CHAPTER 2
Stripping and Being Stripped
Vickie Lynn Marshall stunned everyone when she died unexpectedly in February 2007 at the age of 39. Her death, like her life, ignited a firestorm of media coverage.
Having a hard time remembering just who Vickie Lynn Marshall was? That’s probably because you know her better for her colorful professional career—as an iconic sex symbol. In the 1990s she epitomized the definition of a blonde bombshell. Her curves seared the pages of Playboy magazine leaving little to the imagination, and in 1993 she captured the Playmate of the Year title, solidifying her as an American sex icon. Hers was the face of Guess Jeans and her image appeared in magazines, on television, and in numerous modeling ads. If you are still struggling to figure out who she was, perhaps you knew her by her professional name: Anna Nicole Smith.
Vickie Lynn Marshall—widely (and hereinafter) known as Anna Nicole Smith—may have grabbed national attention as a model, but she stole the media spotlight in 1994 when, at the age of 26, she married 89-year-old self-made billionaire J. Howard Marshall II.
Marshall, a Yale law school graduate, earned his money the old-fashioned way with academic excellence, hard work, and an entrepreneurial spirit. Although he served on the Yale faculty, and later became assistant dean of Yale Law School, it was oil that ran through his veins. He co-authored two articles about oil industry regulations that in 1933 led to his employment in our nation’s ...
