Audience: personal reference, close family/friends.

I am creating this time capsule as a way of creating something to leave behind to carry on my memory. Not as a piece of memorabilia for my fans but for the purpose of a personal account of my life.

What is written on the following pages is my account of the events that happened throughout my life. However brief, it is my interpretation of events that took place without the truth being twisted, in a way that makes my life appear to be something that it isn’t. It is my wishes that this information is kept from being published and in any way altered or fabricated, as this is my life the way I see it and not how someone else interprets it.

My Birth name is Norma Jean Mortenson; I was born on June 1st 1926 in Los Angeles. I was the daughter of Gladys Monroe and a baker named Edward Mortenson, whom I have never met. My mother had a history of mental instability that resulted in her making the choice to have me placed in foster care as a young child. I had a rather unhappy childhood and was placed in a foster home with Albert and Ida Bolaner until I was the age of seven, when I was then returned to my mot

When I was sixteen Grace became ill, so I as a result was supposed to go back to the orphanage. But to save me from that James decided to marry me. I agreed, left school and married him in June at the age of 16. As a couple we weren’t really happy, I wasn't a good housewife and he was constantly jealous, when I was in the centre of attention at dancing evenings. When James went to serve in the war he sent me to live with his mother Ethel. There I found a job where I was folding parachutes for a little income. As a girl I dreamed of escaping from this sad life by becoming a film star and that is exactly what I did.

On May 29, I began filming "There's No Business Like Show Business". Throughout the summer I was ill, and began to show serious side effects of the prescription sleeping pills I had been taking for the last few years.

Following my divorce, I decided to study serious acting and, through this, met the playwright Arthur Miller. We married in 1956. In 1958 and 1960, I sadly miscarried two children. By 1960, I was undergoing psychotherapy and taking tranquillisers, as this was one of the hardest stages of my life. In November 1960, Clark Gable, my co-star in the "The Misfits” suffered a fatal heart attack on the day after filming ended. I still blame myself for his death as I continued to bring my problems to the film set. As this was a very difficult stage in my life I made the decision to separate from my husband Arthur Miller.

Joe and I went to Japan for our honeymoon, and I was asked to go on a USO tour of Korea to entertain the troops. Despite the freezing weather, I entertained the 60,000 soldiers. It was a huge success. Joe did not accompany me on this trip; instead he stayed in Japan and awaited my return.

In 1948 I got a role in the musical movie "Ladies Of The Chorus" at Columbia Pictures. There I got to know Natasha Lytess, who became my voice-coach and a close confidante. On a New Year's Eve Party I met Johnny Hyde, an executive vice-president of the Williams Morris Agency, who I started a relationship with. After having already my overbite corrected, Johnny arranged a surgeon to correct my nose and jaw. As I had no money I posed nude for a calendar in 1949. In the same and the following year I played some more small roles in further

Some topics in this essay:
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