In Chapter 7 of Stormy Weather, Jack Stoddard husband of Elizabeth Stoddard and father of three girls, Mayme, Jeanine, and Bea was charged with statutory rape of a 14 year old girl. He was held in the Wharton County Jail. On October 17, 1937, Jack Stoddard died in his jail cell with a copy of Black Mask Detective in his hands. The coroner told the Stoddard family that he died from a brain hemorrhage, which was brought on by a concussion and the sour gas. At the end of Chapter 7 through the beginning of Chapter 8, it talks about Elizabeth and the three girls moving back to where they had their own farm. After traveling all those miles, they arrived to a place of nothing but dust. This was the time of the Dust
