After marrying James Dougherty, Marilyn Monroe dropped out of high school and became a housewife. When World War II broke out, they moved to California, where Dougherty was initially stationed at Catalina Island. According to Dougherty, his wife was happy then. "We would go down to the beach on weekends and have luaus on Saturday night," he told UPI in 1990. "She loved it over there. It was like being on a honeymoon for a year."
After her husband was sent off to fight, she began working in an airplane factory, where a photographer discovered her and wanted her to model for him. This, according to Dougherty, is what led to the end of their marriage. He told UPI that after finding success as a model, his wife was offered a movie contract but couldn't be married, so he granted her a divorce. "She said we could still live together, but I said no, I wanted to start a family," he said.
We know from Monroe's personal writings, though, that the split was a bit more complicated. "My relationship with him was basically insecure from the first night I spent alone with him," she wrote in a document that surfaced after her death (via Vanity Fair). Per NPR, the two divorced in 1946 after two years of marriage.
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