Marilyn Monroe Photos Found at Garage Sale
Just when you thought you’d seen every Marilyn Monroe image in existence, a New Jersey photographer has revealed new snapshots of the blonde bombshell, who would have celebrated her 85th birthday June 1.
Anton Fury initially unearthed the treasure trove 30 years ago at a garage sale, where he purchased a folder containing two envelopes of negatives for $2, according to CNN. It wasn’t until after he got home and developed the black-and-white photos that Fury realized who the famous subjects were.
“I was like, Oh my God,” Fury told the New York Daily News. “I thought, ‘It’s Marilyn,’ and then I saw the other pictures were Jayne Mansfield.”
The 33 images of Monroe include cheesecake shots of the icon posing poolside in both a light- and dark-colored bikini as well as a tight dark turtleneck with white shorts.
Though it is not known when and where the images were taken, Beverly Hills art dealer David Streets estimates it was Hollywood circa 1950—three years before Monroe made it big warbling “Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend” in a pink satin Travilla dress in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.
Exactly who snapped the 33 images of Monroe and 71 pictures of fellow screen siren Mansfield (aka Mariska Hargitay’s mom) also remains a mystery, though Fury and Streets speculate that an unidentified man who appears in shots with both women could be the photographer.
“We know that Monroe and Mansfield were here working at the same time, were contemporaries and friends,” Streets tells CNN. “So, there’s an intertanglement there that we’re going to unravel and see where the mystery leads.”
Hmm … Impossible as it sounds, if either of those women were named Kate, we’d almost be tempted to guess that Mario Testino was the mystery man.
