Esther Williams Biography

Esther Willams was the youngest of five children of sign painter Louis Stanton Williams and Bula Myrtle, who was a psychologist. She was enthusiastic about swimming in her youth and took a job counting towels at her local pool to cover the entrance fee.

While there, she learnt from the male lifeguards who taught her the butterfly breaststroke. Her medley team set the record for the 300-yeard relay at the Los Angeles Athletics Club in 1939 and Williams was also the National AUU Champion in the 100-metre freestyle swim.

She had won three national swimming championships by the time she was 16 and was planning to compete in the 1940 Summer Olympics but these were cancelled when the Second World War broke out.

However, Esther's beauty made her an instant modelling star and it wasn't long before she caught the attention of legendary showman Billy Rose.

Esther starred as Aquabelle Number 1 in the elaborate musical - 'The Aquacade' - which featured hundreds of swimmers and special effects.

Following her water-born antics, she went on to star opposite Mickey Rooney in 'Double Life' in 1942. However, Esther was never far away from water and 'Bathing Beauty' became Hollywood's first swimming movie. Passionate about swimming, she mastered what were traditionally 'male-only' strokes such as the butterfly.

A string of successful musicals followed and by the end of World War II, Williams was a pinup favourite with returning Gl's. She carried out tours of hospitals, meeting wounded soldiers and cheering them up with jokes and stories.

Esther remained America's sweetheart for more than 18 years, appearing in 26 movies from the early 1940s to the end of the '50s.

When she wasn't swimming, Esther found time to marry four times - the third being Fernando Lamas who made a name for himself as Hollywood's Latin lover in the 1950s.

The romance between Fernando and the million-dollar mermaid Esther was richly chronicled in her best-selling autobiography, which was released in 1999.

She met first husband Leonard Kovner, a premed student, at Los Angeles City College and they married on 27 June 1940. They divorced in 1944 as Williams later explained in her autobiography that she realised she did not need a ring on her finger for security.

In 1945, she married singer/actor Ben Gage, with whom she had three children. During her first pregnancy, she reduced the amount of time she spent swimming and instead taught blind children to swim. She gave birth to Ben in 1949, followed by Kimball in 1950 and Susan in 1953. The couple divorced in 1959, with Williams calling Gage a parasitic alcoholic.

Williams married her former lover Lamas in 1969 and was submissive to him in return of him being faithful until his death of pancreatic cancer in 1982.

In 1956, after appearing in movies for more than 15 years, she lost her contract with MGM after she refused to star in a remake of the 1939 musical 'The Women'. Williams packed up her things, cleared her dressing room and left the studio. As a result of this decision the actress lost more than $3 million in deferred contract payments.

Later that year, she signed with Universal International and appeared in 'The Unguarded Moment'. Although she continued to make television appearances over the next decade, her career began to slow.

Williams was honoured in 1966 when she was inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame.

In 2007, she suffered a stroke and later revealed in an interview that when she opened her eyes afterwards she could not remember anything from her past.

However, Williams appears to be recovering well and made an appearance at a classic film festival in 2010.

She now lives in Beverly Hills with her fourth husband actor Edward Bell, who she married in 1994.