IMAGE: Steve Canyon daily comic strip, September 30, 1952 – Copyright 2014 the Milton Caniff Estate. Miss Mizzou makes a joke about Marilyn Monroe’s calendar.
Milton Caniff had various influences going into the creation of Miss Mizzou. One of the largest was rising film star Marilyn Monroe who had a nude calendar released in 1952. Caniff even got a little “meta” with the comic strip above September 30th, 1952, where he has Miss Mizzou joke about a “Marilyn Monroe calendar fan club.” What influence did Marilyn Monroe’s 1952 nude calendar have on the creation of Miss Mizzou? Let’s examine the creation of the calendar further.
Marilyn Monroe’s career had been stalled somewhat during the later 1940’s. She had been let go from her studio contract in 1947, but still landed film roles here and there. She approached photographer Tom Kelley in the spring of 1949 for modeling work, and he photographed her for a beer ad in a bikini. At the suggestion of a calendar publisher, Kelley asked Marilyn to pose nude.
At first Marilyn refused, but she gave the idea some more thought. She mulled over the fact that she had met Kelley in 1947 after having some car trouble and he had lent her some money she never had repaid. He was apparently unaware of this, but it was something that possibly weighed on her conscience. She also needed the money that the calendar would bring to get her impounded car back. Monroe was still hesitant because she was afraid of what the photos could do to her career, but she finally agreed to pose for them. Kelley reassured her that his female partner would be at the session and they would retouch the photos so nobody could recognize her.
Kelley took the nude photos, but they were still somewhat recognizable as Marilyn. The photos were used for calendars, but didn’t become popular until her film career started getting more recognition. This came to a head during March of 1952 when a newspaper reporter asked Marilyn about the photos in an interview.
It must be said that there are a couple different stories circulating about how the photo scandal started. Some think that Monroe leaked the photographs the press, while others say that Jerry Wald, the producer of her next film “Clash By Night,” was involved with leaking the photos. Regardless of how it went down, “Clash By Night” was released on June 18th that year and did well at the box office because of the press.
The photos put Monroe and her movie career in jeopardy as flaunting sexuality in Hollywood could put an end to her career. She explained that she posed for the photos because she was “broke and needed the money.” Coupled with the story of her troubled upbringing, this public relations move lead to sympathy for Monroe and her plight as a struggling actress. Around this time she also started dating Joe DiMaggio who’s perceived moral purity also helped Monroe in the public eye.
The photos and the scandal helped her career substantially. She landed the cover of Life magazine in April with a story explaining about the photos and talking about her background. This continued throughout the year as she landed several magazine covers and news stories.
Caniff’s first correspondence about Miss Mizzou dates to May 29th, 1952, so it wouldn’t have been too long after Monroe’s Life profile. Miss Mizzou in the comic strip is a character who dreamed of Hollywood fame, but came up a little short. Caniff even described Mizzou as someone who was like Marilyn Monroe but didn’t “hit the jackpot in hollywood.” My theory is that Monroe’s nude photos and her subsequent explanation to the press about her career struggles helped inform the back-story for Miss Mizzou.
It must be kept in mind that Monroe was still a somewhat small time celebrity when Caniff would have been conceiving Miss Mizzou in May. While Monroe had gotten some publicity at that point, I’m thinking that it would have been possible for the press to move on to another person had Monroe not been starring in five films that year. Her career was gaining momentum, but Caniff would have had no idea Monroe would become as big as she eventually did. Monroe’s fame didn’t solidify until 1953 with several films including “Niagra” in January, “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes” in July, and “How to Marry a Millionare” in November. In December of 1953, the first issue of Playboy launched with Monroe on the cover, and she became the first playmate of the month.
One of my observations in my Miss Mizzou book is that her popularity came from the people, and not solely from Caniff’s promotional savvy. Oddly enough, Monroe felt the same thing about her popularity: “If I am a star, the people made me star. No studio, no person, but the people did.” Actor Joseph Cotton agreed: “A lot of people will tell you it’s all publicity. That’s malarkey. They’ve tried to give a hundred girls the same publicity build-up. It didn’t take with them.”
IMAGE: Steve Canyon daily comic strip, Janurary 7, 1953 – Copyright 2014 the Milton Caniff Estate. Pipper the Piper makes a joke about Marilyn Monroe’s calendar.
One last comment about the calendar: The “Marilyn Monroe calendar fan club” joke that was referenced at the top of this post was also repeated in the above Steve Canyon strip from January 7th, 1953. The character who makes this comment is Pipper the Piper, who was seemingly based on newly elected U.S. senator and eventual U.S. President John F. Kennedy. (The character’s personality was also based on David McCallister Jr. as comics historian Bruce Canwell notes in the introduction to Steve Canyon Volume 4.) This is of course an interesting footnote considering that Monroe and Kennedy were allegedly romantically linked a few years after this appeared.