Welcome to Hollywood Graveyard, where we set out to remember and celebrate the
lives of those who lived to entertain us, by visiting their final resting places.
Today we're exploring Eternal Valley Memorial Park, where we'll find such stars
as Tor Johnson, Gene Vincent, Tex Williams and many more.
Join us, won't you?
As our radius outside the Greater Los Angeles area continues to expand we
reach the Santa Clarita Valley, just north of the San Fernando Valley. Nestled
among the windswept hills to the south is Eternal Valley Memorial Park. In 1854
this area was a stagecoach stop called Lyons Station, which also served as the
local store post office and telegraph office. By the end of the Civil War
interments began to be made on this site. In 1888 it became the Needham family
cemetery, and by the 1950s grew to become Eternal Valley Memorial Park, spanning
220 acres. Part of the history of this place includes something you see just as
you enter the cemetery on the left. In a small glass pavilion is this vintage
horse-drawn hearse. Put into service around the 1860s it was the last
horse-drawn hearse of LA County.
We find ourselves here during a troubled time in our history. As a pandemic has
spread across the world even cemetery civ had to make adjustments. Many had
closed their gates for a time only to recently reopen, with precautions in
place, including mandatory face masks and social distancing.
Hollywood Graveyard in the age of coronavirus.
This is how we social distance:
hanging out with people who are always six feet away.
This may not be a moment in time we'll want to remember...
but there are plenty of things we can remember and enjoy to help us get
through this moment in time.
We'll begin our tour by turning right past the
chapel and heading up the hill to the north.
On the right is the Mark Twain Garden.
Herein we find a monument to, you guessed it,
Mark Twain, one of America's great writers and humorists. His novels include
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, often
called the Great American Novel. Just east of here is a section named for one
of Twain's literary creations: the Tom Sawyer Garden, which is where children
are laid to rest here in the cemetery.
Mark Twain was also renowned for his
witticisms and thoughtful quotes. One particularly prescient to Hollywood
Graveyard goes, "The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man who lives
fully is prepared to die at any time."
Twain was born shortly after the
appearance of Halley's Comet and he predicted he'd go out with it.
And so he did, passing away in 1910 the day after the Comet returned to its closest
approach to earth some 74 years later. If you saw our Viewers Special you might
recall our visit to the grave of Mark Twain, but in Elmira New York. This marker
here is a cenotaph - a memorial for us West Coasters to visit.
Look who else I found in this garden!
No it's not that Edgar A. Poe.
The poet of the same name is buried in Baltimore, and remains high
on my list of stars I look forward to visiting... someday.
Let's proceed along this road a little further and stop at the mausoleum on the right. This is the
Mausoleum of the Golden Oaks. Inside along the left wall just above eye-level
we find the crypt of actor Robert Bice. He appeared in around 200 film and
television productions in the 40s through the 60s. You could see Bice as a
guest star in just about every major TV show of the era, including
The Untouchables, and many westerns like The Rifleman and Gunsmoke. He also played
Walt Whitman in the 1955 film Foxfire, and will Scarlett in 1951s Tales of Robin Hood.
There are discrepancies about his birth year but he was only in his
50s when he died.
Just across the street south of the mausoleum is Whispering
Pines section. In several rows, in the shadow of a large tree, we find
Tor Johnson. Born in Sweden the hulking Tor began his career as a wrestler, dubbed
Super Swedish Angel. His 400-pound frame and shaved head gave him an imposing
persona, which by the 1930s he would bring to the big screen. He had smaller
roles in films like Shadow of the Thin Man, and Road to Rio. But he's best known
for his regular work with camp horror and sci-fi director Ed Wood, in films
like Night of the Ghouls, Bride of the Monster, and Plan 9 from Outer Space.
"Stop him Tanna, he's close enough! Turn off your electrode gun! NO!
No, stop him Tanna!"
"I can't get it, it's jammed!"
"Stop him you fool!"
Tor died of heart failure in 1971 at age 68.
