These Rare Photographs Shed A New Light On Marilyn Monroe’s Life

Marilyn's early life was a very far cry from the glitz and glamor of Hollywood, marked out as it was by poverty and abuse. And while her beauty and comedic talents helped her to break away from her difficult past, fame would turn out to come at its own price. Here she is being helped into a swimsuit for Independence Day.

Apparently, Marilyn struggled under the spotlight and saw her real self and her on-screen persona as two totally different people. There’s a well-known anecdote about her strolling with a pal through New York, hiding from paparazzi with a scarf over her head. Turning to her friend, Marilyn supposedly said, “Do you want me to be her? Watch.” Then she undid her jacket, removed the shawl, and went into the iconic Marilyn Monroe strut. After that, it’s said she was accosted by fans within seconds.

And while Marilyn was undeniably beautiful, she was also a talented actress. The ditzy blonde whom she portrayed in many movies was apparently not at all reflective of her true personality, either. You see, Marilyn not only loved to read, but she also reportedly owned hundreds of books. According to fellow actress Shelley Winters, the sex symbol was attracted to smart men, too.

Marilyn’s third husband, Arthur Miller, was certainly an intellectual. In fact, the media mocked the couple when they married in 1956, with Variety running the wry headline “Egghead Weds Hourglass.” And many found it hard to believe that the blonde bombshell and the writer could possibly make a good match. Unfortunately, they were proved more or less right.

Marilyn split from Miller in 1961 at around the time that her movie The Misfits turned out to be a commercial flop. And she received some negative reviews for her performance in the flick, too. The New York Times, for instance, called the actress “blank and unfathomable” in her role as divorcée Roslyn Tabor.

That said, some of Marilyn’s bad press may have been down to anxiety rather than lack of talent. “I liked Marilyn, but she was God-awful to work with,” her one-time co-star Richard Widmark told The Daily Telegraph in 2002. “Impossible, really. She would hide in her dressing room and refuse to come out.”

And Marilyn’s deeper personal issues couldn’t be hidden from her co-stars, either. “When she finally would show up, she was a nervous wreck,” Widmark continued. “It was all a result of fear. She was insecure about so many things and was obviously self-destructive. She was a wounded bird from the beginning.”

In fact, Marilyn’s mental health apparently reached such a low around the time of her divorce from Miller that she was treated in a psychiatric ward. It’s also claimed that the actress’ ex-husband Joe DiMaggio — to whom she had been married before Miller —was a big support for her during this period. That said, her relationship with DiMaggio has been the subject of several controversial rumors over the years.

Marilyn and DiMaggio’s short-lived marriage was apparently both passionate and tumultuous. Reportedly, the baseball star had certain hang-ups about his wife’s public persona — so much so that the relationship began to turn sour. Legend has it that DiMaggio wanted Marilyn to be a housewife rather than an actress. But Marilyn was a sex symbol, and being flirtatious was part of her job.

For instance, there’s a dark tale behind the iconic picture of Marilyn in a billowing white dress. That famous snap, as you may know, comes from a scene in Billy Wilder’s movie The Seven Year Itch. And, apparently, on the day that the sequence was shot, DiMaggio came to watch. But according to some reports, he didn’t like what he saw — and some sources say that he became agitated as a result.

In the 2014 book Joe and Marilyn: Legends in Love, C. David Heymann discussed the violence that Marilyn may have experienced at the hands of her husband. “When [Marilyn] didn’t respond the way [DiMaggio] wanted her to, he became physical,” Heymann claimed. “On one occasion, he ripped an earring from her lobe and scratched her face.”

Then, when Marilyn filed for divorce from DiMaggio, it was reportedly on the grounds of “mental cruelty.” Yet it’s said that the sporting legend remained preoccupied with his ex even after their split. And despite all that had supposedly occurred throughout the course of their tumultuous relationship, the actress ended up more or less going back to him.

But why would Marilyn have returned to a man who is said to have treated her badly? Well, many biographers have pointed out that, sadly, much of Marilyn’s short life featured abuse in some form or another. Even back when she was the beautiful but ordinary Norma Jeane Baker, she had experienced awful things in her early childhood.

Marilyn entered the world in 1926 in Los Angeles, California. Her mother was Gladys Pearl Baker, who had come from an impoverished family; her father wasn’t in the picture. It’s said that Marilyn was eight years old before she even saw a photograph of her dad, who is believed to be a man named Charles Stanley Gifford.

And Gladys also suffered from mental health issues that included schizophrenia, meaning she couldn’t look after her child alone. So, when Marilyn was just a couple of weeks old, the newborn’s mom dropped her off with foster parents Ida and Wayne Bolender.

