Joe DiMaggio

Joseph Paul DiMaggio, born Giuseppe Paolo DiMaggio (November 25, 1914 – March 8, 1999), was an American baseball player.

Marriages

In January 1937, DiMaggio met Dorothy Arnold on the set of Manhattan Merry Go-Round in which he was featured and she was one of its adornments. They married at San Francisco's Church of SS Peter and Paul on November 19, 1939, as 20,000 well-wishers jammed the streets.

Related Topics:
November 19 - 1939

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Even before their son, Joseph III, was born, the marriage was in trouble. DiMaggio was like most ballplayers: a high-school dropout with limited social skills whose life revolved around the game. While not the "party animal" Babe Ruth was, he had his fun, leaving Dorothy feeling neglected. However, she was an ambitious social-climber who took advantage of her status as the wife of sports' biggest star. DiMaggio biographer Michael Seidel reported that, except on the nights before Lefty Gomez was to pitch, a pregnant Dorothy and Lefty's wife, Broadway star June O'Dea, dragged their husbands from one Manhattan night spot to another. He came to resent how she complained about his off-the-field activities while she spent his money. But, when she threatened to leave him in 1942, the usually unflappable DiMaggio went into a slump, and developed ulcers. After the season, she went to Reno, Nevada to get a divorce. He followed her, and they reconciled. But, after he enlisted in the Army and was sent to Hawaii, she returned to Reno. She divorced him in 1944.

Related Topics:
Joseph III - Lefty Gomez - Broadway - Manhattan - Ulcer - Reno, Nevada

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The relationship continued off and on. Dorothy promised Joe she would wait for him to return from 1946 spring training, but married another man while he was away. It was only after he met the love of his life on a blind date in 1952 did he finally get her out of his system for good.

Related Topics:
1946 - 1952

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According to her autobiography, Marilyn Monroe did not want to meet DiMaggio, imagining he had bulging muscles and wore pink ties. Both were at different points in their lives: Joe wanted to settle down; Marilyn's career was taking off. They married at San Francisco City Hall on January 14, 1954, the culmination of a courtship that had captivated the nation (he was excommunicated by the Roman Catholic Church for bigamy).

Related Topics:
Marilyn Monroe - January 14 - 1954 - Excommunicated - Roman Catholic Church - Bigamy

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The relationship was loving yet complex, marred by his jealousy and her casual infidelity. DiMaggio biographer Richard Ben Cramer asserts it was also violent. One incident allegedly happened after the skirt-blowing scene in The Seven Year Itch was filmed on New York's Lexington Avenue before hundreds of fans; director Billy Wilder recalled "the look of death" on DiMaggio's face as he watched. When she filed for divorce just 274 days after the wedding, Oscar Levant quipped it proved that no man could be a success in two pastimes.

Related Topics:
The Seven Year Itch - Billy Wilder - Oscar Levant

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He re-entered her life as her marriage to Arthur Miller was ending. On February 10, 1961, DiMaggio secured Monroe's release from a psychiatric clinic (she was reportedly placed in the ward for the most seriously disturbed). She later joined him in Florida where he was a batting coach at the Yankees' training camp. Their "just friends" claim didn't stop remarriage rumors from flying. Reporters staked out Monroe's Manhattan apartment building. Bob Hope even "dedicated" Best Song nominee The Second Time Around to them at the Academy Awards.

Related Topics:
Arthur Miller - February 10 - 1961 - Florida - Bob Hope - Academy Awards

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According to biographer Maury Allen, Joe was so alarmed by Marilyn's return to her self-destructive ways, falling-in with people he felt detrimental to her (including Frank Sinatra and his "Rat Pack"), he quit his job with a military post-exchange supplier on August 1, 1962 to return to California to ask her to remarry him. But before he could, she was found dead on August 5, a probable suicide. Devastated, he claimed her body, and arranged her funeral, barring Hollywood's elite. He had a half-dozen red roses delivered 3 times a week to her crypt for the next 20 years. Unlike her other two husbands or other men who knew her intimately (or claimed to), he never talked about her publicly nor wrote a book. He never married again.

Related Topics:
Frank Sinatra - Rat Pack - August 1 - 1962 - August 5 - Suicide

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