Marilyn Monroe

One of my favorite Hollywood starlets would have to be Marilyn Monroe. She had beauty and talent and was well known for her affair with "Mr. President".

She was born Norma Jeane Mortenson on June 1, 1926 in Los Angeles, California. Norma Jeane spent most of her childhood in foster homes and orphanages until 1937, when she moved in with family friend Grace McKee Goddard. Unfortunately, when Grace's husband was transferred to the East Coast in 1942, the couple couldn't afford to take 16-year-old Norma Jeane with them. Norma Jeane had two options: return to the orphanage or get married. June 19, 1942 she wed her 21-year-old neighbor Jimmy Dougherty. By all accounts Norma Jeane loved Jimmy, and they were happy together until he joined the Merchant Marines and was sent to the South Pacific in 1944. After Jimmy left, Norma Jeane took a job on the assembly line at the Radio Plane Munitions factory in Burbank, California. Several months later, photographer David Conover saw her while taking pictures of women contributing to the war effort for Yank magazine. He couldn't believe his luck. She was a "photographer's dream." Conover used her for the shoot and then began sending modeling jobs her way. This is basically where her career started. She divorced Jimmy in June of 1946, and signed her first studio contract with Twentieth Century Fox on August 26, 1946. She earned $125 a week. Soon after, Norma Jeane dyed her hair blonde and changed her name to Marilyn Monroe, which was her grandmother's last name. The rest, as the saying goes, is history.

The following movies Marilyn stared in:

1962 Something's Got to Give(never completed)

1961 The Misfits

1960 Let's Make Love

1959 Some Like It Hot

1957 The Prince and the Showgirl

1956 Bus Stop

1955 The Seven Year Itch

1954 River of No Return

1954 There's No Business Like Show Business

1953 How to Marry a Millionaire

1953 Gentlemen Prefer Blondes

1953 Niagara

1952 Don't Bother to Knock

1952 We're Not Married!

1952 Clash by Night

1952 Monkey Business

1952 O. Henry's Full House

1951 As Young as You Feel

1951 Hometown Story

1951 Let's Make It Legal

1951 Love Nest

1950 All About Eve

1950 The Asphalt Jungle

1950 Love Happy

1950 The Fireball

1950 Right Cross

1950 A Ticket to Tomahawk

1949 Ladies of the Chorus

1948 Dangerous Years

1948 Scudda Hoo! Scudda Hay!

1947 The Shocking Miss Pilgrim

Her fame grew over the years, but a tragic event struck during a filming of one of her movies. Before the shooting of Something's Got to Give resumed, she was found dead in her Los Angeles home on the morning of August 5, 1962. She remains one of the 20th century's legendary public figures and archetypal Hollywood movie stars.