Marilyn was brought up for the most part by the Bolenders, who were evangelical Christians. And Marilyn apparently knew from a young age that she wanted to be in showbiz. “When I was five, I think, that’s when I started wanting to be an actress. I loved to play,” Marilyn told Life magazine in 1962. “I didn’t like the world around me because it was kind of grim, but I loved to play house.”

But although the Bolenders provided care for Marilyn and put a roof over her head, her childhood was nonetheless difficult. The family was utterly devoted to their religion, for one thing, and they seemed to expect their ward to be as well. Marilyn once claimed that she wasn’t able to sing or dance in the Bolenders’ presence.

Then, in 1933, Gladys apparently came to take her daughter back — even though the Bolenders had planned to officially adopt her. After that, Marilyn and her mother moved into a Hollywood home that they shared with another family called the Atkinsons. But as it turned out, Gladys wasn’t well enough to look after her child. And the following year, she suffered a breakdown that led to hospitalization.

And as Marilyn’s childhood went on, she reportedly felt more and more unwanted. “Some of my foster families used to send me to the movies to get me out of the house, and there I’d sit all day and way into the night,” she revealed to Life in 1962. “Up in front there with the screen so big — a little kid all alone.”

Then, at around the age of nine, Marilyn was placed into an orphanage — a place she would later speak harshly about in interviews. For one thing, the star claimed, she had had to wash hundreds of dishes, knives, and forks every day while being paid almost nothing for her work. Other sources have disputed these allegations, however.

But regardless of whether Marilyn was actually exploited at the orphanage, she certainly didn’t enjoy living there. And, finally, a friend of her mother’s named Grace McKee Goddard removed her from the institution and took her in. Unfortunately, though, Marilyn may have also suffered sexual abuse at this new home — allegedly at the hands of Grace’s husband, Doc.

And while Marilyn tried finding alternative places to live, she eventually ended up back at the Goddard home. Then in 1942, the Goddards had to move state along with Doc’s company. Marilyn couldn’t go with the couple, however, leaving her confronted with the prospect of being sent back to the orphanage.

Yet there was actually an answer to this problem: Marilyn could get married. And a suitor duly came along in the form of a 21-year-old neighbor of the Goddards’ named James “Jim” Dougherty. The pair had already gone out on several dates, and Dougherty seemingly had no objections to marrying a beautiful girl like Marilyn.

So, three weeks after Marilyn’s 16th birthday, she and Jim married. And her gown for the occasion — a gift from one of her foster parents — was fairly simple. Made of white lace and with lengthy sleeves, it was a far cry from the bold fashion statements that Marilyn would later make at her next two weddings.

At this first ceremony, Marilyn is said to have wept. Was it because she was happy, or was it because she had realized that she didn’t want to walk down the aisle after all? Dougherty insisted that the marriage had been a harmonious one — even after they'd split. But some of Marilyn’s letters and notes, which were published in 2010, seemingly reveal her true thoughts on the relationship.

Historians who have analyzed these documents think that Marilyn may have first written about Dougherty at the age of 17. “My relationship with him was basically insecure from the first night I spent alone with him,” she penned to herself. And other asides she made on the union weren’t particularly flattering, either.

In fact, Marilyn’s writing about her first husband sheds light on some of her most personal musings. She was attracted to Dougherty, she said, because he was “one of the few young men [she] had no sexual repulsion for.” Marilyn went on, “It gave me a false sense of security to feel that he was endowed with more [overwhelming] qualities which I did not possess.”

Of her marriage to Dougherty, Marilyn wrote, “On paper, it all begins to sound terribly logical.” That said, the same message sees her describe herself as “a young, rather shy girl” and make note of her “desire to belong and [develop].” It seems from these letters as though the future star was prone to self-introspection. “I had always felt a need to live up to that expectation of my elders,” she wrote.

But Marilyn’s first marriage isn’t the only turning point in her life to be documented in these letters. She also made extensive notes about her stay in the psychiatric hospital following her divorce from Miller, and these in turn make for sobering reading. “I felt I was in some kind of prison for a crime I hadn’t committed. The inhumanity there I found archaic,” she wrote.

And in a letter to her therapist Dr. Greenson — a man who some biographers think was far too attached to Marilyn to be useful to her mental health — Marilyn described some of her specific experiences at the hospital. “I said to [the doctors], ‘If you are going to treat me like a nut, I’ll act like a nut,’” she wrote.

