Early Life
Born as Norma Jeane Mortensen, Norma's childhood consisted of her jumping from one foster home to another. Her mother, Gladys Pearl Baker, tried to get custody of her but eventually could not when officials deemed her mentally unfit after she was diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic. After living with her strict foster parents for many years, they decided to move to California, leaving her behind. To avoid being put into another orphanage or foster home, she decided to get married at the age of 16 to a man named James Dougherty who later joined the U.S Merchant Marines. They would later divorce in 1946.
YANK magazine photo of Norma Jeane Dougherty, later Marilyn Monroe. June 1945. David Conover for YANK.
After a rough childhood and early failed marriage, Norma began working at the Radio Plane Company in California. She caught the eye of photographers and traveled to Hollywood where she would eventually sign a one-year contract with Twentieth Century Fox. From that moment on, Norma Jeane Mortensen became Marilyn Monroe, a soon to be movie star and sex-icon of the mid 20th century.
Feminist at Heart
In an era when women were often considered mere housewives, Marilyn Monroe was known for the “dumb blonde” roles of her early career. She soon became tired of the character and yearned to be seen in a different light. Monroe then proceeded to negotiate her contract terms, which led to multiple legal threats between her and her company. In the end, she left her company and moved to New York to create her own which was called Marilyn Monroe Productions, which made her one of the first women to be in charge of their own production company.
Still from the Gentlemen Prefer Blondes trailer, 1953. 20th Century Fox.
Before creating her own company, she often fought with male and female counterparts about wage differences. Her producers paid her less than others because they did not expect this ditzy blonde female to retaliate and fight for herself. Along with this, she spoke freely and openly about the sexual abuse she faced both in her childhood and her adult life and was not afraid of backlash that she would inevitably receive as a female in her industry. As a true feminist, she advocated for all women and this was shown when she called the owner of a Hollywood nightclub and told him that she would sit every night Ella Fitzergerald, who was previously denied work at this club only because she was African-American, performed. Not only did she fight for white women that were like her but she fought for all women because that was what equal rights meant to her.
Ella Fitzegerald, 1946. Library of Congress.
Behind the Scenes
With her acting career booming and the second world war coming to an end, men were now coming home from war and returning to their jobs that they had left. In 1954, she remarried to Baseball player Joe Dimaggio and was working on the movie "River of no return". However, during her years in the industry she openly talked about her struggle with mental illness and her mission to personify it into something that would not be so taboo to talk about. In an interview with Huffington Post she says 'I wanted to humanize mental illness and explore it in a way that allows people who are interested -- or thinking about family members or themselves -- to learn more in an accessible way.' She wanted to normalize it and she used her platform to do just that.
In the year of 1956, she had already divorced two times and remarried once more to Arthur Miller, a playwright. However, the couple did not work out in the end and divorced in 1961. A year later in 1962, Marilyn Monroe was found dead in her Los Angeles home with an empty bottle of pills lying next to her.
The front page of the New York Daily Mirror published on August 6, 1962. Source.
What She Taught The World
After a hectic childhood, many failed marriages, time in the showbiz industry, mentall illness, countless miscarriages, and a death that would stun the world for many years to come, she was still a feminist even before there was such a term. Marilyn Monroe was a stage name but it was now much more than that. Apart from an actress, she was a trailblazing feminist that would impact the lives of many young women till this day. Her actions spoke volumes and was understood by women around the world. She fought for equal pay and the rights to practice her own creativity when men in the industry would not allow it. She was Marilyn Monroe, the bombshell beauty of the 20th century and much more.