Gourmet Ghosts 2

By James T. Bartlett

With an arsenal of poison, jealousy, despair, serial killers, scandals, guns, and the ghost stories left behind, Gourmet Ghosts 2 is a collection of murder, mystery and history at dozens of bars, restaurants, hotels and landmarks across Los Angeles.
These weird tales, unpublished accounts, shocking photos and treasures uncovered in the newspaper archives will take you from Downtown to The Valley – and beyond. Learn the truth about “The Romeo Slasher,” “The Rose Murder,” the Deadliest Hotel in L.A. and many more, plus discover where you can drink with the devil or dine with a ghost.

• Language: English
• Publisher: City Ghost Guides
• Release date: Aug 23, 2016
• ISBN: 9780997582918

Book preview

Gourmet Ghosts 2

Gourmet Ghosts 2

Gourmet Ghosts 2

James T. Bartlett

City Ghost Guides

Copyright © 2016, James T. Bartlett

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored, or transmitted by any Means – whether auditory, graphic, mechanical, or electronic – without written permission of both publisher and author, except in the case of brief excerpts used in critical articles and

reviews. Unauthorized reproduction of any part of this work is illegal and is punishable by law.

Gourmet Ghosts logo: U.S. Trademark App No. 86740897

ISBN 978-0-9975829-0-1

Special Thanks To...

Nina Monet, Amy Inouye at Future Studio, and the History & Genealogy Department at the Los Angeles Central Library.

Dedicated To...

My wife Wendall Thomas, who still loves and supports me. 

Introduction

Welcome to Gourmet Ghosts 2, another look into the dark, deadly and weird history of Los Angeles. In these pages you’ll find bars, restaurants and hotels where you can drink with the devil or learn about the strange side of the City of Angels – maybe even both at the same time!

Serial killers, suicides, snipers, scandals, scams, robberies, arsonists, murders and unexplained mysteries: they’re all here, sometimes even in one location (see The Cecil, the Deadliest Hotel in L.A. and the focus of a bizarre death that went viral around the world).

Just like I did for Gourmet Ghosts – Los Angeles, the first book in the series, I scoured the newspaper archives for true crimes known and unknown, spoke to employees and eye witnesses about what they had seen and heard, and again uncovered some very strange connections.

I unearthed new ghost stories as well, but because I found so many amazing stories and hidden treasures that I couldn’t include (well, if I stuck to the idea that they had to be at a place you could go for a cocktail or a bite to eat), I decided to break the rules this time.

So, in some entries you might not find a bar or a restaurant, but you’ll learn about a previously-unpublished death at the Hollywood Bowl, the place MLK’s assassin plotted his deadly deed, the Rose Murderer – and others.

Really, how could I have kept them from you?

History, murder and mystery are a potent mix, so you can continue your investigations by getting a copy of Gourmet Ghosts – Los Angeles.

Inside that book you’ll learn about The Night Watchman at the Last Bookstore, La mujer sin cabeza (the Headless Woman) at Musso & Frank Grill, Millie at the Paradise Cove in Malibu, and James Z. Oviatt, who is still haunting the building that killed him.

You can submit your own stories and read more at www.gourmetghosts.com and keep right up-to-date on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram too – just search for Gourmet Ghosts.

Finally, the guide for how much you might expect to pay in these bars, restaurants and hotels is roughly as follows:

$ - Cheap, fun night

$$ - A few more bucks for the bang

$$$ - Standard L.A. prices

$$$$ - Serious cash

Apologies in advance if you go to one of the locations listed here and find that something’s different. I did try to keep Gourmet Ghosts 2 as current as possible, but sometimes things just disappear into the night…

Contents

Hollywood & W. Hollywood 

Mid-City & Beverly Hills

Downtown

Silver Lake to the SFV

Beaches & Further Afield

Take Out / Off The Menu

Bibliography

About The Author

Chapter 1

Hollywood & W. Hollywood

The Hollywood Sign

The Hollywood Bowl

Frolic Room

Hollywood Historic Hotel

Hollywood Plaza Hotel

Scientology Building

Sunset Tower Hotel

Crossroads of the World

Updates

The Hollywood Sign

The Famous Suicide and the Unknown Accident

Perhaps the most famous icon in the world, the Hollywood sign was originally designed by forgotten sign-maker Thomas Fisk Goff (though a couple of other people claimed the honor too).

