PoeForward

Dead Girls

PoeForward.com

DEAD GIRLS: Historical Contemporary Future

HISTORICAL: Celebrity Wives Depression Era European Executed Porno Stars Starlets Western

The Original Dead Girl: Mary Rogers/Marie Roget

HOME

POE

EVENTS

POETRY

GALLERIES

DEAD GIRLS

LIBRARY

ABOUT US

STARLETS - DOROTHY STRATTEN

STARLETS

Dominique
Dunne

Peg
Entwistle

Virginia
Rappe

Rebecca
Schaeffer

Dorothy
Stratten

Sharon
Tate

Thelma
Todd

Dorothy Stratten

1960 - 1980

Dorothy Stratten's sweet personality and exquisite beauty perfectly exemplified the "girl-next-door" appeal of a Playboy magazine centerfold. Her appearances ushered out the naughty seventies and her murder would introduce the mad eighties.

Dorothy Ruth Hoogstraten was born in a Salvation Army hospital in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada on February 28, 1960 to Holland immigrants Nelly and
Simon Hoogstraten.

Dorothy's parents divorced when she was a child.

Her mother remarried and divorced again. Once again, Nelly found herself a single mother, but now with three children to support. While an A-student in school, teenage Dorothy helped out the family finances by taking a part-time job at Dairy Queen. Then, Prince Charming entered her life.

Paul Leslie Snider looked like a pimp. Besides dressing in the most cartoonish of seventies' clothing, he wore one of those slimy seventies' moustaches that made every guy who ever wore one look like a horny, raunchy, white slaver. In fact, Snider was a small-time pimp with high and mighty dreams.

In late 1977, Paul Snider entered the Dairy Queen and spotted his next conquest. He instantly knew she could be not only his meal ticket, but also his passport to the good life.

Snider began romancing young underage Dorothy. He seduced her and convinced her to lie to her mother. Although Snider looked and dressed like a pimp, Dorothy didn't notice. She had fallen in love. She felt she had found her prince as well as the father figure she had always craved.

From the beginning, Dorothy's mother and friends disliked Paul Snider. They weren't blinded to his manner or his manipulations. When Snider realized they weren't falling for his act, he forbade Dorothy to see her friends anymore. Not stupid enough to talk bad about her mother, instead, he told Dorothy that he wanted to "take care of her" all by himself.

In the summer of 1978, Playboy magazine founder, Hugh Hefner, announced he was searching for the young woman to be the magazine's 25th anniversary playmate. The winner would appear in the January 1979 issue of Playboy and receive $25,000.

Paul put his charm to work and convinced Dorothy to pose for nude photos. Snider even faked her mother's signature on the Playboy application.

When the Playboy staff saw Dorothy's photos in August, they were so impressed that they immediately flew her out to Los Angeles. Dorothy met with West Coast photo editor Marilyn Grabowski and founder Hugh Hefner.

"I was shaking so bad I thought
that everyone in that room could hear
my knees knocking!
I was so, so shy."
- Dorothy Hoogstraten

Dorothy moved into the Playboy Mansion while she posed for several photo sessions with photographer Mario Casilli. Dorothy began to feel comfortable and began to enjoy her life, making a lot of friends, attending parties, going dancing. Then in October 1978, Paul Snider showed up in town.

Dorothy and Paul moved in together. While she worked as a model and as a "bunny," Snider plied his schemes in the adult entertainment business.

Candy Loving became the 25th Anniversary Playmate. But Playboy chose Dorothy to be "Miss August 1979."

Following a Canadian tour, Dorothy returned to Los Angeles and began to take acting lessons. She started to get small parts in film and television.

"A lot of playmates want to become good actresses,
but they don't want to go out and work for it.
Dorothy was willing to give up everything
to become a good actress."
- David Wilder, agent

During the summer of 1979, Paul Snider, feeling the distance growing between him and Dorothy, begged her to marry him. Feeling obligated for all he had done for her, she agreed.

Playboy decided to make Dorothy the Playmate of the Year for 1980. While Dorothy and Casilli worked through the winter of 1979 on her photos, Paul spent her hard-earned money on cars and clothes.

In late 1979, Dorothy met the true love of her life. Film director Peter Bogdanovich met Dorothy and cast her in his upcoming film They All Laughed. While filming in New York City in early 1980, Dorothy and Peter fell in love and began a secret love affair.

Suspicious back in Los Angeles, Snider hired a private investigator and learned the truth of their relationship.

Dorothy drafted a letter to Snider, explaining herself and asking him for an amicable divorce.

"If you love me, you'll let me go.
I'm like a bird and I want to fly."
- Dorothy Stratten

After the film was completed, Dorothy returned to Los Angeles to work on another pictorial for Playboy. The photo shoot was frequently disturbed by Snider's constant angry calls to Dorothy who would become upset. Sick to her stomach, Dorothy began to think she was developing an ulcer.

Dorothy moved in with Bogdonovich into his Bel Air mansion at 212 Copa de Oro. By August, Dorothy had legally separated from Snider and they were negotiating a divorce settlement.

Around noon on August 14, 1980, Dorothy went to see Paul at the apartment they formerly shared at 10881 W. Clarkson Avenue in West Los Angeles.

Snider shot Dorothy in the face with a 12-gauge Mossberg shotgun and then killed himself.

Snider's roommate, Dr. Stephen A. Cushner, M.D., found the bodies that evening and called the police. By that time, the corpses were crawling with black ants.

Dorothy Stratten's body was cremated and buried on August 19, 1980 at Westwood Memorial Park. Dorothy's family and Peter Bogdonovich were stricken with grief.

Snider's body was buried in Schara Tzedeck Cemetery, in Vancouver.

"As long as it's good and it makes me happy."
- Dorothy Stratten

HISTORICAL: Celebrity Wives Depression Era European Executed Porno Stars Starlets Western