1963 October 1^st Paige Young marries Mark Frederick Segal in Las Vegas, per nearly impossible to read ledger records found on ancestry.com.

An elopement likely in one of those 24-hour Las Vegas wedding chapels.

The record shows only the date and names.

 Paige’s new husband was born in 1942 and was the son of WW2 veteran Harold Segal and his wife. They resided in Sherman Oaks at 4518 Vista Del Monte, at one time.  Mark was a marine private who took combat training in 1961 at Camp Pendleton.

  Segal was also a car dealer at “Sea-Gull Motors,” a business started by his father, according to newspaper ads in the late 1950s, and Segal friend Rex Ramsey. Sea-Gull Motors either had several locations or moved locations several times in the Sherman Oaks/Van Nuys area in the 1950s and 1960s: 7211 Balboa Avenue, 4425 Van Nuys Blvd. and 6738 Sepulveda Blvd.

Rex Ramsey, a friend of Mark Segal’s, was a semi-successful race car designer and driver, told me that Mark’s father Harold Segal, also owned the business Fox Auto Service in the SFV, and the Segal family had several brothers in addition to Mark. He mentioned that the family was “pretty well-off.”

1963-1964 Paige and Mark live together as husband and wife at 4133 Crisp Canyon Road in Sherman Oaks, “South of the Boulevard.” Ramsey said that that the home was a cabin type, the kind that Hollywood stars would rent on the weekend to “get away from it all.”

It’s very close to the neighborhood where Diana Cotterell lived and attended elementary, Dixie Canyon, and junior high school, Van Nuys Junior High.

Paige continues to board her horse Hamish at Sepulveda Stables.  I corresponded with a woman who told me that when she was 12 years old, she met Paige at Sepulveda Stables; Paige was about 19/20 years old and Paige drove her to the house on Crisp Canyon Rd., to hang out and drink lemonade.

August 28, 11 months after her Las Vegas marriage, Paige and her attorney file for divorce from Mark F. Segal. Paige is represented by rising Beverly Hills attorney Marvin M. Mitchelson.

Below are just a few of the dozens of divorce documents I obtained from a records department located in Downtown LA.

 The filing below states that Mark threatened Paige and her animals with bodily harm “on numerous occasions,” and on August 17, 1964, “brandished a knife in her presence,” and “Plaintiff’s profession is that of an artist and painter and on or about June 15, 1964, defendant maliciously and with intent to destroy plaintiff’s artwork drove nails through plaintiff’s prized paintings and further did mischievous damage by driving nails through plaintiff’s personal belongings including an expensive fur stole.”

Paige requests and is granted a temporary restraining order from the court.

Mark quickly countersues and denies all of Paige’s claims of abuse. He claims that she is the one who caused him mental anguish and suffering. I see nothing in the documents further explaining what Mark meant by that, no further details on what Paige did to him.

Marvin Mitchelson, on behalf of client Paige, asks for alimony, lawyer’s fees and court costs: “Plaintiff is not employed and presently embarking on a career as a painter, therefore needs the money from Defendant who is able bodied and employed.”

 Marks balks at this request and states he can’t afford it.

The divorce filing was picked up by the wire service UPI and appears in several of newspapers across the country.

We might call these headlines “clickbait” today.

There is a high probability that Marvin M. Mitchelson was behind the above stories.

Beginning early in his career, Marvin had a belief in the power of publicity and looked for ways to garner some for his cases.

“No matter how trivial the cause of action, if he (M.M.M.) found an angle, he could turn it into a story. And in the early days when his client list was still thin, he could gin up publicity by filing an oddball lawsuit himself.”

…”But Mitchelson knew that Man Bites Dog was what sold papers…this was 1964 and he had to work with the material fate sent him.”

Patti Corman recalled that for her in 1976 divorce, Mitchelson “called AP, UPI and every other P there is.!”

From the book “Ladies Man, The Life and Trials of Marvin Mitchelson” by John A. Jenkins

 This is likely the reason Mitchelson took Paige’s case despite her lack of ability to pay him any money upfront.  The case was unusual or “oddball” enough for it to be of use to him.

