Jayne Mansfield: Doll Parts

Doll Parts: Jayne Mansfield is en route to New Orleans after an appearance in Biloxi, Mississippi when a dense insecticide fog of anti-mosquito spray drifts across the highway. Mansfield is set to appear on WDSU's Midday Show the following day, but at 2:25AM on June 29, 1967, Mansfield's '66 Buick Electra crashes into the tractor-trailer, shearing off the top of the Electra. The three adults in the front seat - Mansfield, her lawyer/companion, and their 20-year-old driver - die instantly. Mansfield's children sleep in the backseat and survive with minor injuries. The gruesome crash scene photos spawn one of Hollywood's darkest legends. At the time of Mansfield's death, rumors circulate that the star was decapitated in the car crash. The stories are fueled by photos of the star's blonde hair tangled in the car's windshield. Although Mansfield's mode of death is gruesome, she was not beheaded. Scalping is a closer description of Mansfield's fate - according to the police report, "the upper portion of this white female's head was severed.” Mansfield's death certificate notes a “crushed skull with avulsion (forcible separation or detachment) of cranium and brain.” Her skull was cracked or sliced open, and a sizeable piece of it was carried away. Kenneth Anger’s 1975 "Hollywood Babylon" contains the "controversial" photo of Mansfield's wrecked Electra which shows Mansfield’s dead dog lying beside the car as well as a clump of blonde hair. 

Orphans in the Moonlight

"I didn't feel like a married woman. The most important thing my marriage did for me was to end forever my status as orphan," Marilyn says in her autobiography, "My Story.” "Jim was a nice husband. He never hurt me or upset me - except on one subject. He wanted a baby." The thought of having a baby makes the hairs on Norma Jeane's arm stand on end. Can you blame a child bride for not wanting to bring a kid into this world? Daughtry - who she calls either Jimmie or Daddy - never truly ‘gets’ Norma Jeane. "She was just a housewife," remembers Jimmie/Daddy, "We used to go down to the beach and have luaus on Saturday nights." The couple's favorite song is Glen Miller's "Moonlight Serenade." They listen to it together on the beach in Avalon and dreamily hold each other in their arms. If you haven’t held someone in your arms on Catalina, what are you doing with your life?

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Oh, Catalina...

At 16, Norma Jeane has two options: Ship off to another orphanage, or marry the boy-next-door and set sail for Catalina Island. According to Norma Jeane's then-husband, James Daughtry, the island paradise is where Marilyn Monroe is born. Dougherty states, “I would marvel at how she’d ‘turn on’ when she was walking and knew men were looking at her. She’d do ‘the walk’ seen later in millions of her films, but back then, she was just learning to do it, and she was very, very good at it!”

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Castroburger of Catalina

I'm feeling a little under the weather since we got back from Catalina Island last night, but I'm feeling more inspired than ever! Can’t wait to share my next two zines with everyone... “Dead in Hollywood: Natalie Wood” and “Marilyn of Avalon.” Took so many pictures, did a lot of research, and had a fucking blast with the most amazing husband a guy could ask for! The first photo in this series is a photo of me getting my ticket for the Cyclone - a 90mph speedboat that took me to the other side of the island to Two Harbors so that I could get photos for my Natalie Wood zine. 

Jean Harlow (March 3, 1911 – June 7, 1937)

…Harlow, Jean. Picture of a beauty queen. Jean Harlow (March 3, 1911 – June 7, 1937) is famous for her roles in movies like “Hell’s Angel,” "Dinner at Eight,” and “Saratoga.” Harlow dies at the age of 26 during the filming of “Saratoga.” On May 29, 1937, Harlow is shooting a scene in which the character she is playing has a fever. Harlow is clearly sicker than her character, and when she leans against co-star Clark Gable between scenes, says, "I feel terrible. Get me back to my dressing room." Harlow starts feeling better on June 3rd and her co-workers totally expect her back on set June 7th. Gable, who visits her during her time off, later says that she was severely bloated and that he smelled urine on her breath when he kissed her—both signs of kidney failure. On June 6th, the day before she is due back on set, Harlow is taken to Good Samaritan Hospital in Los Angeles, where she slips into a coma. The next day at 11:37 am, Harlow dies in the hospital at the age of 26. In the doctor's press release, the cause of death is given as cerebral edema, a complication of kidney failure. Hospital records mention uremia - the condition of having “urea in the blood.” Urea is one of the primary components of urine. One of the MGM writers later says, "The day Baby died there wasn't one sound in the commissary for three hours.” Spencer Tracy writes in his diary, "Jean Harlow died today. Grand gal." MGM closes on the day of her funeral, June 9. She is buried at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale in the Great Mausoleum in a private room of multicolored marble. 

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Famous Last Words: "Is Everybody OK?"