Some of the notes that Marilyn sent also mentioned how bad her mental health had become. “I wish I knew why I am so anguished,” she wrote to her friend Paula Strasberg in an undated letter. “I think maybe I’m crazy like all the other members of my family were. When I was sick, I was sure I was.”

And it may have been these demons that eventually contributed to Marilyn’s death in August 1962. While rumors and conspiracy theories have circulated about what — or who — killed the actress, Los Angeles County coroners ruled that she committed suicide. There were a lot of drugs in her system, and they seemed to have all been taken in one go.

When three psychiatrists were assigned to investigate Marilyn’s mental state at the time of her death, their findings spoke of the actress having gone through extreme distress. “Miss Marilyn had suffered from psychiatric disturbance for a long time,” read the report. “She experienced severe fears and frequent depressions. Mood changes were abrupt and unpredictable.”

Inevitably, the reactions of Marilyn’s lovers were scrutinized following her death. It was noted, for instance, that DiMaggio planned the funeral with Marilyn’s business manager and invited only a handful of people to the event; those who turned up unsolicited were kept away by police. And the baseball star would send roses to Marilyn’s grave thrice weekly for some 20 years.

Miller, meanwhile, didn’t go to the funeral, which led some Marilyn fans to cast him as a cold-hearted ex who never truly cared for the actress. But in 2018 an unpublished essay written by Miller was released. And in it, he gave his real reason for not attending that day. “I decided to stay home and let the public mourners finish the mockery… Most of them there destroyed her,” he wrote.

As for Dougherty, when he spoke of his ex-wife’s passing to the Associated Press in 2002, he too seemed to place some of the blame on Marilyn’s celebrity. “I had almost been expecting it,” said Dougherty, who had gone on to become a police detective. “Fame was injurious to her. She was too gentle to be an actress.”

Dougherty died in 2005 of leukemia-related complications at the age of 84. And while he had fielded questions about Marilyn for his whole life, the words he spoke to United Press International in 1990 are truly poignant. “I never knew Marilyn Monroe, and I don’t claim to have any insights to her to this day,” he said. “I knew and loved Norma Jeane.”

And while very few ever truly knew Norma Jeane, Marilyn Monroe was adored and loved by millions. Yet in the end, nobody could save her. In one of the letters that the star wrote while she was married to Miller, she admitted, “I have always been deeply terrified to really be someone’s wife, since I know from life one cannot love another, ever, really.”

Plenty of people still love Marilyn, of course, and that’s clear from the legions of fans she has today. But back at the time of her passing, not everyone was so complimentary about the actress. And one obit, in particular, was surprisingly scathing about Marilyn, her life, and her work.

Marilyn died on August 4, 1962. She was found in her Los Angeles home by her housekeeper, and the screen star was later ruled to have died by suicide. Understandably, her sudden and unexpected passing at the age of just 36 sent shockwaves throughout the world. And the salacious details surrounding her demise only fueled the media storm that followed.

Four days after Marilyn’s death, she was interred at Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery’s Corridor of Memories. And while the funeral was private, hundreds of fans packed the surrounding streets to say goodbye to the star. But the press wasn’t done with Marilyn. Through their obituaries, they had one last opportunity to tell the world how they really felt about her.

Many well-respected publications ran obituaries for Marilyn — but a number of them weren’t the kind that served as glowing reports of her achievements. Some — such as the piece that ran in Time magazine — chose to focus on the negatives. More specifically, the publication commented on the star’s perceived lack of professionalism. “She was always late for everything,” the obituary read. “Her tardiness was measured in weeks instead of hours.” But Time magazine’s strong opinions didn’t end there.

For instance, despite Marilyn’s obvious success in the entertainment industry, the obituary condemned her for offering “a photographer exclusive rights to nearly nude shots of her.” Then, just to reiterate the point, it said, “Last week, she negotiated still another sale of a nude photograph to a picture magazine.” And Time was far from the only news outlet to criticize the late star.

The New York Times chose, for instance, to focus on Marilyn’s personal possessions — or lack thereof. The obituary in the newspaper of record pointed out that her bedroom “was neat but sparsely furnished.” And just to labor the point, the article added, “Her one-story stucco house… was far different from the lavish Beverly Hills Hotel suites more typical of her.” But the American media weren’t the only ones to attack Marilyn in their tributes.

The British newspaper The Guardian took several swings at the late Hollywood star. In its obituary, the paper described Marilyn as a “pretty woman whose beauty crumbled overnight.” Marilyn was also apparently “charming, shrewd, and pathetic,” as well as someone who, “in the end, sought ultimate oblivion.” But perhaps the most damning critique of the actress came from her hometown paper.

