High-Priced Letter

A handwritten letter scrawled in pencil by a teenage Marilyn Monroe has been sold for $43,125 at a New York auction. The high bid for the five-page letter - written by 16-year-old Norma Baker Dougherty, later known as Marilyn Monroe - came from an anonymous telephone bidder, a Sotheby’s spokeswoman said. Monroe, born out of wedlock to a mother who eventually was institutionalized, spent much of her childhood in foster homes. The letter, full of spelling and grammatical errors, is addressed to her guardian, Grace McKee Goddard. Written in February 1943, the letter describes Monroe’s excitement at the prospect of meeting her biological father. “Golly, I just hope that he will want to see me,” she wrote. But it is unclear if the meeting ever took place.