Unable to compete in the 1940 Summer Olympics because of the outbreak of World War II, she joined Billy Rose's Aquacade, where she took on the role vacated by Eleanor Holm after the show's move from New York City to San Francisco.

[2][3][4][5][6] In 1952, Williams appeared in her only biographical role, as Australian swimming star Annette Kellerman in Million Dollar Mermaid, which went on to become her nickname while she was at MGM.

[7] Williams left MGM in 1956 and appeared in a handful of unsuccessful feature films, followed by several extremely popular water-themed network television specials, including one from Cypress Gardens, Florida.

Before retiring from acting, she invested in a "service station, a metal products plant, a manufacturer of bathing suits, various properties and a successful restaurant chain known as Trails.

[citation needed] The two lived on neighboring farms in Kansas and carried on a nine-year courtship until June 1, 1908, when they eloped and set off for California.

[13] Her medley team set the record for the 300-yard relay at the Los Angeles Athletic Club in 1939,[14] and was also national AAU champion in the 100 meter freestyle, with a record-breaking time of 1 minute 9.0 seconds.

[20] To earn money for tuition, Williams worked as a stock girl at the I. Magnin department store, where she also modeled clothing for customers and appeared in newspaper advertisements.

[22] While Williams was working at I. Magnin, she was contacted by Billy Rose's assistant and asked to audition as a replacement for Eleanor Holm in his Aquacade show.

[27] In her contract were two clauses: the first being that she receive a guest pass to The Beverly Hills Hotel where she could swim in the pool every day, and the second that she would not appear on camera for nine months to allow for acting, singing, dancing, and diction lessons.

[29] To prepare, Williams and her publicity assistant would listen to Bob Hope and Jack Benny's radio programs, retelling the funniest jokes while at the hospitals.

[31][32] A (forged) signed, waterproof portrait of Williams was circulated among men in the United States Navy for a "capture the Esther" competition.

[17] This competition continues to this day in the Royal Australian Navy, which holds in its archives an "original" forged signed portrait while maintaining a "capturable" image for use in the fleet.

[37] Bathing Beauty, previously titled Mr. Coed, starred Red Skelton as a man who enrolls in a women's college to win back his swimming instructor fiancée, played by Williams.

A period musical starring Gene Kelly and Frank Sinatra, the two male leads' characters were players in a baseball team owned by K.C.

[6] Williams made Neptune's Daughter (also 1949) around the same time with co-stars Ricardo Montalbán, Red Skelton and Betty Garrett, who had also been in Take Me Out to the Ball Game.

Williams and Montalbán were originally slated to sing "(I'd Like to Get You on a) Slow Boat to China", but studio censors thought the song was too sexual (interpreting the word "get" as "have") and instead gave them "Baby, It's Cold Outside.

[55] In Dangerous When Wet (also 1953), Williams worked with three important male co-stars – Tom and Jerry and her future husband Fernando Lamas.

[citation needed] In 1953, Williams had been on maternity leave for three months while pregnant with her daughter Susan, and assumed she would go straight to work on the film Athena when she returned.

[56] However, production started without her, and the studio cast Jane Powell in the lead role,[57] rewriting much of the premise that Williams and writers Leo Pogostin and Chuck Walters had come up with.

[58][59][60] Many of her MGM films, such as Million Dollar Mermaid and Jupiter's Darling, contained elaborately staged synchronized swimming scenes, with considerable risk to Williams.

After 15 years of appearing in films, Williams was threatened with contract suspension from MGM after refusing the lead role in The Opposite Sex (eventually released in 1956), a musical remake of 1939's The Women.

Williams redecorated her dressing room to accommodate returning star Grace Kelly, packed her terry cloth robes and swimsuits and drove off the studio lot.

She would, however, make occasional appearances on television, including mystery guest appearances for What's My Line?, The Donna Reed Show, The Ed Sullivan Show, and two aqua-specials, The Esther Williams Aqua Spectacle held in London at The Empire Pool Wembley in 1956 and Esther Williams at Cypress Gardens which was telecast on August 8, 1960.

[16] Williams retired from acting in the early 1960s and later turned down the role of Belle Rosen, a character with a crucial swimming scene, in The Poseidon Adventure.[why?]

[50] She co-wrote her autobiography, The Million Dollar Mermaid (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1999), with popular media critic and author Digby Diehl.

[68] Their film, Neptune's Daughter (1949), was screened at the pool of the Roosevelt Hotel, along with a performance of the Williams-inspired synchronized swimming troupe, The Waterlilies.

Grant's therapist, Mortimer Hartman, described LSD as "a psychic energizer which empties the subconscious and intensifies emotion and memory a hundred times".

Grant said that, with the help of LSD, he had "found that [he] had a tough inner core of strength", and that when he was young, he "was very dependent upon older men and women.

[citation needed] On her death, CNN quoted[96] her International Swimming Hall of Fame biography, saying, "Her movie career played a major role in the promotion of swimming, making it attractive to the public, contributing to the growth of the sport as a public recreation for health, exercise, water safety – and just plain fun.

"[97] Actress Annabeth Gish tweeted a tribute, writing that Esther Williams was an "elegant, gracious movie star, legend and neighbor".