The Los Angeles Times — or the LA Times, for short — had seemingly taken a dislike to Marilyn, if its obituary is anything to go by. Whether this was because of the culture of the time, Marilyn’s part in a changing of attitudes, or something completely different, the paper's obit was brutal towards her. And describing the coroner as likely giving a “'presumptive opinion' that death was due to an overdose of some drug” was just the start of it.

From such cold beginnings, the obituary went on to seemingly decry the physical state of Marilyn’s dead body. It read, “She was unkempt and in need of a manicure and pedicure.” This supposed nail-care situation, the publication said the authorities added, indicated “listlessness and a lack of interest in maintaining her usually glamorous appearance.” The obituary also described Marilyn as “a troubled beauty who failed to find happiness as Hollywood’s brightest star.”

And as was the case with many other reports, the paper made note of the fact that the star had been nude when she died. The piece added that Marilyn had passed away while “lying face down on her bed and clutching a telephone receiver in her hand when a psychiatrist broke into her room at 3:30 a.m.”

And in an echo of The New York Times’ obituary, the LA Times later described some of the late star’s possessions in considerable detail — specifically the linen on her bed. The unflattering tribute revealed that Marilyn had been lying “under a sheet and champagne-colored blanket” that had been “tucked up around her shoulders.” Its story of the discovery of Marilyn's body is not exactly warm, either.

The piece went on to very matter-of-factly describe the moment when Marilyn’s doctor, Dr. Ralph Greenson, and her housekeeper, Eunice Murray, discovered her body. It stated, “Dr. Greenson took the receiver from her hand and told Mrs. Murray, ‘She appears to be dead.’” And as if all that wasn’t insulting enough, the news outlet also gave a scathing critique of the actress’ working life.

The paper cited Marilyn’s career as being “on the skids after two straight movie flops in Let’s Make Love and The Misfits — her last two movies.” This, it posited, had been the potential cause of the star's possible depression. The obituary also took the time to point out that the detective on the scene said that the drugs that had been responsible for her death had come from “12 to 15 medicine bottles on Miss Marilyn’s bedside stand.” Only “some,” it seems, had prescription labels.

The LA Times reported that Marilyn’s 50-pill Nembutal prescription had been “issued only two or three days” before her death. Given that the bottle was now empty, then, the paper seemingly implied that the star had ingested far more than the recommended daily dose. And from there, the piece went on to describe in detail the final time that Marilyn's body left her house.

“Miss Marilyn’s body was wrapped in a pale blue blanket,” the obituary read, “and strapped to a stretcher as it was removed from the home.” The article then recounted the authorities’ next steps, saying, “Miss Marilyn’s body was loaded into the back of a station wagon and transported to the Westwood Village Mortuary.” But the grim, unfeeling coverage didn’t end there.

The obituary even went on to describe what happened to Marilyn’s body in rather more detail than you would expect. “The body was later transferred to the county morgue, where the nation’s number one glamour girl became Coroner’s Case number 81128, and the body was placed in Crypt 33,” the piece read. And when the paper sought out comments from Marilyn's former husbands, they didn't exactly fall over themselves with praise.

“In Woodbury, Conn., [Arthur] Miller replied, 'I don’t, really’ when asked if he had any comment,” the LA Times reported. And while Joe DiMaggio — Marilyn’s second husband — “flew [in] from San Francisco as soon as he heard,” he had nothing to say to reporters. “His face was lined and he appeared deeply saddened,” the paper described. The reporters didn’t get much out of Marilyn’s first husband, either.

“Her first husband was Jim Dougherty, now a Los Angeles policeman,” the LA Times reported. “His only comment was, 'I’m sorry.’” Yet some of Marilyn’s friends refuted the idea that she’d deliberately ended her life. “This must have been an accident,” Pat Newcomb, the star’s press agent, told the LA Times. “Marilyn was in perfect physical condition and was feeling great. We had made plans for today.”

Marilyn’s colleagues raced to defend the star, too. Joshua Logan, director of Bus Stop, described the star as “one of the most unappreciated people in the world.” And even Laurence Olivier – with whom the late star had apparently clashed during the making of The Prince and The Showgirl – was angry on her behalf. He reportedly thought her “the complete victim of ballyhoo and sensation.”

The LA Times did manage to muster some pathos for its last look at Marilyn's death. “Miss Newcomb took the housekeeper home and carried with her Miss Monroe’s small white dog Moff,” it stated. “All that was left behind for the eye of the curious were the dog’s two stuffed toys, a tiger and lamb, lying in the rear yard.” It was a very different picture than how she'd come into the world.