Who Was Israel Before the Forgeries?
Born on Dec. 3, 1938, Leonore Carol Israel was a lifelong New Yorker who never had any desire to work a normal 9-to-5 job. As reported by The New York Times in 2015, Israel earned a bachelor's degree in speech from Brooklyn College in 1961. Afterward, she made a living as a freelance writer for outlets ranging from The Times to Soap Opera Digest. Then, in 1972, she published her first book: Miss Tallulah Bankhead, a biography of the famous actress's life. She followed up her first biography with a second; this time her subject was the journalist Dorothy Kilgallen, and her efforts landed her on the NYT bestsellers list.
It was at this point that Israel's fortunes took a turn for the worse. Her third novel was an unauthorized biography of Estée Lauder, which arrived in bookstores at the same time as the famed cosmetics icon's authorized biography hit the shelves. With her third book a flop, Israel's career took a downturn that ultimately led to her living on welfare and unable to pay for her sick cat's medical expenses.
During a 2008 interview with NPR, Israel explained it was at this point that she saw an opportunity to make enough money to get her cat's health test results back. While she was at the library, she was left alone with some valuable letters, and she told NPR that she "took a couple of Fanny Brice letters, slipped them in my sneakers, and sold them to a place called Argosy on the east side of New York City."