CAMARILLO : Photographer of Marilyn’s Subway Pose Plans to Move

Camarillo is about to lose its link to one of Hollywood’s most famous figures: Marilyn Monroe.

Bill Kobrin, the photographer who shot pictures of the star in one of her best-known publicity shots, is moving to Palm Springs. With him, he takes pictures of Monroe that he shot in 1954 as a free-lance photographer working for 20th Century Fox during the filming of “The Seven-Year Itch.”

The photographs depict the famous scene of Monroe on a New York City street with her white dress billowing as she stands over a subway vent.

As Kobrin tells it, Monroe’s husband at the time, Joe DiMaggio, was unhappy that his wife was standing over a grate while her dress was blown waist-high before a crowd of 1,000.

“DiMaggio listened to the roar of the crowd rise and fall in time with Marilyn’s skirt. He was livid,” Kobrin said. “In 1954, Monroe was a starlet trying to achieve celebrity status, hoping to get good roles. She wasn’t the cult figure she is now.”

Throughout the past year, residents of Ventura County have viewed the photos in galleries in Ventura and Thousand Oaks. But now, Monroe fans will have to travel farther south to see Kobrin’s photographs.

“My whole physical being and psyche are leaving, and now Palm Springs is the home of Marilyn Monroe,” said Kobrin, 70, who plans to move Dec. 7 with his wife, Virginia. A resident of Leisure Village, Kobrin came to Camarillo in 1978. Since then, he said he has become unhappy with the way the city’s population has grown.

“What drew us here was the marvelous open spaces and the agricultural lands,” Kobrin said. “We decided we would not like to be around to see what happens here. I see on the horizon a miniature San Fernando Valley.”