Born in London in 1890, Goff had settled in Los Angeles by the 1920s and was doing well as the owner of the Crescent Sign Company, so his commission from a real estate company looking to sell land under some hills was probably no big deal at the time.

Hollywoodland

Originally the hillside sign spelled out the word Hollywoodland, the name of the development area, and Goff’s design saw the 50 foot high, 400 foot long sign lined with 4000 flashing light bulbs to attract buyers.

It was only meant to last a year or so after it was unveiled in 1923, but by the time the bulbs went out and the promotion was over, Hollywoodland meant something much more glamorous.  

But glamorous or not, the Hollywood sign has had a checkered history.

For a start, a drunken caretaker who lived on site once drove his car into the H in the early 1940s, and in 1949 the H fell down after a storm, the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce quickly offering $5,000 for a replacement so it didn’t become known as ‘ollywoodland.

They also agreed to the removal of the LAND letters, and though the sign has been destroyed in many blockbuster movies and alien invasions, by the late 1970s the rotting, much-vandalized sign faced destruction for real, despite having been declared Cultural Historical Monument #111 in 1973.

Luckily, it was saved with donations from an odd mix of celebrities including Alice Cooper, Gene Autry, Andy Williams and Playboy’s Hugh Hefner, all of whom paid around $27,700 per letter, and when Goff died in early 1984, he was doubtless still unable to believe what had happened to his sign.

Over the years the sign has been renovated – most recently with 275 gallons of paint to celebrate her 90th birthday – and even occasionally altered for charity events (or as a prank or protest), but today the priceless 350 foot landmark is closely monitored by the LAPD and Griffith park officials.

The Most Famous Suicide in Tinsel Town

While the Hollywood sign might seem to be the very symbol of fame and success, it was also the place where someone who had had seen their movie dreams crushed came to end their life.

Born in Wales in 1908, Millicent Lillian Peg Entwistle was just a young girl when her family – her father was also an actor – came to America.

She had some early success in Broadway theatre, and when she came to Los Angeles in 1932 for the play Mad Hopes, she got more good reviews.

She naturally then tried out for the big screen, but despite her blond hair, blue eyes and theatrical prowess, her luck ran out.

Around September 16, 1932, after leaving a suicide note with her shoes, purse and jacket, Entwistle climbed a workman’s ladder to the top of the H and looked out over the city for the last time before leaping to her death.

An anonymous woman called in the discovery of the body and left Peg’s belongings on the steps of the Hollywood Police station. The body was later found at the bottom of a hundred foot ravine, and the cause of death was multiple fractures of the pelvis.

The LA Times published a picture of the smiling Entwistle and the melodramatic report on the spectacular suicide, the story reading in part: a house of cards that came tumbling down and revealed to her the futility of fleeting fame!

The suicide note was published too:

I am afraid, I am a coward. I am sorry for everything. If I had done this a long time ago, it would have saved a lot of pain. P.E.

Her ashes were sent to Ohio for burial next to her father, and her only movie appearance – a small part in Thirteen Women alongside Irene Dunne and Myrna Loy – hit theaters soon after her death, but it was not a success.

Ironically, her suicide at the age of just 24 did bring Peg posthumous fame.

She’s been the subject of many books and even a 2014 opera called Goodnight September, and then of course there’s the rumor that she lives on in spirit, still haunting the place where she took her final bow.

The smell of gardenias…

Apparently her ghost can be seen around the H of the sign, and even the smell of her perfume (gardenia) has been noticed here too.

