A TRIBUTE TO MARILYN MONROE
1926 - 1962

MARILYN SPEAKS

"I want to grow old without face-lifts...I want to have the courage to be loyal to the face I have made. Sometimes I think it would be easier to avoid old age, to die young, but then you'd never complete your life, would you? You'd never wholly know yourself."

"No-one ever told me I was pretty when I was a little girl. All little girls should be told they are pretty, even if they aren't."

Gladys Baker (nee Monroe) who was married at 15 and then deserted by her husband, suffered from bouts of mental illness, as did her own mother, and had an uncertain grip on life, spending time in and out of mental hospitals.   She worked as a film cutter in Hollywood, California, and, on June 1, 1926, in Los Angeles, California, gave birth to a baby daughter who she named Norma Jean (Jeane)...the “Norma” after Gladys’s movie idol Norma Talmadge and the “Jean” after another of her movie idols, Jean Harlow.

The birth certificate listed Norma Jean’s father’s name as Mortenson, but years later, during one of her good times, Gladys told Norma Jean that her real father was a man named C. Stanley Gifford, who had moved up north and had no interest in his illegitimate daughter or her mother.   Norma Jean was to spend her life believing that one day her father would look for her and claim her, but he never did, and, during her years as a child, when her mother was being treated in mental hospitals, Norma Jean was placed in a series of foster homes, with two years in an orphanage; from where she could see the Hollywood Hills with the Hollywood sign, and escape the loneliness and sadness of her life by fantasizing that one day she would become a famous movie star.

As a teenager herself, she married another teenager, James Dougherty, in order to escape being returned again to another orphanage, but it was a marriage of convenience for them both and a few years later Norma Jean began her modelling career and the marriage subsequently ended.

"I just want to be wonderful."

"I don't understand why people aren't a little more generous with each other."

For Norma Jean, a child of Hollywood, who knew all the angles and worked them to her advantage, moving from modelling into bit parts in the movies was no smooth transition.    Hollywood, in the 1940’s, was awash with beautiful, sexy young women trying to make it into the movies.    But Norma Jean’s incredible beauty and sexuality caught the attention of men and women wherever she went, two of whom were to make a huge impact in transforming her into a star: Lili St Cyr, the beautiful striptease star of that era who could hold an audience spellbound without removing one stitch of her clothing, and Johnny Hyde, the powerful Hollywood agent who, after meeting Norma Jean, devoted the rest of his short life to helping her break into stardom.    From Lili St Cyr, Norma Jean learned all the subtle makeup tricks to further enhance her beauty, and along with her famous, sensual, swivel hip walk - that no one has ever been able to mimic - the breathy child like voice, dyeing her brown hair platinum blond, and with Johnny Hyde’s determination, she became.....

MARILYN MONROE
MOVIE STAR
SCREEN GODDESS.

"There was my name up in lights.   I said 'God, somebody's made a mistake.  But there it was, in lights.   And I sat there and said, 'Remember, your're not a star'.   Yet there it was up in lights."

"...a sex symbol becomes a thing.   But if I'm going to be a symbol of something, I'd rather have it sex than some other things we've got symbols of."

Marilyn married three times, her last two husbands were American icons, baseball great, Joe DiMaggio, and literary talent, Arthur Miller, but she died alone, at the age of 36, on August 5, 1962 at her home in Hollywood, California.   The mysteries surrounding her death have made her a megastar, and an icon of the 20th century movie world.

"Fame is fickle and I know it.   It has its compensations, but it also has its drawbacks and I've experienced them both." "My illusions didn't have anything to do with being a fine actress.   I knew how third rate I was.    I could actually feel my lack of talent, as if it were cheap clothes I was wearing inside.  But, my God, how I wanted to learn, to change, to improve!" "If I play a stupid girl and ask a stupid question I've got to follow it through.   What am I supposed to do - look intelligent?" "Some people have been unkind.   If I say I want to grow as an actress, they look at my figure.   If I say I want to develop, to learn my craft, they laugh.   Somehow they don't expect me to be serious about my work." "With fame, you know, you can read about yourself, somebody else's ideas about you, but what's important is how you feel about yourself - for survival and living day to day with what comes up."

Index to Oceans Of Love Greetings

~~~	SPECIALS	~~~
A Mother's Love	A Father's Love	The Trail Of Tears
Somewhere In Time	You are here	The Man from Snowy River

The information contained on this page was obtained from various sites around the internet, and the novel “Norma Jean...A Hollywood Love Story” by Ted Jordan.

Some of these images are copyrighted by the Milton H. Greene Archives (Images ©1998 Archives Milton H. Greene LLC. All rights reserved (541) 997-4970)

MARILYN MONROE, MARILYN, and NORMA JEANE are trademarks of the Estate of Marilyn Monroe c/o CMG WorldWide.

Photos of Marilyn Monroe by Sam Shaw are copyrighted and belong to the Shaw Photo Collection

If anyone has not received credit for their work that appears on these pages please let me know and I will add it.