Linda Douglas

This honey blonde, blue-eyed former beauty queen came endowed with a peaches-and-cream complexion and an entrancingly smoky voice. She seemed destined for Hollywood stardom. Yet, as so often in those days, success failed to materialise. She was born Mary Jo Tarola to Joseph and Mildred Tarola in Portland, Oregon. In 1948, she changed her distinctive name to the rather more commonplace stage moniker 'Linda Douglas' and was signed under that name by RKO in 1952. She made just three pictures -- none of them particularly memorable: a couple of Tim Holt westerns and a marital comedy in which she was billed third behind Victor Mature and Jean Simmons (ironically, having reverted back to her birth name on the urging of her parents). That was the whole extent of Mary Jo's career in films. That she attracted the headlines henceforth was due primarily to her off-screen dalliances. In December 1952, she married the self-styled 'Glamour Boy of Hollywood', 43-year old Pat DiCicco, a shady character with mob connections (allegedly an affiliate of Lucky Luciano) who operated under the guise of a talent agent to pimp out prostitutes and peddle drugs in tinseltown. He also had a reputation for abusiveness and violence towards women. His two former wives, the actress Thelma Todd and heiress and fashion designer Gloria Vanderbilt, suffered numerous beatings at his hands. Both sued for divorce on grounds of cruelty. His union to Mary Jo lasted (amazingly) just over seven years and ended childless. In 1964, Mary Jo got married again, (this time with happier results) to Hall of Fame Detroit Tigers baseball legend Hank Greenberg . She was widowed in 1986 and as Mary Jo Greenberg spent her remaining years at her Beverly Hills Regency style-mansion, latterly valued at $9.5 million.