Marilyn Monroe Read Free

one of the bosses at Consolidated.
    ‘Gifford was a real likeable guy,’ remembered one friend; while another described him as ‘well-dressed, and always drove a pretty nice car’. He had a dark side, however, as witnessed by his first wife, Lilian, and detailed in divorce papers submitted by her shortly after they separated in 1923: Gifford ‘continuously pursued a course of abuse, threats and intimidation calculated to harass, annoy, hurt and worry the plaintiff’. This was just the tip of the iceberg. Lilian said she also experienced physical injury and accusations that she was being unfaithful to him, when actually she believed that he was undertaking affairs with women where he worked, as well as taking illegal drugs. Things had come to a head during June 1923, when Gifford verbally abused her before striking her so hard on the cheek that she was ‘knocked against the bed post’, sustaining severe bruising. The divorce papers also claim that a blood clot was formed under her cheek and urgent medical attention was required to remove it.
    Whether or not everything cited by Lilian was true will never be known, but certainly the marriage had been turbulent and bythe time the divorce was finalized and Gladys Baker arrived in his life, Gifford was enjoying his new-found freedom and had no plans to settle down. Unfortunately for Gladys, she believed she could persuade him to change his mind, and on 26 May 1925, walked out on Martin Edward Mortensen.
    During the autumn of 1925, Gladys became pregnant. It has been said that there were various men who could have been the father, including a twenty-eight-year-old colleague called Raymond Guthrie. Friends at the studio claimed that Gladys had dated blue-eyed, brown-haired Guthrie for several months that year and that he could very well be the father. Raised by his aunt and uncle since a baby, Guthrie had also recently divorced and was certainly in a position to date Gladys, though all records indicate that she never considered him to be her baby’s father.
    The official ruling is that the father was unknown, though evidence suggests it was Gifford, and this was most certainly the belief of Gladys. For instance, family letters and memories show that both Gladys and Norma Jeane named him as the father on several occasions, and in August 1961, an article appeared in
Cavalier
magazine which said: ‘[Marilyn’s] father is very much alive and residing in Southern California. He was once connected with the movie business, although he no longer is today.’ This would certainly be a nod in Gifford’s direction, since by that time he was living south of Los Angeles, where he was running a dairy farm.
    Gladys broke the news of the pregnancy to Gifford during a New Year’s party at the family home, presumably that of his father, carpenter Frederick Gifford, who lived at 12024 Venice Boulevard. Later, as the pregnancy became obvious, it created quite a stir in the Gifford family; particularly with his sister Ethel, who lectured him intensely, demanding to know what he intended to do about the situation. The argument culminated with Ethel telling her brother, ‘Look, either marry the woman or do something.’ According to relatives, Gladys was not seen at their home any more.
    Shunned by the Gifford family, Gladys then tried to gain sympathy from her mother, who by this time was living on her own at 418 East Rhode Island Avenue, while Charles Grainger was now working overseas. Della acknowledged disgust that her daughter was once again pregnant with an illegitimate child, and then sailed off to South-East Asia on 20 March 1926 in order to visit her husband.
    When Gladys gave birth on 1 June 1926, she had hoped Gifford would accompany her to the hospital. She was greatly disappointed, however, as he purposely stayed away, refusing to have anything to do with her or the child. Gladys perhaps would not have been shocked by this had she known that in 1922, when his wife Lilian gave