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Bettie Page biography

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Quick Facts

  • PLACE OF DEATH: California
  • Originally: Bettie Mae Page
more about Bettie

Best Known For

Bettie Page was a Playboy pin-up model and sex symbol of the 1950s. Her straight black bangs and innocent, playful attitude made her a fashion icon.

Synopsis

Bettie Page was born on April 22, 1923 in Nashville, TN. She posed for Playboy in 1955 and worked with pin-up photographers Bunny Yeager and Irving Klaw. A series of bondage photos brought Page to the attention of the Kefauver Hearings on obscenity in 1957. This contributed to her departure from modeling and decades long reclusiveness. Page died in 2008 afer a long battle with mental illness.

Contents

Quotes

Peabody College
– Bettie Page

Profile

Model. Born Bettie Mae Page on April 22, 1923, in Nashville, Tennessee. The second of six children, Page was frequently placed in an orphanage with her sisters while her single mother worked to save money. A hard-working student, Page graduated at the top of her high school class and graduated from Peabody College. She married Billy Neal in 1943, and the couple moved to San Francisco, where Page launched her modeling career.

After divorcing Billy in 1947 and moving to New York, Page worked with a photographer to produce the first of many pinup calendars. Within months, she was posing for national magazines, including the centerfold of January 1955's Playboy. With her deep blue eyes and raven black hair with signature short bangs, Page soon became more than a model, she was a living icon. She dabbled in acting, but her success was primarily in modeling. She moved to Florida to work with several influential photographers and married her second husband, Armond Walterson, in 1958. A third marriage to Harry Lear would also end in divorce.

In the 1960s, Page mysteriously disappeared from the limelight and was said to have suffered from severe mental problems. Two films have been created about her life, 2004's Bettie Page: Dark Angel starring Paige Richards and 2005's The Notorious Bettie Page with Gretchen Mol. Though she retreated from the public eye to live a private life with her family, Page's legend remains as strong as ever. The 50s pin-up queen, Bettie Page died on December 11, 2008.

 

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