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Professional aspirations

She moved to California because she was inspired by movies and acting and she always knew that she wanted to go into the performance industry. Because she had nowhere to stay and needed a job, she applied for a job as a cashier at a military post, Camp Cooke, in Montana, which didn’t last long. At this job, she got a lot of attention from her male co-workers, although because she was looking for a serious relationship that would lead to marriage, she did not go on many dates. Instead she spent most of her free time at home. She soon moved to Santa Barbara with a friend. After her arrest in 1943, she met Matt Gordon, the man she fell in love with and was going to get married, but was killed in war. He was in the military. She later moved to San Diego, staying with a woman she met named Dorothy French. She did housework for the French family but she frequently went out late-night and partied and dated men. One of these men was Robert “Red” Manley, he was a salesman from Los Angeles who was married with a pregnant wife. On January 8,1947 the two went out to party and stayed in a hotel room together. The next morning Manley dropped Elizabeth off at the Biltmore Hotel because she claimed that she was going back to Massachusetts but first needed to see her sister .

Arrest record

Elizabeth Short's 1943 Mugshot

While Elizabeth was living in Santa Barbara with a friend, she had a run in with the law on September 23, 1943 when she was out with some friends at a restaurant. They were causing too much commotion and were underage drinking so they had the police called on them. Because she was a minor, she was not charged with any misdemeanor. She was sent back to Massachusetts but soon returned to Hollywood California .

Family life

Elizabeth had a rough family life. When Elizabeth was only five years old, her father left, with some suspicious that he had committed siuicide. His car was found next to a lake, empty. Years later he mysteriously returned to his family, apologizing for leaving them, although his wife would not take him back, so he moved to California. Elizabeth lived in Hyde Park, Massachusetts with her family until she moved to California with her father in 1943. Her father soon after kicked her out because she was lazy and she was forced to live on her own .

Childhood

Elizabeth Short was born on July 29, 1924 in Hyde Park, Massachusetts to parents Sawyer and Cleo short. In 1929, Cleo went broke overnight due to the stock market crash. A year later, he was presumed dead from suicide. As she grew older, she grew very attractive and was known as a social girl.  While in highschool, Elizabeth suffered a severe lung condition that required surgery at the age of 15. Because of this, she had to drop out of highschool during her sophomore year. A few years later, her father revealed he was still alive, so she moved back to California with him until he kicked her out at the age of 18 .

Death

On the night of January 14, 1947, Red Manley dropped Short off at the Biltmore Hotel because she told him she was meeting his sister. Manley had a 6:30 pm appointment and left her there and did not wait until she saw her sister. She went missing for 6 days and her body was found, chopped into pieces, in a lot on the morning of January 15, 1947. She was found by a mother and daughter, laying on the street, nude. Her body was slashed in half at the abdomen. She also had slashes from the sides of her mouth all the way to her ears. In her autopsy, the marks found around her breasts indicated they had been made over a period of a couple of days, signifying she was tortured. There were also indications of rope burn around her wrist and ankles. After she was killed, the killer drained all of the blood from her body, then washed her body and hair. She was named the “Black Dahlia” because of her black hair, and her tendency to wear black clothes .

After Elizabeth’s death

After Elizabeth’s death, the media made the murder out to be her own fault. They deemed it as a “sex related crime” . According to the media, she was last scene “prowling the streets” in skimpy, suggestive clothing. She was known more for her appearance than her actual life. Most articles spoke about her life in a negative light, even in her memoirs. There were many stories of her becoming a “misguided girl” who chased about the country “in search of a service husband”. She was portrayed as a misguided girl who got caught up in bad social scenes.