 Sigh. Just pose and get paid. And remember—nobody I know will ever see these photos. 
This Technicolor lithograph published by Champion Line features Dolores Del Monte, Playboy magazine's centerfold for March 1954, in a shot entitled “Radiant Beauty.” Del Monte began her modeling career posing for the legendary photographer Bruno Bernard and the acclaimed pin-up painter Zoe Mozert, at times making as much as $50 a day. That was in 1951, when that pay rate was the equivalent of about $500 in today's money. A year later Del Monte quit modeling. In 1954 the above photo was offered to Playboy. Though Bruno Bernard shot it, the centerfold credited the John Baumgarth Company of Melrose Park, Illinois. Such are the entanglements of copyright. When Del Monte received a letter asking permission to use her likeness she assumed Playboy was a standard pin-up magazine, and the images requested were from a shoot she recalled where she wore a leopard pattern bathing suit. Wrong on both counts, and one can only imagine her reaction when the centerfold hit newsstands, since she was not only married but a mother by then. Well, at least she got the $50. And the world? It got something priceless. We have lots more classic Technicolor lithos, and you can see those by clicking here.
 I’ll be so famous people will completely forget about that other Marilyn. Just wait and see. 
When you hear the phrase “Marilyn Walk” you probably associate it with Marilyn Monroe’s distinctive sashay. That’s a fine image, but if your name happens literally to be Marilyn Walk then that means you went down in Hollywood history unremembered. We like to imagine Walk dreaming of catching her first big break and seeing an article about herself entitled “Walk of Fame.” It doesn’t seem as if that happened, but this shot by renowned lensman Bruno Bernard, aka Bernard of Hollywood, bestows a sort of fame upon Walk all by itself by making her image a rare collectible. It was probably made during the early 1950s. And just in case you think we’re making up her name, the reverse of the photo appears below.
 Update: We now think this is Playboy model Marilyn Waltz. The look is right, the time is right, and the name is close. She was probably trying out a pseudonym to dissociate herself from her centerfold appearances, which spanned February 1954 to April 1955. Or this shot predated those appearances and she used a new name for her nude modeling. Either way, we're 95% on her identity.
 Aww, we can’t believe how big she’s gotten. 
A naked woman in a baby crib? From our 2012 perspective we think the whole idea is a bit deviant, but in 1963 presumably this photo from Bruno Bernard, aka Bernard of Hollywood, was totally innocuous, right? No, we didn’t think so either. Nude photography runs the gamut. Sometimes it depicts women as strong or even domineering, but more often it suggests that the perfect woman is pliant and childlike, so to us at least, going the extra step and putting the model in a crib is just a bit too overt for good taste. But we were not even zygotes in 1963 so we’re not trying to judge. The photo is pretty, and that’s really all we can say. The week’s quips, with observations from poet Carl Sandburg and actor Vincent Price, are below. Dec 8: “A baby is God’s opinion that the world should go on.”—Carl Sandburg Dec 9: “A lot of girls who can dish it out can’t cook it.”—Vincent Price Dec 10: Behind every successful man there’s a woman nagging him he’s not so hot. Dec 11: “Solo: A loud passage played by the orchestra leader’s brother-in-law.”—John Doremus Dec 12: “Every time my mother-in-law comes to sleep at our house, I have breakfast in bed. I sleep in the kitchen.”—Bobby Ramsen Dec 13: “The modern girl marries for keeps; she keeps on working and keeps house.”—Paul Fogarty Dec 14: There’s no economy in going to bed early to save candles if the result is twins—Chinese Prov.
 When she says jump you ask how high. 
