The Final Years of Marilyn Monroe: The Shocking True Story Read Free

prove, however, the man in the picture was evidently not Edward Mortenson, but Gifford, who did bear a strong resemblance to Gable. And her mother was wrong that the man had been killed in a motor accident. Gifford was not killed in a motor accident,
    Mortenson, however, was. The fateful collision occurred on Tuesday 18 June 1929, at approximately 5pm, and in Ohio rather than New York; Mortenson was riding his motorcycle along the road from Youngstown to Akron and when he tried to overtake a car in front of him, he smashed into a sedan, breaking both of his legs. He fell to the ground unconscious and paralysed. Mortenson passed away just as the ambulance he was travelling in reached the nearby hospital. (To add to the confusion, a second man bearing the name, Martin Edward Mortenson, also entered the scene claiming to be Marilyn’s true biological father. When he died of a heart attack on Tuesday 10 February 1981, aged 83, in Riverside, California, a copy of Norma Jeane’s birth certificate was found among his possessions.)
    The actress’s mother had become besotted with the stout, dark-haired Gifford during his stint in charge of the day shift at Consolidated Film Industries in early 1925. Gifford’s employment with the motion picture plant Thomas H. Ince Studios in Culver City had recently been terminated and his wife, Lillian Priester, was suing him for divorce. Her claims against him (he associated himself with low-life women, was addicted to narcotic drugs and had beaten her on numerous occasions) made it abundantly clear what kind of man he was. In an attempt to rebuild his life and earn some useful dollars, Gifford took a post at Consolidated as ahypo-shooter and developer and, within months, had worked his way up to the position of superintendent of the night crew. By the spring, the pair were having an affair and on Wednesday 6 May, his divorce became final. Twenty days later, on Tuesday 26 May, Gladys walked out on her husband, Mortensen. Her intention was clear to everyone; she had set her sights on becoming the next Mrs Gifford. However, he saw Gladys as just another fling and, by Christmas Eve 1925, had tired of it and promptly fled. But there was a catch: Gladys was now three months pregnant. Norma Jeane would become that child.
    The idea of placing Norma Jeane with neighbours Albert and Ida Bolender on Sunday 13 June 1926, just 12 days after the baby’s birth, came from Gladys’s mother, Della. She had asked the couple, who lived across the road at 215 Rhode Island Avenue in Inglewood, Los Angeles County, to watch over her granddaughter while she travelled to South America to reconcile with her husband.
    Contrary to the long-held belief that Gladys totally abandoned her daughter, she actually resided with Norma Jeane at the property and dutifully paid Albert and Ida $25 a month rent. Della knew Gladys and Norma Jeane would be in good hands and that a visit to them would always be just a short distance away. ‘Mrs Baker [i.e. Gladys] was with me,’ Ida confirmed in 1956. ‘She stayed in Hollywood when working nights as a negative cutter, and stayed with me while working days . . . She [Norma Jeane] was never neglected and always dressed nicely. Her mother supported her all the time and bought all her clothes.’
    Incontestable proof that both Gladys and her daughter lived under the Bolenders’ roof can be found in an official census of Inglewood Township, Los Angeles County (enumeration district no. 19). Details of that Rhode Island Avenue house, as registered on Tuesday 1 April 1930, revealed that, besides Gladys and Norma Jeane, the other occupiers of the building were Albert, aged 46, Ida, 42 and their son Lester, 3. (Albert made a mistake when he filled out the form, noting Gladys as being 27 years of age and Norma Jeane as 63.)
    In spite of his carefree, unconcerned exterior, Gifford did not (despite what we have been told before) wash his hands of the child. When Norma Jeane was just one or two