Norma Jeane Baker

Marilyn Monroe: The Beginning (Dead Blondes Flashback) by Karina Longworth

Listen to this episode on Apple Podcasts.

Today we begin the first of three episodes on the most iconic dead blonde of them all, Marilyn Monroe. We’ll start by revisiting our episode on Marilyn from our series on stars during World War II, in which we traced the former Norma Jeane from her unhappy, almost parentless childhood through her teenage marriage, her work in a wartime factory, her hand-to-mouth days as a model, her struggles to break into movies and, finally, the sex scandal that made her a star.

This episode originally debuted in February 2015. The original show notes for this episode can be found here

Marilyn in 1946.

Marilyn in 1946.

Tom Kelley's nude Marilyn photos, 1949

Tom Kelley's nude Marilyn photos, 1949