MARILYN MONROE - MONROE PAINTING AND PHONE BOOK FETCH $168,000

MARILYN MONROE's personal telephone book containing numbers for FRANK SINATRA and HENRY FONDA was sold at auction alongside one of her paintings for $168,000 (GBP88,000) on Saturday (04JUN05).

The SOME LIKE IT HOT beauty's 1962 painting of a red rose was initially inscribed to US President JOHN F KENNEDY, but the late leader was never given the present.

Instead, Monroe overwrote the inscription with another that reads, "Happy Birthday Marilyn Monroe". The piece sold for $78,000 (GBP41,000) to an art museum in Rhode Island.

The brown leather phone book, which contains hundred of names and address for celebrities including PETER LAWFORD and former husbands OE DIMAGGIO and ARTHUR MILLER, sold for $90,000 (GBP47,000), said DARREN JULIEN, president and chief executive of JULIEN'S AUCTIONS, which organised the auction of Monroe memorabilia.