 Hollywood History/Celebrity Connections: Only a few days after the articles about Paige Young/Mark Segal divorce is published in a few newspapers, more news breaks that Beverly Hills LA talk show host, Pamela Mason, has won the unprecedented amount of over 1 million dollars in her divorce settlement from husband of 20 years: actor James Mason.

Her lawyer is Marvin Mitchelson.

Sept.1, 1964 Pasadena Independent, Pasadena, California.

Author Jenkins discusses the 1 million plus dollar settlement Mason case:

“Afterward in the courthouse corridor, “James (Mason) called the settlement ‘a flea bite.’ After all, he was getting off the hook without giving her any alimony at all. But Pamela was ecstatic. Her settlement was one of the first to break the magic million-dollar mark, and Mitchelson had gotten her, and himself, a ton of publicity about it.”

“The Mason case set the tone for the Hollywood divorces to come. Pamela was so grateful she did everything she could to make Marvin Mitchelson a household name. Pamela introduced Mitchelson to her divorcing friends…she became his entrée to those rarefied upper brackets of Beverly Hills and Hollywood. Pamela hired him eight months later for a 138, 500 breach-of-contract suit against actress Loretta Young on behalf of Pamela’s sixteen-year-old daughter Portland.”

“Pamela Mason introduced Mitchelson to her divorcing friends, all of whom were wildly delighted with the results, she later said.” END

The Mason case was a first as far as Hollywood divorces go, and a major breakthrough for the career of Marvin Mitchelson.

Later in 1964, Michelson represented legendary lyricist Alan Lerner’s estranged wife, Micheline in a very contentious custody fight.

Roy Cohn was Micheline’s divorce attorney in NYC. Yes, that Roy Cohn, who had a great admirer in Mitchelson.

  

Mark F. Segal came from a fairly well off Sherman Oaks family. His father Harold Segal owned a thriving car business according to his friend racing and stunt car driver, Rex Ramsey.

Still Mark Segal wasn’t anywhere near the league of My Fair Lady, Gigi and all the rest composer Alan Lerner.

However both men however did have some things in common that most divorcing men that year didn’t, and that was estranged wives represented by rising lawyer Marvin M. Michelson.

The other is being found in contempt of court by failing to pay alimony to these estranged wives.

 Mark’s attorney is Bernard Echt from Sherman Oaks. Echt, a few years down the road, would represent the milkman who was being sued by Vincent Bugliosi for suspected impregnation of his wife. Strange yet true.

 An initial agreement is reached pretty quickly: Sept. 18,1964 . Mark is required to pay Paige alimony, but only for six months.

This would be about $1000 in 2017, so the equivalent of $6000 total in today’s money.

1964 November 24:  Paige and her grandmother Virginia LaRocca are sworn-in for testimony in a Los Angeles courthouse, probably 111 Hill Street, for the divorce trial; Mark is a no-show. Virginia LaRocca testifies for the plaintiff, her granddaughter Paige. An interlocutory decree of divorce is granted to Paige on grounds of extreme cruelty.

 Paige waives her right to any further alimony payments beyond the six months.  Mark is also ordered to pay Marvin Mitchelson $300 (about $2072 in 2017 dollars) and $15.00 in court costs around $100 today.   Paige is awarded a 1953 MG Roadster; Mark is ordered to sign the title over to her.  Paige gets to keep certain antiques and wedding gifts.  Mark gets to keep his home at 4133 Crisp Canyon Rd. in Sherman Oaks.

Both parties are ordered to not annoy, molest or harass the other.

1965

This year shows Mark has not been making his required alimony and lawyer’s fees since 1964.

1965-Marvin Michelson goes hard on Mark Segal this year. For every month Mark fails to make his monthly alimony payment to Paige and the lawyer’s fees, Michelson files a contempt suit in court.

And it turned out to be all 12 months.

More on this in the next chapter.