The Virginia Street Bridge from “The Misfits”

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Another Marilyn Monroe location that I dragged my dad and grandmother out to stalk while visiting Reno, Nevada last month was the famed Virginia Street Bridge, aka the “Bridge of Sighs”, which was featured in the 1961 film The MisfitsAs I mentioned in last Friday’s post about the Washoe Country Courthouse, during the first half of the Twentieth Century, Reno was known as “the Divorce Capital of the World” and the “Great Divide” due to its lenient divorce laws.  People from all over the United States would temporarily relocate to the “Biggest Little City in the World” in order to be granted a quickie divorce, or to get “the six week cure” as divorces were dubbed in 1931 when residency laws in Reno were shortened to a scant six weeks.  According to tradition, after receiving their final dissolution of marriage decree, which was also called “being Reno-vated”, newly-single female divorcees would leave the courthouse and immediately head one block north to the Virginia Street Bridge to toss their wedding rings into the Truckee River as a symbol of celebrating their new-found freedom.

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In The Misfits, immediately after being granted a divorce at the Washoe County Courthouse, Roslyn Taber (aka Marilyn Monroe) and her friend Isabelle Steers (aka Thelma Ritter) head to the Virginia Street Bridge where Isabelle tries to convince Roslyn to toss her ring into the Truckee River by saying, “If you throw in your ring, you’ll never get another divorce.” Contrary to what has been reported on countless tourism websites and in numerous filming location books, Roslyn does not in fact throw her ring into the river, but instead walks off to grab a drink at the supposed Harrahs Club (filming actually took place at the now-defunct Mapes Hotel Casino) with the band still safely encircling her finger. In the scene, Marilyn and Thelma stood on the southwest corner of the Virginia Street Bridge, facing the Sierra Street Bridge, which is pictured in the background of the above screen captures.

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That same view is pictured above.

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It is widely debated as to how the ring-tossing tradition began and some historians even believe the whole thing was quite simply a publicity stunt dreamed up by Reno officials hoping to lure divorce-seekers – and their money – into the city.  The first known account of the Virginia Street Bridge ring-fling was depicted in a 1927 informational pamphlet titled “Reno! It Won’t Be Long Now: Ninety Days and Freedom”.  The custom became more widely known when Cornelius Vanderbilt, Jr., who came to the Silver State in 1927 in order to obtain a divorce, penned his 1929 premiere novel Reno, in which one of his main characters throws his wedding band into the Truckee River.  In October of 1930, a movie based on Vanderbilt’s book was released and the rest, as they say, is history.  And while numerous historians were apt to dismiss the tradition as myth, the ring-toss lore became inexorably woven into the pages of Reno’s history and in 1976, three fortune-seeking citizens who were searching for coins in the Truckee River wound up excavating more than 400 wedding bands from the area directly underneath the Virginia Street Bridge, forever quieting the legend’s many naysayers.

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No matter how the tradition began, whether a legitimate custom dreamed up by newly-minted divorcees or a marketing tool created by city officials, the Virginia Street Bridge is an ABSOLUTELY gorgeous place to visit and I cannot more highly recommend stalking it!  The structure that stands today was originally built in 1905 by San-Francisco-area architect John B. Leonard.  Amazingly enough, the span was actually the fifth to be constructed in that particular spot linking Virginia Street above the Truckee River.  The first bridge was engineered in 1860 by a man named Charles W. Fuller and was known, appropriately, as “Fuller’s Crossing”.  The wooden and log construction could not withstand the strength of the Truckee, though, and was sadly washed away in a flood in 1861.  Four replacements followed, the last of which is the Beaux-Arts-style structure pictured above.

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As you can see above, the area surrounding the Virginia Street Bridge, which includes a “River Walk”, a public park, flowing waterfalls, and outdoor restaurants, is truly breathtaking and my dad absolutely fell in love with the place.  While there, he kept enthusing, “I cannot believe I never would have known this area existed if not for you and your stalking!”  I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – stalking is the VERY best way to discover off-the-beaten-path, not-in-a-guidebook type spots.  So I guess I should be saying, “Thank you, Marilyn!” for this one!

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While there, I just had to make my grandma – who at 86 years old was still up for walking miles around Downtown Reno to do some Misfits stalking with me – pose for a pic.  The woman absolutely rocks my world and I can only hope that I am in half as good a shape as she is when I enter my golden years!  I love you, Grandma!

