Personal life of Frank Sinatra

Frank Sinatra had many close relationships throughout his life.

He was married four times and had at least six other notable relationships in between.

He had three verified children, as well as more than one of questionable paternity.

Frank Sinatra met Nancy Barbato (March 25, 1917 – July 13, 2018) in the summer of 1934, and they married on February 4, 1939, in Jersey City, New Jersey, Barbato's home town.

The wedding was held at Our Lady of Sorrows Church at 93 Clerk Street, after which the newlyweds lived in an apartment house at 137 Bergen Avenue.

Their first child, Nancy Sinatra, was born on June 8, 1940, and their son, Francis Wayne Sinatra, known as Frank Sinatra Jr., was born on January 10, 1944.

Both were born at the Margaret Hague Hospital in Jersey City.

Following the family's move to Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, Sinatra began engaging in extra-marital affairs, the first known with Marilyn Maxwell.

These affairs also became public knowledge and caused great embarrassment to Nancy Barbato Sinatra, who considered calling off their marriage then and had an abortion when she became pregnant in 1946.

A third child, Christina Sinatra, known as "Tina", was born on June 20, 1948.

The couple announced their separation on Valentine's Day, February 14, 1950, with Sinatra's additional extra-marital affair with Ava Gardner compounding his transgressions and becoming public knowledge.

Sinatra separated from Nancy on Valentine's Day 1950, after he confessed to his passionate affair with Gardner, and she subsequently locked him out of the house and hired a lawyer.

After originally just seeking a legal separation, Frank and Nancy Sinatra decided some months later to file for divorce, and this divorce became final on October 29, 1951.

Frank Sinatra's affair and relationship with Gardner had become more serious, and she later became his second wife.

Less widely known were Sinatra's continuing visits, his long, confiding late-night phone calls, and the convivial family dinners on birthdays, holidays and other occasions.

Although Nancy initially refused to divorce him, Sinatra was eventually granted a divorce in Nevada in October 1951, and subsequently obtained a marriage license in Pennsylvania, marrying Gardner in a small ceremony on November 7, 1951.

Following a turbulent marriage, with many well-publicized fights and altercations and an abortion in November 1952, the couple formally announced their separation October 29, 1953 through MGM.

He was inconsolable in the fall of 1953 after the split, and according to Kelley, on November 18, Jimmy Van Heusen found him in the elevator of his 57th Street apartment with his wrists slashed.

After the divorce, Sinatra continued to feel very strongly for Gardner and they remained friends for life.

Gardner's power in Hollywood helped Sinatra get cast in From Here to Eternity (1953) and his subsequent Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor helped revitalize Sinatra's film career.

Gardner filed for divorce in June 1954, at a time when she was dating matador Luis Miguel Dominguín, but the divorce was not settled until July 1957.

Sinatra blamed Peter Lawford, who had dated Gardner before, for the split, and it took six years for Sinatra to forgive him.

Sinatra married actress Mia Farrow on July 19, 1966, when she was 21 and he was 50.

At the time, Sinatra was enjoying a wave of renewed popularity as the song "Strangers in the Night" returned him to the top of the Billboard charts only seventeen days later.

They met on the set of Sinatra's film Von Ryan's Express.

She agreed to appear in his 1968 film The Detective, but when she reneged as her filming schedule for Rosemary's Baby overran, Sinatra served her divorce papers in front of the cast and crew.

They were divorced in Mexico in August 1968.

Additionally, Sinatra took responsibility for Gardner's business affairs long after the split, and was still dealing with her finances in 1976.

When she fell into ill health in later years, Sinatra paid $50,000 towards her medical bills.

In an interview for the November 2013 issue of Vanity Fair, Farrow said that she and Sinatra "never really split up" and answered "possibly" when asked if her son Ronan might be Sinatra's.

"Throughout the many years after they split, my grandfather came to visit whenever his crazy life would allow it," Mrs. Sinatra's granddaughter A. J. Lambert wrote in a 2015 remembrance in Vanity Fair.

"I can remember times when she would be on the phone with her ex-husband, and the next thing I knew some eggplant was coming out of the freezer to thaw so that she could make him some sandwiches when he showed up."

She remained profoundly private, uttering barely a word in public about her life with Sinatra, though their mutual feelings were clear, her granddaughter recalled, to those who knew them best.

"I know he never stopped loving her," Lambert wrote.

"And I know she never stopped loving him."

She never remarried and had outlived not only her ex-husband but also her son Frank Jr., who died in 2016.

Biographer Kitty Kelley claims that Sinatra had first seen photographs of Ava Gardner in a magazine and had sworn that he would marry her.

Ruth Rosenthal, a friend of Gardner's, stated that Gardner initially detested him upon meeting him at MGM, finding him to be "conceited, arrogant and overpowering".

Their similarities, however, from vices like smoking, drinking hard liquor and cursing, to their volatile tempers and love of violent sports, soon became apparent.

Nancy Barbato Sinatra died in 2018 at the age of 101.