Some call it cheesecake, glamour, or even smut, but we prefer to call it preserving the ephemera of history. For instance, this image by the renowned mid-century photographer Bruno Bernard, aka Bernard of Hollywood, did not exist on the internet a moment ago. And now it does. See how that works? So think of us as archivists, and yourselves as researchers. That probably won’t help if someone sees you looking at this image, but hey, it’s worth a try. Of late, when reading the Goodtime Weekly quips, we’ve been imagining them delivered as part of a stand-up show—i.e., followed by uproarious laughter. That actually helps a bit. When we obey the two drink minimum that helps even more. Next we’re going to steal a few of these lines and try them out in the real world. After all, the true test of a quip is whether actual living and breathing, flesh and blood humans laugh at it. So we’re going to give some of these a trial run and get back to you. Stay tuned. Oct 13: Mother Nature still blushes before disrobing. Oct 14: “Sometimes a man pulls the wool over his wife’s eyes with the wrong yarn.”—Mitch Miller Oct 15: “Have you heard of an elephant that went on a diet? Now he’s eating like a horse.”—Peggie Castle Oct 16: “The ten best years of a woman’s life are between her 25th and 26th birthday.”—Jerry Lester Oct 17: “Overheard at a restaurant: ‘She promised to love, honor, and obey. Now I’d settle for only one.’”—Irv Kupcinet Oct 18: “Every husband knows the best time to wash the dishes is right after his wife tells him.”—Paul Gibson Oct 19: “Husbands are like furnaces. You have to watch them or they’ll go out.”—Sam Cowling
 Hmm, maybe I should change this wallpaper. 
Some well known photographers have contributed to the Goodtime Weekly Calendar, but the above image is by a true icon—Bruno Bernard, aka Bernard of Hollywood. The German-born Bernard possessed a doctorate in criminal psychology and had no formal photographic training, but after leaving Germany in 1937 was operating his own portrait studio within a year. His second studio was on Sunset Boulevard, and that’s where he worked for 25 years, along the way creating such iconic images as Marilyn Monroe’s Niagara and River of No Return promos, Lili St. Cyr’s Indian headdress and transparent bathtub shots, and portraits of virtually every star in mid-century Hollywood. The Goodtime Calendar has several other Bernard contributions, and you’ll see those as the year continues. As a side note, you may be wondering why we’re showing you this second week of July image a week early. It’s because we’re headed off to Sevilla, Spain tomorrow for a week or so, and we won’t be posting during that time. Well, you never know. Probably we won’t. Depends on what we see. But anyway, we didn’t want our vacation to interrupt our Goodtime Weekly series, so you get this page a week early. You also get the quips a week early:
July 7: “When a man opens the car door for his wife, it’s either a new car or a new wife.”—Larry Attebery July 8: When a pensive little thing gets married, she often becomes an expensive little thing. July 9: “A psychiatrist is a man who doesn’t have to worry so long as other people do.”—Pat Buttram July 10: “A Hollywood guy changes his name once, a dollar bill once in a while, and his girl once she gets wise.”—Joe Hamilton July 11: A man is incomplete until he marries—then he’s really finished. July 12: “Science is dandy, but what makes a world’s fair is sex and cotton candy.”—Gracie Hansen
July 13: Small town: a place where there’s no recreation for single folks once the sun goes down.
Update: Turns out the model is named Terry Higgins. We just discovered this in June 2015, but better late than never. At least you know we're always updating and refining the information on our site.
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The headlines that mattered yesteryear.
1954—Joseph McCarthy Disciplined by Senate
In the United States, after standing idly by during years of communist witch hunts in Hollywood and beyond, the U.S. Senate votes 65 to 22 to condemn Joseph McCarthy for conduct bringing the Senate into dishonor and disrepute. The vote ruined McCarthy's career. 1955—Rosa Parks Sparks Bus Boycott
In the U.S., in Montgomery, Alabama, seamstress Rosa Parks refuses to give her bus seat to a white man and is arrested for violating the city's racial segregation laws, an incident which leads to the Montgomery Bus Boycott. The boycott resulted in a crippling financial deficit for the Montgomery public transit system, because the city's African-American population were the bulk of the system's ridership. 1936—Crystal Palace Gutted by Fire
In London, the landmark structure Crystal Palace, a 900,000 square foot glass and steel exhibition hall erected in 1851, is destroyed by fire. The Palace had been moved once and fallen into disrepair, and at the time of the fire was not in use. Two water towers survived the blaze, but these were later demolished, leaving no remnants of the original structure.
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