Valley Village Residents Shocked Developer Knocks Down Marilyn Monroe House
VALLEY VILLAGE (CBSLA.com) — A piece of Hollywood history is now a pile of rubble.
Residents in Valley Village say the house where actress Marilyn Monroe once lived was just a step away from being declared a landmark when the owner tore it down on Monday.
The plain one-story home sat on Hermitage Avenue near Magnolia Boulevard.
A city planning report had already found the structure unworthy of being listed as a historic site.
But several members of the community continued to fight for the house. They submitted a 100-page application to the City of Los Angeles Cultural Heritage Commission and had a hearing scheduled for Thursday.
The owner, Joe Salem of Hermitage Enterprises LLC, reportedly obtained a permit a year ago to demolish the house to make way for condominiums.
Monroe had spent a year living there before she was discovered in 1944 as a pin-up model. At the time, Marilyn - then known as Norma Jean Dougherty - was married to a sailor.
She broke into the film industry around 1948 and went on to become a Hollywood icon.
