Tina Turner created a career on her terms, not defined by her trauma

NASHVILLE, Tenn. — In 1976, a young Tina Turner, bloodied and beaten by her husband and musical partner Ike Turner, fled in the dark across a Dallas freeway dodging trucks and cars with only pennies in her pocket.

That moment when she decided she’d had enough of the physical, sexual and emotional abuse was a turning point for the “Queen of Rock ‘n’ Roll,” who would go on to have a musical renaissance in the 1980s. After the Rock & Roll Hall of Famer and worldwide star died Wednesday at 83, tributes often remarked on her courage in the face of horrifying violence.