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

The Virginia Street Bridge - The Misfits

Stalk It: The Virginia Street Bridge spans the Truckee River on South Virginia Street, in between Island Avenue and Truckee River Lane, in Downtown Reno, Nevada.  In The Misfits, Marilyn Monroe and Thelma Ritter stood at the southwest corner of the bridge, near where Island Avenue meets South Virginia Street, in the area depicted with a pink circle in the above aerial view.

The Washoe County Courthouse from “The Misfits”

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As promised, while visiting my grandmother in Reno last month, I did indeed bring along a copy of The Misfits on DVD and we did indeed watch it.  Prior to gathering around her television set, my grandma informed me that she had actually seen The Misfits once before, back in 1961 when it first came out in theatres.  How incredibly cool is that!  When I asked her if she had enjoyed it, she said “No, not particularly.”  Ha!  My grandmother has never been one to mince words.  Winking smile She told me that the movie was a bit too depressing for her taste and that the horse-wrangling scenes seriously disturbed her.  Now, having seen the flick myself, I can say that her analysis was spot on.  The Misfits was seriously depressing and I had to fast-forward through each and every one of the scenes involving horse-wrangling.  I must say, though, that it was, as always, thoroughly enjoyable to see my girl Marilyn Monroe onscreen in what many consider to be her finest performance.  Every time MM would enter a scene, my mom, who watched the film with us, would say, “God, she was beautiful!”  And it is so true!  The camera certainly loved Marilyn and she was absolutely luminous in The Misfits, which, as fate would have it, was the last picture the starlet ever completed.

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A very brief, but important scene from The Misfits, which was filmed almost in its entirety in the Silver State, takes place at the Washoe County Courthouse in Downtown Reno, a building which is still in use to this day.  So I, of course, just had to drag my dad and my grandma out to stalk the place while we were in town. (My mom, who had just had back surgery, decided to sit this one out.)  The absolutely beautiful, neo-classical-style courthouse was originally designed in 1911 by Frederic DeLongchamps, in what was to be the prolific Nevada-area architect’s very first solo commission.  The stunning structure, which was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1986, cost $250,000 to construct and features a copper dome, towering Corinthian columns, a large portico, terrazzo tile flooring, and a stained glass ceiling.

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Sadly though, as you can see above, no photography whatsoever is allowed inside of the building.  According to the Yahoo! Travel website, more marriage licenses have been given out at the Washoe County Courthouse than at any other courthouse of its size in the entire country. Consequently, due to Reno’s lenient divorce laws (the city’s waiting period for a divorce in the early 1900s was only six months; in 1927 that waiting period was shortened to three months; and in 1931 it was shortened yet again to a scant six weeks!), countless marriages have ended within the courthouse walls, as well, resulting in the city being dubbed “The Divorce Capital of the World”.  In the 1930s alone over 33,000 divorces were granted at the historic courthouse, which is, I am guessing, how The Misfits came to be filmed there.

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In The Misfits, Guido (aka Eli Wallach, whom my sharp-as-a-tack, 86-year-old grandmother immediately recognized as Arthur Abbot from fave movie The Holiday), drives Roslyn Taber (aka Marilyn Monroe) and her friend Isabelle Steers (aka Thelma Ritter) to the Washoe County Courthouse so that Roslyn can be granted a – you guessed it – divorce.  Guido drops the two women off on the northeast corner of South Virginia Street and Court Street in the scene, just across the road from the courthouse, which you can see in the background in the two screen captures pictured above.

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Roslyn and Isabelle then cross South Virginia Street and head to the courthouse, where they run into Roslyn’s soon-to-be ex-husband, Raymond Taber (aka Kevin McCarthy), and have a brief confrontation with him on the front steps.  I find it absolutely amazing that the courthouse not only still looks exactly the same today as it did in 1961 when The Misfits was filmed, but that the place is still in use almost a full century after its inception. SO INCREDIBLY COOL!

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While stalking the courthouse, I was under the mistaken assumption that Marilyn had walked up the north side of the front steps in The Misfits and I had my dad take a photograph of me posing there.  It was not until I got home and re-watched the scene that I realized that Marilyn had actually walked up the south side of the steps.  Ugh, I am such a blonde sometimes!  Ah well, I guess I will just have to go back and re-stalk the place during my next visit to Reno!

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  Smile

Stalk It: The official address of the Washoe County Courthouse from The Misfits is 75 Court Street in Downtown Reno, but the front of the building and the area that appeared in the movie is actually located around the corner at 117 South Virginia Street.