anymore. He really destroyed the Sable Starr thing". Starr made frequent visits to New York, where she had an affair with Richard Hell and participated in the local burgeoning punk rock scene. By the early 1980s, she was no longer part of the groupie milieu.

Later years and death She became a table game dealer at Carson Valley Inn in Minden until shortly before her death.

Starr died at her home in Nevada on April 18, 2009, of brain cancer at the age of 51.