Tragedy Stalked Marilyn Monroe All Her Life

By Joseph Finnigan (August 7, 1962, Toronto Daily Star)

Marilyn Monroe's life began in the downbeat squalor of cheap Los Angeles foster homes and ended just as tragically in one of its most glamorous suburbs.

Looking at Marilyn's life, one sees the classic rags-to-riches story, the only difference being that the glamorous actress didn't "live happily ever after".

Marilyn's death Sunday n a Mexican-style cottage surrounded by all the opulence of a big movie star, including the ever-present swimming pool, was a tale of the unfortunate life of a girl who was said to have everything Hollywood's film moguls wanted.

But to Marilyn, it all added up to loneliness, broken marriages, sadness, severe criticism of here conduct and finally a bottle of sleeping pills which claimed her life.

A glimpse of Marilyn's childhood and adolescent years gives not the slightest hint that she would become one of filmland's most glamorous stars - the greatest movie sex symbol since Jean Harlow, herself the victim of a tragic and early death in 1937.

Even Marilyn's birth on June 1, 1926 in Los Angeles was tinged with that element of being unwanted which plagued her life. She was an illegitimate child.

She was known as Norma Jeane Mortenson.

Marilyn never saw her father who was killed in an automobile accident. And she was hardly acquainted with her mother who has been confined to a mental home for many years.

Speaking about her mother, Marilyn once said, "we never had any kind of relationship. I didn't see her very often. To me she was just the woman with the red hair."

Marilyn was in a succession of foster homes starting from the time she was 12 days old. By the time she was 16 she had been in 12 foster homes.

Occasionally she would live with her mother. But after the mother was sent to a mental institution when Marilyn was eight, the little girl became almost totally dependent on foster homes and an orphanage for survival.

Marilyn's foster homes ranged economically from poor to moderate income families, mostly the former. The moral climate went from religious fanaticism to imorality.

In one home Marilyn was pounded with religious precepts that dictated damnation for her slightest transgression. At another, the little girl was given whiskey bottles to play with instead of dolls. The tawdry aspect of her formative years is most graphically illustrated by an experience Marilyn under went as a six-year-old. She was raped by an older man she later recalled was "a friend of the family" with whom she lived.

During her residence in an orphanage, Marilyn earned five cents a month washing dishes. One penny went into a church collection plate each Sunday. The remaining cent allowed little Marilyn childish luxury - a pretty ribbon for her hair.

Marilyn who was to have Hollywood's love - an emotion often predicated on box office appeal and dollar value - rarely received affection as a child.

It was not until she was 11 years old that Marilyn was befriended by someone who cared. A social worker found a home for Marilyn with an elderly spinster, Ana Lower.

Years later, when she seemingly had the world at her feet, Marilyn recalled that early relationship with a fondness she rarely expressed for others.

"She changed my whole life" said Marilyn of "Aunt Ana". "She was the first person in the world I ever really loved, and she loved me. She was a wonderful human being. I once wrote a poem about her and I showed it to somebody and they cried when I read it to them. It was called "I love her." It was written about how I felt when she did died."

Marilyn who married and divorced three times, was first wed when she was 16 years old. Her husband James Daugherty, then an aircraft worker and now a Los Angeles policeman, was five years her senior.

The marriage urged upon Marilyn by a foster mother who wanted the teenager to "settle down" lasted four years. But the couple lived together only part of that time.

Marriages to former baseball player Joe Dimaggio and playright Arthur Miller, after she reached stardom also ended in divorce.

A desire for an acting career was evidenced in childhood. Even the simple expression of such a childhood desire once brought Marilyn a reprimand from her religiously zealous guardians who didn't believe in acting.

While she was in the orphanage, Marilyn was taken with some other children to RKO studios for a Christmas party. The youngsters saw a movie and were given a gift of imitation pearls.

The gesture was one of her greatest childhood thrills, she once said.

Marilyn has an attractive figure (37-23-37). While working in an aircraft factory years ago, her picture in a company magazine led to modelling jobs.

The shapely model's work came to the attention of filmmakers. But her movie career consisted mostly of minor roles until it was revealed that she once posed in the nude for a calendar portrait.

Posing for the calendar portrait brought Marilyn fame she had never known before. Her box office appeal increased tremendously. Thousands of the calendars were distributed throughout the world.

Soon producers were seeking the sensational new star for multi-million dollar productions.

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