Hopping back across the street to the north just a
bit further west is the Zane Grey garden. This garden area is named in honor of
another American literary figure, Zane Grey. He's known for his American
frontier adventure novels, including his best-selling book, Riders of the Purple Sage,
which has been adapted on film several times. As with Twain this is just
a memorial statue. Grey was laid to rest in Pennsylvania.
In the western corner of this garden we find Tex Williams.
He was a Western Swing musician known for his
talkin blues style. He was one of the most popular country entertainers of the
40s, perhaps best known for his song "Smoke Smoke Smoke (That Cigarette)."
[music]
The song was the opening theme for the 2005 movie
Thank You for Smoking. His popularity led Universal Pictures to bring him to
Hollywood to film a series of Western shorts. He died from pancreatic cancer
at age 68.
Just over this hedge west is Will Rogers garden. Most of the way in we find
the grave of Henry Wills. He was an actor and stuntman in Hollywood, known
particularly for his work in westerns. He gained a reputation as one of the best
horsemen in the field, setting a record for nearly 1500 horse falls in his career.
Wills would double for some of Hollywood's biggest names, like Alan Ladd,
and Roy Rogers. His skills also led him to become a second unit director on the
High Chaparral. He died from a heart attack at the age of 73.
This garden is named in honor of a legend of Hollywood --
Oklahoma's favorite son: Will Rogers.
More than just a film star, Will Rogers was a widely popular humorist, writer, and stage
performer. Hopefully someday we'll have a chance to visit his grave site on the
Will Rogers museum grounds in Oklahoma.
There are two notable monuments nearby. The first just west is a memorial
honoring veterans - the brave men and women who fought to preserve our freedom.
Perhaps the most distinctive monument at Eternal Valley is the Garden of Sardarabad,
a monument marking the 100th anniversary of the Battle of Sardarabad,
which took place in 1918, and was a pivotal victory for the survival of the
Armenian people against the encroachment of the Ottoman Empire. This is a
small-scale replica of the Sardarabad Memorial in Armenia which features two
winged oxen and 12 bells.
This monument was dedicated in 2018.
Continuing south we reach the Garden of Prayer. Near the western edge of this
garden, close to a tree, we find the grave of Cliffie Stone, real named Clifford Snyder.
He was a country music artist as well as a radio and TV personality.
He hosted local country-western variety shows on TV and radio, helping develop
the region's country music scene and launching talents like Molly Bee, and
Tennessee Ernie Ford. Stone also had a hit in the 1955 song, "The Popcorn Song."
[music]
Time has worn the marker making it hard to read, but it
says: Cliffie, a 21-gun salute to your life and our love. Hollywood Walk of Fame,
ACM Pioneer Award, Walk of Western Stars, and CMA Hall of Fame.
Hopping the street south again we reach one of the newer sections of the cemetery,
the Garden of Inspiration.
This is where we find the niche of actor William Bronder. You saw him in the 1986
classic Stand by Me, as the unfriendly junkyard owner Milo Pressman.
"I know your names.
You're LaChance. I know all you guys.
And all your fathers are gonna get a call for me.
Except for the looney up in Tokus.
He also appeared in a number
of TV shows in the 70s and 80s, like MacGyver, CHiPs, and Knots Landing.
Bronder was also a man who loved pigeons, and was a Hall of Fame member of the San
Fernando Valley Pigeon Club which races pigeons. He died in 2015 at age 84.
Continuing still further south we find a section known as the Garden of Liberty.
Just east of a monument featuring Lady Liberty we find Ed Gilbert,
real name Giesbert. He was an actor best known for his voice work.
90s kids will recognize him as Baloo in TaleSpin.
"We'll tell her we were ambushed by air pirates!"
"Awww, Baloo, you used that one yesterday."
"There we were, outnumbered a jillion to one.
We were dodging and weaving, and dodging...
Oh baby, what a fight!"
He was also Blitzwing in the Transformers, General Hawk in GI Joe, and
many many more. He also played Fenton Hardy on the
Hardy Boys Mysteries.
