Anna Nicole Smith

Anna Nicole Smith, born as Vickie Lynn Marshall, was a popular American model, actress, sex symbol and a prominent television personality. She initially gained success with “Playboy” and became the “Playmate of the Year” in 1993. During her career, she modelled for recognized clothing companies such as Lane Bryant and Guess jeans. She also appeared in her own reality show called “The Anna Nicole Show”.

Early Life

Vickie Lynn Marshall was born in Harris County, Texas on November 8th, 1967. She was the only child of Virgie Mae and Donald Eugene Hogan. She later changed her stage name to “Anna Nicole Smith”. Her parents were divorced in 1969, when her father left the family. She was raised by her mother Virgie, who was a law enforcement officer in Texas for 28 years. Her mother married several times after that.

Anna attended the “Durkee Elementary School” as well as the “Aldine Intermediate School” in Houston, Texas. She went to live with her mother’s sister in Mexia while she was in grade 9. She attended the Mexia High School and failed her freshman year. Anna Nicole quit school as soon as she entered her sophomore year. She then started working at Jim’s Krispy Fried Chicken as a waitress in Mexia. During her tenure at the restaurant, she met Billy Wayne Smith, who happened to be the cook there. She was 17 and he was 16, when the couple got married on April 4th, 1985. She gave birth to their son, the very next year, and was named “Daniel Wayne Smith”.

Anna Nicole and Billy were separated in 1987 and she moved back to Houston with her year-old son Daniel. The couple got officially divorced in February, 1993. later on, Anna started working at Wal-Mart and then again as a waitress in Red Lobster. She then became an exotic dancer and started taking modelling as well as voice lessons in 1993. In October, 1993, she found an ad in the local newspaper about the auditions for the ‘Playboy’ magazine.

Marriage to J. Howard Marshall

While she was performing at the ‘Gigi’s’, a local strip club in Houston, she met an elderly oil tycoon J. Howard Marshall. They started dating in October 1991 and maintained a two year relationship. During this time, he reportedly sent her lavish gifts and asked her to marry several times. After officially getting divorced from Billy, she got married to Marshall on June 24th, 1994. Anna Nicole was 26, whereas Marshall was 89 when they got married in Houston. This led to a great deal of gossip and there were speculations that she married him for his money. Although she never lived with him, she maintained that she was in love with her husband and age was of no importance to her. 13 months after the wedding, Marshall died on 4th August, 1995.

PlayBoy and Modelling Career

There came a major turning point in the life of Anna Nicole Smith in the year 1992. She was chosen by Hugh Hefner as the new cover girl for the March 1992 issue. She was featured as Vickie Smith and wore an attractive low-cut gown. She gave a statement where she said she wished to become ‘the next Marilyn Monroe’. She became one of the most popular models of the ‘Playboy’ magazine and was larger and heavier than a typical model. She was chosen as the ‘Playmate of the Year’ in 1993. Before the award pictorial, she started using her name as “Anna Nicole Smith”.

Later on, she signed a contract to replace the existing supermodel Claudia Schiffer in the advertisement campaign for Guess Jeans. She became popular with her series of sensuous black and white photographs. Her team at Guess strongly capitalized on her resemblance to Jayne Mansfield, another sex symbol. Just before Christmas that year, she modelled for the clothing company from Sweden called Hennes & Mauritz. Her underwear seductive poses became popular in Norway and Sweden.

On August 24, 1994, New York magazine used a photo of Anna in an issue which was titled as the “White Trash Nation”. She was squatting in a short skirt in the picture with cowboy boots while eating chips. In October that year, Anna’s lawyer issued a $5,000,000 lawsuit in opposition to the magazine for the unauthorized use of her picture and that the article had greatly damaged her reputation. Her lawyer also stated that Anna was told that the magazine was going to cover the “All American Woman Look” and the cover picture was originally taken for fun during the break time.

Death and Funeral

On September 10, 2006, Anna Nicole Smith lost her 20 year old son Daniel, while he was visiting his mother in the hospital to see his newly born sister. After the second autopsy, it was confirmed that he died due to a drug overdose, supposedly consuming a lethal combination of Methadone, Lexapro and Zoloft.

Despite the rise in her career, she experienced a lot of tragedy in her personal life. At the age of 39, she was found dead in her hotel room on February 8, 2007. The authorities at the Seminole Hard Rock Casino Hotel confirmed, after several weeks, that the death may perhaps be a result of accidental drug overdose. She had been taking different kinds of medications before she died.

After her death, there were numerous speculations regarding the paternity of her newly born daughter DannieLynn, including one of the claims made by Prince Frederick Von Anhalt. After the DNA results in April 2007, it was announced that Larry Birkhead was the biological father of Anna Nicole Smith’s daughter. Her lawyer Howard K. Stern was also known to be romantically linked with her; however the custody was later granted to Birkhead. Anna Nicole Smith made headlines all across the world and was paid a tribute by the Playboy Magazine. At the same time as being ridiculed for her spacey persona, she was also admired for her journey to success, amidst several difficulties. After she died, she was compared to Jean Marlow as well as Marilyn Monroe.

