For most of us, childhood was a happy time, filled with curiosity and wonder.
But for some, childhood was something stripped too quickly to enjoy.
The Land Before Time is a nostalgic flashback to the 80s,
but it’s easy to forget that under the mask of the cute voice behind Ducky,
lies the grizzly past of Judith Barsi and her unfortunate demise.
Born to Hungarian immigrants Jozsef Barsi and Maria Virovacz on June 6th, 1978, Judith Barsi began acting from a very young age.
Eager to experience the American dream, Judith’s mother trained her to be a star.
Her success began at the age of five when she was discovered at San Fernando Valley Skating Rink
by a film crew who were shooting a commercial.
Mesmerized by the cute, petite child, they knew she would be perfect for their commercials.
Her first commercial was for Donald Duck Orange Juice
and after just one meeting, she was signed with Harry Gold & Associates Talent Agency.
Her success in 72 commercials eventually landed her larger roles in tv shows as The Twilight Zone and Growing Pains, and movies.
Her best known roles were Ducky in The Land Before Time and Anne-Marie in All Dogs Go to Heaven.
Her small stature and baby-face allowed her to be cast in younger roles,
especially so directors wouldn’t need to deal with younger actors, who would be easily distracted.
Judith was known to be excellent at following directions and a pleasure to work with.
According to agent Ruth Hansen, “when she was 10, she was still playing 7,8.”
With her quick success, she made upwards of $100,000 a year.
Eventually the family was able to buy a modest three-bedroom home in the West Hills, a suburb of LA.
Little did the public know, Barsi’s role in Fatal Vision as an abused child closely shadowed her own life.
Despite her success, there was darkness looming over in the Barsi household.
Jozsef was distressed from his unemployment and inability to find work so he turned to alcohol.
According to friends, he was prone to angry outbursts when drunk,
threatening men he suspected “snickering at him”.
He was what friend Peter Kivlen considered a show-off.
Jozsef claimed to have served time in New York for killing a man, yet there are no police records of his arrest.
In fact, he had only been arrested three times for DUIs.
The drinking outside was brought back to the home and so were the violent outbursts.
He was jealous of his daughter’s quick success and his employment situation,
but also felt a deal of possessiveness over her, according to Sandra Palmer, a Los Angeles Police Detective.
She was their main source of income and he considered Judith his “little girl”.
Despite her stardom and abuse behind the scenes,
Judith appeared to be a normal girl, playing outside with her friends and painting pictures.
This was not Jozsef’s first marriage.
Upon fleeing Hungary after the 1956 uprising and moving to France,
he met another Hungarian immigrant, Karla, whom he married and had two children with.
They experienced a similar form of abuse upon moving to the United States, until Karla left her husband and took her children to Arizona.
Abandoned, Jozsef followed his wife and children who decided to give him another chance.
However, this chance was broken, when he threw a cast iron pan at Karla’s face in another fit of drunken rage.
They filed for divorce shortly after.
In December 1986, Maria had filed a police report against her husband when he threatened to kill her,
accusing him of choking and hitting her face.
With no visible injuries she eventually declined to prosecute.
In 1987, before going to the Bahamas to shoot Jaws: The Revenge,
Jozsef held a knife to Judith’s thr--- and whispered, “if you decide not to come back, I will cut your thr---.”
Her Agent from the talent agency, Ruth Hansen, witnessed Jozsef reminding Judith what he had said before she left, sending the little girl into hysterics.
From then, Hansen knew there was something wrong.
According to sources, Maria would tell whoever would listen about the abuse and how scared she was.
Judith would often tell her classmates that she was afraid to go home.
That her dad was drunk and miserable, and wanted to kill her mother.
Concerned and aware about the situation, neighbours and family friends offered
refuge for Maria and Judith, but were pushed away.
In fact, a neighbour told LA Times that Jozsef “told me 500 times he was going to kill his wife…
I’d try to calm him down. I’d tell him, ‘if you kill her, what will happen to your little one?’” He would then claim he would kill her too.
Another neighbour claimed Jozsef said he would kill himself and Judith and keep Maria alive to suffer.
Due to what she experienced at home, Judith exhibited traits of trichotillomania,
a disorder that results from extreme stress and causes sufferers to pull out hair from their scalp, eyebrows, and eyelids.
She was reported to have plucked out all of her own eyelashes while pulling out her cat’s whiskers.
In May, 1988, Judith’s agent Ruth Hansen noticed she was crying before an audition, stating that she “couldn’t take it.”
Troubled by the situation, Hansen informed Maria that she should take Judith to see a child psychologist.
The therapist described Judith’s situation as “extreme verbal, mental, and emotional problems”
and that she needed to report it to the Los Angeles County Department of Children’s Services.
According to Ray La Motte, a spokeswoman for the LA DCFS, they had a plan of action to separate the two from their abuser,
but Maria decided that she needed to deal with the situation by herself and called it off.
Around this time, Maria had rented an apartment in Panorama City where she and Judith
would hide out during the day and return to their home at night.
According to Jozsef’s daughter from his previous marriage, Augie,
Maria was determined to stay at the house that Judith had worked so hard for.
It was Maria’s dream, after all, and she didn’t want Jozsef to have it.
“If anyone was gonna leave, it was going to be my father”.
Leaving also meant that she and Judith would have to go into hiding, which meant losing their source of income.
Fed up with the abuse and finally ready to leave, Maria would plan to serve divorce papers the next day.
Little did she know, these plans might’ve been the last straw for Jozsef.
On the somber evening of July 25th 1988, as Judith lay in her canopy bed, sleeping peacefully across from her pink television,
Jozsef Barsi entered his daughter’s bedroom and sh-- her once in the head.
Startled by the noise, Maria ran into the hallway to investigate, when Jozsef turned around and sh-- her as well.
Earlier that morning, Jozsef received a call from Judith’s agent, Hansen, wondering where she was.
The young girl had missed a crucial appointment with Hanna Barbera Productions Inc., which worried Hansen.
He lied and told her that Judith and Maria had taken a car to San Diego.
For two days, Jozsef Barsi wandered inside the house.
On July 27th at 8:30AM, he doused the bodies of his wife and daughter in gasoline and
lit the house on fire before eventually shooting himself with a .32 caliber pistol.
Their neighbour Eunice Daly was out watering her garden when she heard an explosion. Smoke started rising from the house.
“At first thought, as I ran to call 911 was “he’s done it. He’s killed them and set fire in the house, just like he said he would.”
Police officers raced to the scene of the crime and found the charred bodies of Judith Barsi and her parents.
Judith Barsi and Maria Virocacz were buried in Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Los Angeles. Until 2004, Judith’s grave remained unmarked.
Now, engraved on her tombstone is her iconic line as Ducky from The Land Before Time, “Yep, Yep, Yep!”
forever reminding us of the child star who continues to bring smiles to faces worldwide.
How could a father kill his own family? According to family friend Elizabeth Lindon, he felt that Maria was abandoning him,
just as his first wife did, and he couldn’t take the pain of rejection.
We’ll never know what made him snap—Whether it was the fear of being alone, or malicious jealousy against his own daughter.
Some blame Child Protective Services for failing Judith,
claiming that they should not have dropped the investigation at the request of Maria.
Others blame Maria for not leaving her husband sooner.
Regardless, the tragedy of losing a young life still occurred.
In loving memory of Judith Barsi, the closing credit song in All Dogs Go to Heaven, “Love Survives” was dedicated to her.
Undoubtedly fitting, because despite the twists and turns that this story took, love does survive in Judith Barsi's legacy.