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Many famous personalities of the 1950s and 1960s are still known to the general public today. Musicians such as Sam Cooke and John Coltrane, who died in 1965 and John Coltrane in 1967, and film stars such as Marilyn Monroe, who died in 1962, remains an eternal icon with loyal fans who still love their work. until today. Similarly, writers of this period are still widely admired, including J.D. salinger"The Catcher in the Rye"Yet one of the world's best-selling books (byWashington Post）.
However, while the names of countless figures who lived and died more than half a century ago are still familiar to us, many of the most revered figures in American popular culture of that period have grown more obscure as the years pass. One of them was Dorothy Kilgallen, a respected writer and television personality of her time but little known today.
Perhaps it was the ephemeral nature of Kilgallen's work that kept her sadly excluded from the annals of posthumous fame. According to reports, she was primarily a newspaper columnist—with great success—and her most famous column, "Sounds of Broadway," contained insightful show business news and gossip and was widely distributed throughout the United States.Hollywood Walk of FameIn 1960, he gave a star to Kilgallen. Kilgallen's stardom, however, is due to her TV work as the hit show What's My Line? A long-time and much-loved panelist on . accordingInternet Movie DatabaseKilgallen appeared in 736 episodes between 1950 and 1965, the year of her shockingly untimely and, to many, suspicious death.
Dorothy Kilgallen: An Underrated Researcher
While Dorothy Kilgallen was primarily known during her lifetime for her entertainment and gossip columns and television and radio appearances, she was also a respected investigative reporter with an impressive list of assignments. as stated insmithsonian magazineOne of Kilgallen's most famous works early in his career was the 24-day trip around the world featured in the best-selling book,girls all over the world1936. Her other early missions reportedly included covering the wedding of Franklin D. Roosevelt, Jr. to Ethel Dupont and the coronation of Britain's monarch, King George VI.Women in Communication: A Biographical SourcebookKilgallen is also widely regarded as the most famous co-respondent of the infamous group.Sam ShepardReportedly, the 1954 murder trialCleveland location.
Despite his income and reputation as a witty and engaging television personality, when he died in 1965, Kilgalen was dealing with one of the biggest stories of all time: the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1963. as notedLee IsraelIn the months leading up to her death, Kilgallen used her established reputation as a reporter to interview some of the most important people connected to the murder, leading some to believe that her investigation may have had something to do with the death. her.
The Death of Dorothy Kilgallen
According to reportsNew York TimesDorothy Kilgallen was found dead in her five-story New York mansion on November 8, 1965, just hours after filming her final episode, What Was My Line?, hours later. Although Kilgallen's death was initially blamed on "natural causes", a later medical report attributed the famous journalist and TV personality's death to "a combined reaction to alcohol and barbiturates".
The same report said police "found no signs of violence or suicide." The death of the healthy and vivacious Dorothy Kilgallen at the young age of 52 shocked those who knew her and her fans across the country.
According to Lee Israel's 1979 biography "the wedge gall"An estimated 10,000 mourners visited Kilgallen's coffin and she was mourned by many famous friends, including Joan Crawford. Since its publication, Lee's biography has become one of the most authoritative accounts of Kilgallen's life and death and fueled speculation: The official story of her death, the biographer directly claims that Kilgalen's death was not accidental but covered up.
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Suspicious cause of death?
pe li israelpassageKilgallen's death was highly suspicious because police at the scene ruled out suicide or murder immediately after finding her body, meaning her death was only written off as "uncertain circumstances". If the police had even had suicidal thoughts, there might have been more evidence to piece together exactly why Kilgallen died. Writers interested in Kilgallen's death, such as Israel and Mark Shaw, have pointed out many curious details that seem to undermine the official account of accidental death.
accordingIsraelIt was Kilgallen's barber who found her body, propped up in bed with a book in hand, but heavily made up - a detail that seemed at odds with the reporter's story of getting ready for bed. Another suspicious detail of the scene is that the book found next to Kilgallen's body is the last novel by Robert Rooke. However, the book was the last she had read - her hairdresser later recalled discussing it with her - so why was she reading it again so soon? Where are Kilgallen's reading glasses, Israel asked. Reading glasses were not mentioned in the crime scene report, but if the visually impaired reporter was reading at the time of her death, surely she would have been wearing them?
approaching the Kennedy assassination
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For those who doubted there were more reasons behind Dorothy Kilgallen's untimely death, it was her investigation into the circumstances of John F. Kennedy's assassination that made the journalist's death seem suspicious and likely premeditated.Lee IsraelOf the many journalists who covered the Kennedy assassination, Kilgallen was the only one to privately interview JFK assassin Jack Ruby (pictured).Lee Harvey Oswald. Shortly after Ruby's capture, she spent eight minutes alone with him in the safe house.
This detail alone suggests the unique closeness of veteran crime reporter Kilgarren's story to history. However, asIsraelRecognize that while Ruby may indeed have given Kilgallen a reason for shooting Oswald—and may have given the reporters some candid details about JFK's assassination—we'll never know because the reporter never published any reports of their meeting. Ruby was known to be emotional and in poor mental health at the time, and may have simply had trouble understanding or not saying anything.
In recent years, however, an author, Mark Shaw, has reignited interest in Dorothy Kilgallen's death with his 2016 book,journalist who knows too muchand some follow-up, strongly arguing that Kilgarren was murdered because of her intelligence gathering on the JFK assassination and her frequent criticism of the Warren Commission.
Notes on Lee Israel and further doubts
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Although Lee Israel's biography of Kilgallen was critically acclaimed when it was published, and remains a source of uncertainty about the final hours of Dorothy Kilgallen's life and the exact nature of her death, it is a source of speculation, but there is reason to believe that the fiction of Israel's integrity in relation to secession is likely to be called into question.
as pointed outNew York TimesIsrael was a respected journalist and biographer when Kilgallen's biography was published, but her career collapsed within a few years when Estée Lauder's unofficial biography was rushed out, undermining Lauder's official memoir, which led to an onslaught of criticism. Somewhat unexpectedly, Israel went on to become an inscrutable literary forger, stealing letters from public libraries by the likes of Ernest Hemingway and Noel Coward, and replacing them with homemade versions so he could sell the originals to autograph collectors. She later created her own letters, imitating the writing styles of authors and celebrities.Mark ShawConvinced that Lee Israel's investigation into Kilgallen's death was flawless, despite her career as a thief and forger, the arguments she makes in the sequel to "Kilgallen" are credible. However, Israel's cynical second "career" has always cast doubt on what her biography says about Kilgallen's death.
Meanwhile, experts say claims of Kilgallen's murder have been "completely debunked".tribune of the san diego association, althoughskepticThe magazine noted that Kilgallen's death was a fringe issue even among Kennedy conspiracy theorists, with "no one seriously believing" that she was the target of the assassination.
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