As Robert F. Kennedy lays mortally wounded in the Ambassador Hotel’s kitchen area, busboy Juan Romero cradles Kennedy's head and places a rosary in his hand. Kennedy asks Romero: "Is everybody OK?" Romero responds, "Yes, everybody's OK." Kennedy then turns away and says, "Everything's going to be OK.” This moment is captured by Life magazine photog Bill Eppridge and Boris Yaro of the Los Angeles Times and becomes the iconic image of the presidential hopeful’s assassination. A witness states that a female in a polka-dot dress repeatedly exclaims, "We killed him! We killed him!” before running away - video footage of her testimony can be seen in the new Netflix series "Bobby Kennedy for President” - I highly recommend watching the 4-part series. Kennedy is shot three times. One bullet is fired at a range of about 1 inch (2.5 cm) and enters behind his right ear, dispersing fragments throughout his brain. The other two enter at the rear of his right armpit; one exits from his chest and the other lodges in the back of his neck. Despite extensive neurosurgery to remove the bullet and bone fragments from his brain, Kennedy is pronounced dead at 1:44AM on June 6, nearly 26 hours after the shooting. This past week, it is revealed that two of Kennedy’s children want a new investigation into his death. Robert Kennedy Jr. believes someone else - and not Sirhan Sirhan - shot his father. Robert Kennedy Jr. met with Sirhan in prison earlier this year. (Fun fact: Robert Kennedy Jr.'s wife is, “Curb Your Enthusiasm” actress, Cheryl Hines. Haines waited outside in the car for two hours while Kennedy spoke with his father’s assassin. #deadinhollywood #robertfkennedy #ambassadorhotel #midwilshire #losangeles #hollywood #truecrime #zines 

R.I.P. Robert Kennedy

On this primary night, let’s not forget that 50 years ago today on June 5, 1968, presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy is mortally wounded after winning California’s Democratic presidential primary. Kennedy addresses his supporters at 12:10AM in the Ambassador Hotel’s Embassy Room Ballroom in the Mid-Wilshire district of L.A. - at this time, the secret service only provides protection for incumbent presidents but not for presidential candidates. Kennedy ends his speech by stating: "My thanks to all of you; and now it’s on to Chicago, and let’s win there!” He is supposed to walk through the ballroom, but William Barry, Kennedy’s bodyguard and former FBI agent, stops him and says, “No, it’s been changed. We’re going this way.” He clears the way for Kennedy to go left through swinging doors to the kitchen corridor, but Kennedy is hemmed in by the crowd and follows maître d' Karl Uecker through a back exit. Uecker leads Kennedy through the kitchen area, holding his right wrist but releasing it as Kennedy shakes hands with well-wishers. Uecker and Kennedy start down a passageway narrowed by an ice machine against the right wall and a steam table to the left. Kennedy turns to his left and shakes hands with busboy Juan Romero—just as his assassin, Sirhan Sirhan, steps down from a low tray-stacker beside the ice machine, rushes past Uecker, and repeatedly fires a .22 caliber revolver...

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Poltergeist Turns 36!

Poltergeist was released 36 years ago today. Five months after its release Dominique Dunne, the teenage daughter in the film, is strangled to death by her ex-boyfriend. A few years later, Heather O’Rourke who plays the iconic role of Carol Anne dies at the age of 12 from “cardiac arrest caused by septic shock.” Some believe the movie to be cursed. ☠️ All that I know is the movie scared the shit out of me as a kid and it still does! On a side note, I always thought it was so great that the parents smoked pot and weren’t druggies or losers. They were just your normal parents. Check out Dead in Hollywood: Stalked (Issue #7) for the tragic story of Dominique Dunne (click on "Store" above).

Gentlemen, Blondes & Monroe

Two nights ago I watched “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes" for the first time. I can’t believe I had never seen it. Then I wake up the following morning and it’s Marilyn Monroe’s 92nd birthday! #kismet

Coming Soon...

In 1942, a 16-year-old Norma Jeane Baker avoids being shunted to yet another foster home by marrying her 21-year-old neighbor, James Dougherty - a merchant marine soon to be stationed on Catalina Island. Dougherty moves his young bride to an apartment overlooking Avalon Harbor. The future Miss Marilyn Monroe spends the next year and a half living as a housewife, 22 miles off the coast of California. To be continued...

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A Case of the Gays

In 1956, Natalie Wood goes to the Academy Awards with Tab Hunter, her co-star in "The Girl He Left behind” - Hunter will go on to leave all girls behind when he comes out in his 2005 autobiography, “Tab Hunter Confidential: The Making of a Movie Star.” Reports of Hunter’s alleged romances with Debbie Reynolds and Natalie Wood are strictly fodder for studio publicity departments. As Wood and Hunter embark on a well-publicized yet fictitious romance, promoting his apparent heterosexuality while promoting their films, insiders develop their own headline for the item: "Natalie Wood and Tab Wouldn't."

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