Joe DiMaggio Net Worth

Joe DiMaggio's Quotes

• It's almost a joke when some fan tells me I'm a great man. I'm just a ballplayer who works hard trying to get by.
• "I've never thought that was anybody's business but my own." - on his relationship with Marilyn Monroe.
• They call a man graceful because he hits a little ball with a certain swing. My father hammered piles on a railroad out of Martinez for 10 cents an hour to support a family. That was grace.
• "I don't have a coherent answer as to why that is. I don't try to knock people, hurt their feelings or beat them out of money, but I also haven't tried to create or maintain an image. I work to maintain my privacy." - on his status as a cultural icon.
• There was no grass. We played on asphalt with a big ball - a softball - but we threw it overhanded and played by regular baseball rules. When I was 11 or 12, I started playing with older fellas, guys in their 20s. I guess they saw something in me.

Interesting Facts about Joe DiMaggio

1. A monument was dedicated to him in Yankee Stadium on April 25, 1999
2. Inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame, 1955. Played for the American League's New York Yankees, 1936-1951 (except for military service, 1943-1945).
3. Holds the Major League Baseball record of hitting safely in 56 consecutive games (1941).
4. Never remarried after Marilyn Monroe's death.
5. Banned the Kennedys and Rat Packers from Marilyn Monroe's funeral.
6. His #5 is retired by the New York Yankees. [April 1952].
7. The day after his 56 game hitting streak ended, DiMaggio embarked on a second streak that lasted 16 games. Had he hit in game #57, he would have had a 73 game hitting streak! DiMaggio had a 61-game hitting streak in the minor leagues.
8. Became the subject of death threats while dating Myrna Fahey in 1964. The FBI determined the threats came from a patient at Agnews State Hospital (Santa Clara, CA) who could not bear to see DiMaggio with anyone other than Marilyn Monroe. In an irony, Monroe's mother, Gladys Baker, was a patient at Agnews when DiMaggio began dating Monroe.
9. Almost signed to write his memoirs with Joseph Durso, but backed out because he didn't want to talk about Marilyn Monroe. Durso went ahead and penned "DiMaggio: The Last American Knight." It was the closest DiMaggio ever came to cooperating with any of his biographers.
10. An estimated 20,000 well-wishers jammed the streets around San Francisco's Church of Sts. Peter's and Paul's to witness DiMaggio marry Dorothy Arnold.
11. Was sued by first wife Dorothy Arnold in June 1952 to get full custody of their son, claiming his now-girlfriend Marilyn Monroe posed a threat to the boy's morals. Suit was dismissed in February 1953.
12. Claimed Marilyn Monroe's body after her death, and arranged her funeral, paying for her casket and crypt, and was the only one of her former husbands to attend the funeral.
13. Diamond and platinum "eternity ring" DiMaggio gave to Marilyn Monroe after their marriage was auctioned by Christie's for $772,500. [October 1999]
14. Marilyn Monroe won an interlocutory decree from DiMaggio on 27 October 1954, but, under California law, the divorce was not finalized until exactly 1 year later.
15. Died at precisely 12:12 AM EST.
16. Wanted no money for his cameo in The First of May (1999), but SAG rules dictated he had to accept the minimum salary of $250 per day.
17. Vice-President of the Baltimore Orioles (1979 - 1988)
18. Executive Vice-President and batting instructor for the Oakland A's (1968 - 1969)
19. First athlete in North American pro sports history to be on 4 World Championship teams in his first 4 pro seasons. In total, DiMaggio led the New York Yankees to 9 World Series titles in 13 years.
20. Was born in a two-room dock-side house (destroyed by fire in 1948) and delivered by a midwife, identified on his birth certificate only as Mrs. J. Pico, at approximately 7:00 AM PST.