- Once sued Cassandra Peterson, claiming that her "Elvira" persona was modeled after what she created as Vampira.
- Is believed to be the first television "horror host".
- As a cast member, she attended the original premiere of Plan 9 from Outer Space (1957). She did not get a chance to actually sit down and see the film. She claimed that she did not actually see the entire film until 1980.
- Was involved with Orson Welles and claimed he was the only man she ever traveled to other cities to be with.
- During the making of Plan 9 from Outer Space (1957), she would put on her Vampira makeup and costume at home and then take a bus to the Quality Studios soundstage where her scenes were filmed.
- Was fired by Mae West from the cast of West's 1944 Broadway play "Catherine Was Great", because West feared that she was being upstaged.
- Following her death, she was interred at Hollywood Forever Cemetery in Los Angeles, California.
- In 1958, singer Bobby Bare recorded a rock 'n' roll song about her entitled "Vampira".
- Once worked with famous stripper Lili St. Cyr.
- She was played by Lisa Marie in Ed Wood (1994).
- In 1982, the horror punk band The Misfits recorded a song about her entitled "Vampira".
- Posthumously inducted into the Horror Host Hall of Fame in 2011, as her character Vampira.
- Kinescopes have been found from her first horror hostess gig showing Vampira emerging from the fog and letting out a loud scream.
- Was a close friend of Anthony Perkins in the 1950s and shared a similar iconoclastic sense of humor. They were linked romantically by Allied Artists' publicity mill, though Nurmi was married at the time to TV writer Dean Reisner.
- Was close friends with Hollywood artist and movie extra, Kenneth Kendall.
- She is portrayed by Sabra Jardine in the short film The House That Ed Built (2019).
- For a brief period in 1959, she was engaged to Carleton Carpenter.
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