Travel Channel show Ghost Adventures looked into this haunting, and in 2014 the Halloween edition of Vanity Fair quoted a jogger who, while running through another part of Griffith Park, began sneezing when she felt the overpowering scent of gardenias.

More frighteningly, she then said that she saw a woman with blond hair who seemed to be walking on air.

The Unknown Accident

But Peg wasn’t the only person who died up here at the Hollywood sign.

A story that doesn’t seem to have made the pages of any other books, it took place in March 1988 when Susan Diaz, 16, her brother Michael and several other people went climbing up under the Hollywood sign to take pictures.

Tragically, Susan and Michael both fell off a cliff and while Michael luckily wasn’t injured, Susan had to be airlifted to a Burbank hospital by helicopter, where she later died of head injuries.

For many years the sign and its surroundings had been accessible, and people did climb the steep, rocky hills to get pictures, drink beer, make out, or simply go hiking, but that’s just not the case today – and the death of Diaz is one of the reasons why.

So as inviting as it might be to get up close and personal with the huge letters, don’t go up there – you might end up in hospital or a jail cell.

www.hollywoodsign.org

The Hollywood Bowl

2301 Highland Avenue

Los Angeles, CA 90068

Tel: [phone]

Death Before Ghosts

Many tourists don’t realize that you can actually get a great view of the Hollywood sign from places in L.A., though perhaps one of the best vantage points is from inside the Hollywood Bowl, an outdoor venue that can seat around 17, 500 people.

The amphitheater was first carved into the wilds of Daisy Dell in the Griffith Park hills back in 1922, with the iconic white arched shell coming in 1929.

Since then it has hosted opera, ballet, theatre, music, Monty Python and President Franklin D. Roosevelt (not at the same time), and essentially everyone save for Elvis Presley has taken the stage here at one time or another.

Elton John holds the current record for the most performances, but the record attendance was over 26,000 for a recital by French opera star Lily Pons in 1936.

Before the show starts – and one of the biggest attractions of visiting the Bowl – is that you can bring your own picnic and beverages, from soda to champagne, for al fresco dining in and around the 15 picnic areas, as well as in your seat.

There are of course restaurants including the fancy The Backyard and The Wine Bar, burger joint Kitchen 22, Marketplaces, Street Food, and stores where you can buy cookies, sandwiches, popcorn, cheeses, beer, wine, coffee, snacks and of course souvenirs.

However, aside from the bats that fly overhead when the sun goes down, there aren’t many ghostly stories associated with the Bowl (though there have been alien invaders; a skunk in the seats, a family of raccoons on the arches, and even a fox who came on stage during a show!)

But one night it was the location for a suicide that seems to have been lost to history, one that, perhaps if more people knew about it, might be said to rival poor Peg’s in terms of dramatic style.

Just take a quick glance at photographs of the dead body; they made me gasp out loud when they appeared on the microfiche at the Central Library.

On March 26, 1938, the LA Times reported on the last moments of a 45 year old interior decorator:

Under the curving concrete shell whence the music of the immortals ascends each season to the star-studded skies, Emanuel E. Linhart went, not for the accolade of the multitude, but for a tryst with death.

Found sprawled out on the stage by a janitor, Linhart had a pistol with one bullet missing lying next to his body. He had shot himself in the head, and while the LA Examiner had an amazing picture, the Los Angeles Evening Herald-Express headline read:

Hearst Communications, Inc

The motive behind his suicide was unclear, though it emerged he had won $3500 on the Irish sweepstakes a few years before.

Perhaps he had gambled or lived beyond his means, and had hoped for another moment of good luck…. but that luck never came.

$$$ & $$$$ Various; hours vary

www.hollywoodbowl.com

Frolic Room

6245 Hollywood Boulevard

Hollywood, CA 90028

Tel: [phone]

Strange Guests

Though it’s a small dive bar, the Frolic Room has perhaps one of the most recognizable neon signs outside – it seems to feature in all articles and tour guides about Hollywood (and movies like L.A. Confidential).

