Raquel Welch, 1940-2023: beautiful photos of a Hollywood icon

Raquel Welch was an American actress with a remarkable career going back to the 1960s. She died on February 15, 2023, at the age of 82 after a brief illness, TMZ reports.

Jo Raquel Tejada, now more commonly known as Raquel Welch, was born in Chicago in 1940. Her father, Armando Tejada Urquizo, was a Bolivian aeronautical engineer, and her mother, Josephine Sarah, was Irish American.

The actress told Men's Health, jokingly: "Bolivian blood isn’t a whole lot different than anybody else’s blood. But yes, I do have Bolivian blood. My father was Bolivian, which makes me half-Bolivian."

The actress explained that the Bolivian heritage may be where she got "some of my exotic features and certainly my skin tone. And I guess my.... visceral reaction to everything is kind of tinged with the Latina chromosome. But I consider that a good thing."

Of course, her name comes from Latin origins. But she was not going to change her name no matter what 20th Century Fox said. "They said it was difficult to pronounce, nobody’s going to remember it," she told Men's Health. "And they had a point. In school, nobody could pronounce my name. They just called me Rocky."

"But school kids are one thing, your career as an adult woman is another," she continued. "I took it as a challenge. I was like, 'Well, let’s see what happens.' You either embrace your identity or you let them force you into homogenizing yourself.”

Before she reached fame as an actress, Welch won beauty titles such as Miss Photogenic and Miss Contour in high school.

A captivating young woman, she went on to win the title of Miss San Diego – the Fairest of the Fair – at the San Diego County Fair and eventually the state title of Maid of California.

(Photo: CBS 8 San Diego / YouTube)

She tried to make the cross into acting, studying at college with a theatre arts scholarship. She received a few roles in local theatre productions until she first hit the screen as a weather forecaster at KFMB, a local San Diego television station.

A move to Dallas with her two children after her divorce meant she started her career again, this time as a model and cocktail waitress. Anything to make ends meet for her family.

She made the decision that she wanted to be an actress most of all and moved back to LA. There, Raquel she starred in small films and TV shows. Many remember her in her early days appearing on the weekly variety series 'The Hollywood Palace' as a billboard girl and presenter.

She became America’s symbol of attractiveness when she appeared dressed in a sheepskin bikini in the movie ‘One Million Years B.C.’ released in 1966.

This image propelled her to centerfold girl status. She was immediately recognized everywhere she went. The role brought her immense success during the sixties and seventies.

Later in an interview, Welch would say that production took a couple of snaps of her before she left the set and got on a plane. Then, when she got off the plane, the photos had been circulated around the world and she knew something big had changed.

It's the image everyone thinks of when they hear Raquel Welch’s name. The actress herself kept living with the phenomenon: “Every day, every day. I have people that handle my fan mail, and every day tons of photos come in, with requests for autographs. The fur bikini is the perennial one,” she told Men’s Health.

Raquel didn't actually own the bikini. In fact, the actress said, “They had to have several versions of the same costume, and they all had to be form-fitting. So he [the costume designer] literally designed it around me. Carl just draped me in doe-skin, and I stood there while he worked on it with scissors.”

Although she was often criticised for her acting skills, she still managed to win the hearts of many. The actress also appeared in magazines and became the fantasy of boys and men all over the world.

It should be mentioned that she never did a photoshoot or a movie with the full Monty; all her scenes were tastefully done.

Welch starred in the 1967 British spy film 'Fathom,' playing the lead role of Fathom Harvill. The actress captivated audiences in the opening sequence with what could be described as one of the most understated sensual scenes in any movie.

Photo: 20th Century Fox

Maurice Binder, who did the opening sequence, seemed to understand how to make it as seductive as possible, Raquel said. "He knew how to be sexy without being profane about it, and without being too graphic."

"I’ll be honest, I didn’t really understand it at the time," she said about that experience. "When we were shooting that opening moment in Fathom, it seemed silly to me. They had to explain it to me, and even then I was like, 'Okay, fine, whatever you think.'"

Over the next few years, she was cast in major projects including one costarring Robert Wagner in the 1968 crime film, ‘The Biggest Bundle of Them All,’ and also in films like ‘Bedazzled’, ‘Lady in Cement’, ‘Flareup’, and ‘Bandolero!’

Photo: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer

She said of her time as an icon, "I felt like there was always a struggle. There was this perception of 'She’s just a body. She probably can’t walk and chew gum at the same time.' In my first couple of movies, I had no dialogue. It was frustrating."

A greatly controversial movie was, of course, 'Myra Breckinridge.' It's a film about a man who travels to Europe to get a gender change, becoming the lovely Myra. Welch took the role of Myra to be perceived as a serious actress, progressing from just a hot woman to appearing in films that gave her the opportunity of more challenging roles.

Unfortunately it didn’t quite work out as planned. The film was a huge flop, receiving terrible reviews from critics and the public alike. Raquel herself even hated the film, saying: "It wasn’t the funny adventure it should’ve been. It was a bizarre adventure with some offensive things in it."

Aside from her work on screen, Raquel also appeared in the theater. She played on Broadway in ‘Victor/Victoria’ and ‘Woman of the Year’ in the 1980s and 90s.

Years later she would return to the world of modelling that she'd tried out as a young woman. She was the face of Lux Soaps, Foster Grant sunglasses, and she also had line of signature wigs and HAIRuWEAR extensions.

She also had an entrepreneurial side: Raquel launched a Beauty and Fitness book and a series of yoga videos. In addition, she had her own jewellery and skincare line.

In 1996, when receiving a star at the Hollywood Walk of Fame, she was finally recognised for her commitment to film.

In 2001, she received the Imagen Foundation Lifetime Achievement Award for her positive promotion of Latin Americans throughout her career. Welch said: "Latinos are here to stay. As citizen Raquel, I'm proud to be Latina."

A big accolade was the fact that she beat Marilyn Monroe and many other incredible beauties to come in at #2 in Men’s Health’s 'Hottest 100 Women of All Time' list. She beat some really tough competition. Controversially, however, she missed out on the top spot to Jennifer Aniston.

A global star, Welch remained true to herself. She famously said: "Once you get rid of the idea that you must please other people before you please yourself, and you begin to follow your own instincts - only then can you be successful."