Marilyn Monroe

Marilyn Monroe has an ever-lasting impact on today’s civilization. She placed elevated values for herself and was a motivation to a lot of youthful individuals. Marilyn Monroe transformed Hollywood’s stance on women eternally. Her illustration, body, smile, and individuality are what are expected in a new actress or in the least the models at the moment. Nowadays, just because of Marilyn’s sky-scraping standards, it is a lot more intricate for women to make it large as an artist or model. She was something further than just a mere megastar or beauty queen, Marilyn Monroe was a universal sensation in her life span.

Early Life

Marilyn Monroe was born as Norma Jean Mortenson on June 1st, 1926, in the Los Angeles General Hospital. Before she was born, Marilyn’s father bought a motorbike for himself and immigrated north to San Francisco, dumping the people in Los Angeles. Marilyn grew up without knowing who her father was. She often spent time guessing and that was one of the regrets she had all her life. Her mother, Gladys Baker has several romantic encounters all through her life and that further confused her. Gladys gave her the name Norma Jean Baker after a boyfriend she had after Mortenson. Norma had a very troubled childhood. There was never ending poverty in the family. However, her mother had an extremely attractive personality and worked for the RKO studios as a film cutter. She suffered from a series of mental illnesses and hence little Norma had to be sent to foster homes while her mother was being cured in the medical institutions. In the year 1937, Norma Jean moved in with her mother’s friend. So that’s the reason most of her primary education comes from orphanage and foster schools. Her mother’s friend Grace took care of her and she spent some of the most important years of her life with her. Grace would teach her to apply make up and dress appropriately.

First Wedding

In 1942, Grace’s husband was transferred to the East Coast as he was working in the army, hence she could not afford to take young Norma with her. Thereafter Grace arranged her marriage to their young neighbor, Jimmy Dougherty. In June, 1942 Norma got married and turned into Norma Jean Dougherty. It should not be forgotten that Norma was sixteen when she was married to Jimmy. Their marriage started off really well but within four years, she divorced him. She took up modeling as her career after that. She started to model swimsuits and also bleached her hair blonde. A lot of attention was paid to her photo shoots and very soon she gained immense popularity. These pictures were seen by the head of the RKO pictures who in turn offered a screen test to Norma.

Career Progression

Some agent advised her to be associated with 20th Century Fox as that is a better studio than RKO. She then signed a contract with 20th Century Fox for $125 a week for six months. It was at that time that Norma Jean became Marilyn Monroe. Her contract was then extended with an extra $25 per week for another six months. The first film that she featured in was “The Shocking Miss Pilgrim” in the year 1947.

She then had to undergo a rough patch in her career. Her performance was highly neglected in the film Scudda Hoo! She left 20th Century Fox and went back to the acting school. Her first commercial success was after she posed nude on the cover of the playboy magazine. After the year 1953, she saw a lot of success in her films as well as the modeling career. She gained a lot of popularity with the movies like “Monkey Business” and “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes”. It was the same year when she began dating the great baseball star banes Joe DiMaggio. She then started drawing a lot of audience with merely her appearance. She then appeared in her next hit called “How to Marry a Millionaire”. Her co-stars were often jealous of her onscreen presence as she clicked with most of her audience, especially the males. In 1954, she officially married Joe DiMaggio and also continued acting for the film “There’s No Business like Show Business”. This film was followed by the unforgettable comedy called “The Seven Year Hitch”. It was this movie that showcased Marilyn standing on the subway station and the wind blowing her white dress. This scene is by far the best scene in the history of Hollywood. By eight months after her wedding to the baseball star, she declared her divorce.

Those were the bad times of her career, mostly self-invited. She was suspended by the 20th Century Fox for not coming on time for the forthcoming movies. She carried a non-cooperative attitude towards her producers, directors including her co-stars. Finally in the year 1956, she married the legendary playwright Arthur Miller. Their marriage lasted four years and then they got divorced as well. Marilyn had to wait really long before her next hit in the form of “Some Like it Hot”. This film was the best hit she ever gave in terms of commercial success. Then she starred in her last film which is called “The Misfits” which was also the last film of her co-star George Cukor. In 1962, she was cast for the move “Something’s Got to Give” but her late coming attitude went beyond control and the studio planned to fire her. It cost them a lot of money when such delays happened and she was already 36 by then.

The End

Marilyn came across a lot of obstacles in her life. She also went through a lot of therapies and medications of all sorts. She was suffering from Anemia and severe Bronchitis. In the year 1962, she decided to remarry Joe DiMaggio, who happened to be over protective to her. But before that she was invited to the President John F. Kennedy’s birthday dinner and was believed to have an affair with both John Kennedy and his brother Bobby in the same night. However, no one can confirm the reports of her actually having an affair with both of them but there are a lot of sources that confirm her closeness with John. F. Kennedy.

On August 5th, 1962, Marilyn was found dead in her bed by a maid servant. According to the doctors, she had taken an overdose of sedatives. Doctors also concluded that stress and her family’s mental history was partially responsible for her death. It was also rumored all over the world that she killed herself because John Kennedy refused to divorce his wife and marry her. She was laid to rest in the Corridors of Memories, number 24, Westwood Memorial Park in Los Angeles.

Marilyn Monroe made sure that she realized her dreams, amidst of all difficulties. However, there were a lot of dark sides to her personality. Well, she shall be remembered as a dedicated, extremely sexy model as well as a motivational human being. She has set both, the good as well as the bad examples to the world!