Jonnie Nicely

Jonnie was Playmate of the Month for August 1956. Her pictorial was titled Command Performance.

Jonnie was born Jonnie Faye Nicely on Feb. 25, 1936, in Fort Smith, AR. Her mother died when Jonnie was two and her father died four years later. Jonnie was raised by her older sister. Jonnie entered an Oklahoma City convent school briefly, then headed west at age 16 and found work in modeling.

Jonnie first appeared in the pictorial, 2 Playmates for the Price of One, in October 1955. For the pictorial, Playboy asked photographer Hal Adams to shoot Jonnie and Jean Moorehead, from which editors would pick a Playmate of the Month. Jean was chosen for the October issue. Johnnie would become Playmate in August 1956.

Jonnie was 20 at the time of her Playmate of the Month pictorial. It was her third modeling job, according to a 1995 Los Angeles Times article. Of her work with Playboy, she is quoted in the article as saying, “Some people call it exploitation. I don’t. I think it does a whole lot for your self-esteem. When people find out I was in Playboy, they treat me like royalty.”

Following her pictorial Jonnie worked as a seamstress and a carhop, and performed in a traveling “girlie show” that performed at state fairs. Eventually she landed a job as an electrical installation mechanic at Rockwell International in Palmdale, CA, where she worked for 12 years. She retired in 1996.

According to the Los Angeles Times article, Jonnie dated actor John Hart, a star of the early TV series “The Last of the Mohicans.” She married three times. She met her first husband, Joel, while working as a restaurant hostess. Joel was a college athlete with an engineering degree, and was then studying law. But he suffered an emotional collapse four months after the wedding and was diagnosed with schizophrenia which saw him in and out of mental hospitals for several years. The marriage dissolved after more than five years. She later married Darrell Kline, on Aug. 21, 1975, and Stephen Kerwin, on Sept. 30, 1984.

Later in life, Jonnie was regularly featured at celebrity and GlamourCon conventions nationwide.

At the end of her life, she lived in Lancaster, CA. Jonnie died of lung cancer Feb. 6, 2013, in Los Angeles at age 76 after a lengthy battle with respiratory disease.

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Digital | Later in life

Playboy appearances:

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Television:

  • E! True Hollywood Story (2006) in the episode “Hugh Hefner: Girlfriends, Wives and Centerfolds”