Gilbert died of lung cancer at age 67.
Before moving on let's say hello to Lady Liberty.
Turning east now, across the street, is the Garden of Meditation. Near the middle
of this lawn, under a tree, is the grave of Andrae Crouch, a legend of gospel
choral music. He was a seven-time Grammy winner known as the father of modern
gospel music, and was inducted into the gospel Music Hall of Fame in 1998.
His choral arrangements would also be heard in popular music and film, from the
choirs in the Lion King, background vocals in Madonna's "Like a Prayer," and
arrangements for The Color Purple, which earned him an Oscar nomination.
[music]
It was heart failure in 2015 that would claim his life at the age of 72.
As of filming his grave is unmarked.
Following this same row straight east we find
another musician, Roy Brown. He was a blues singer, a pioneer of early rock and
roll and R&B in the 40s and 50s. He had a hit record in the song "Good Rockin' Tonight,"
which has been covered by artists from Elvis to Bruce Springsteen.
[music]
He continued to perform right up until his death in 1981 from a heart attack,
and was posthumously inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame.
Turning north again let's stop at the northwest corner of the Garden of Peace.
This is the final resting place of Noble Johnson, real name
Mark Noble. He was a character actor who performed in close to 150 films in his career.
He got his start in the silent era, and in 1916 founded his own studio
to produce films made for African-American audiences, which at the
time were generally ignored. The Lincoln Motion Picture Company, as it was known,
strived to produce films depicting African-Americans as real and not just
as caricatures. As an actor he can be seen in a slew of legendary classics,
including King Kong, The Thief of Bagdad, The Mummy, and The Most Dangerous Game.
He died of natural causes at the age of 96.
Finally let's make our way to the easternmost section of the cemetery,
the Garden of Repose.
Fans of rockabilly music will recognize our last star, Gene Vincent. He was credited
for pioneering the rockabilly style. In 1956 he released what would become his
greatest hit: "Be-Bop-a-Lula," which drew comparisons to Elvis, and would later be
listed as #103 on Rolling Stones 500 greatest songs of all time. Even the
notes here on his marker loosely spell out the melody of "Be-Bop-a-Lula."
[music]
The song even played a role in the formation of the Beatles. John Lennon's Quarrymen
were playing at that fateful day in 1957 when John Lennon first met Paul McCartney.
A few years later Vincent was seriously injured in the same car crash
that killed fellow rock musician Eddie Cochran.
His popularity led to appearances in movies like
The Girl Can't Help It," and "Hot Rod Gang."
His promising career was cut short in 1971 when he died from a ruptured stomach
ulcer, possibly brought on from excessive drinking.
He was just 36.
Gene Vincent was the first inductee into the rockabilly Hall
of Fame, and the next year was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
And that concludes our tour.
What are some of your favorite memories of the stars we visited today?
Share them in the comments below, and be
sure to like, share, and subscribe for more famous grave tours.
Thanks for watching! We'll see you on the next one.
A lots changed in the world since our
last video, as you can see... this mask is no fashion statement. Even cemeteries are
requiring facial masks and social distance of six feet or more.
Though, staying 6 feet away from others in a cemetery is not exactly a challenge.
Still, these are difficult times, and I think during this time maybe you, like me,
and many others, have turned to some of our favorite entertainers to help get us through.
Movies, books, television, music, have all helped distract us from the crisis that
we're facing, perhaps giving us a renewed appreciation for the value of the arts.
But at the same time I think a lot of us have a renewed appreciation for the
value of the work that a lot of you do out there -- those of you on the front
lines who are helping to keep the world spinning while for many of us it seems to
be spinning out of control: health care workers, nurses, doctors, scientists, first
responders, grocery store workers, transportation workers, all of
you who are helping to fight on the front line to give us a sense of
normalcy during this difficult time.
I want to extend my gratitude to all of you.
You are all every bit the superstar and superhero that we've come to
recognize here on Hollywood Graveyard.
Thank you. Stay safe my friends, we'll see you soon.