It has a long history too, officially coming into being in 1934, though for years before that it had been the secret unofficial bar (the speakeasy) of the Pantages Theater next door.

The Pantages was built in 1930, during Prohibition, so naturally there were no signs – or even a front door to the bar – but people in the know would come up a side walkway (which is now where the women’s bathroom is) and go in to the storage room.

In that storage room, which is right at the end of the bar, you can still see the now bricked-up outline of a door that led directly to the theatre stage.

The Pantages Theater was built as a vaudeville and movie venue, and the bar was always part of that. They’re still the landlord of the bar today, though the Frolic Room itself is separately owned.

As for the inspiration for the Frolic Room’s name, it is said that one Freddy Frolic was the genial host for actors, guests and others at this illegal joint.

In 1949 Howard Hughes bought the Pantages and set up his offices on the second floor, and from then until 1959 it was the venue for the Academy Awards – and surely plenty of star-studded parties.

Later in the 1970s and 1980s, it suffered as the surrounding area of Hollywood fell prey to pimps, hookers, addicts and the homeless, though patrons still stayed loyal, and today it’s close to being a hip place as well as a dive.

Inside, the bar is dark, the jukebox loud, and the welcome friendly. Once I’d ordered a beer, bartender Gita Bull was happy to talk about her time here – some 20 plus years, she says.

She came to Hollywood with her parents when they emigrated from Romania, and she fondly recalled the days of clubbing on the Sunset Strip, when you could just talk to celebrities; they came out and partied just like us.

She also remembered talking to one of the bartenders who worked here back in 1947. He told her that in those days they used to fix sandwiches in the back and didn’t have a jukebox – just a record player. Frank Sinatra used to come in from recording at Capitol Records up the road with fresh-off-the-press vinyl records and play them.

In recent years, Gita said that Keifer Sutherland, who used to live in an apartment opposite, was a regular, though he hadn’t been in much recently.

I think he got divorced or moved, she said, adding that she got mail addressed to him c/o The Frolic Room.

Black Dahlia sitting at the bar…

She added that Charles Bukowski used to drink here (as he did around most of Hollywood) and that the Frolic Room was the last place Elizabeth Short – better known as The Black Dahlia – was seen alive.

Apparently she came here after being dropped off at the Biltmore Hotel downtown (the last place she was officially listed as being seen), had her last drink, and then met a man she left with.

Gita thinks the horrific (and still unsolved) murder was a date gone wrong, and that Short was accidentally killed and the man cut up her body and dumped it on waste ground.

She added that the 48 Hours television show had come out from New York to do a story on it, and that there’s supposed to be a tunnel from The Frolic to a long-gone bar across the street.

This is a common story at many bars – especially those that served liquor under the table – and while some tunnels have been found, many, including one from the Frolic Room, have not been located.

Handprints & Someone Trying To Escape?

Nevertheless, she did have a number of strange stories about ghosts and unexplained events, admitting that she always felt uneasy when she was here at night.

She recalled her friend who had been a bartender here in the late 1940s saying that once he had been wiping down the bar when a full handprint emerged where he’d just been cleaning; another time footprints emerged on the cement floor, clearly visible among the peanut shells.  

She also mentioned something that had happened to her and to a co-worker – but years apart. Neither had mentioned it to the other until a mutual friend who heard both stories made the connection.

Years ago Gita was here alone setting up the bar for the day when a man walked in and asked to use the restroom:

Then, for around 30 or 40 seconds, the women’s restroom door started shaking – as if someone was trying to get out.

Thinking the man had gone into the wrong bathroom and was crazy, Gita didn’t do anything – until the hapless man, white-faced and looking terrified, shot out of the men’s restroom (not the women’s), and ran out of the bar.

It rang similar to the story of her co-worker, who was there one Thursday night, closing up, when he went upstairs to the liquor room where the bottles are kept in a locked area.

The lock on the liquor room began shaking violently, and he was so scared he put down the bottles he was carrying and ran out, she says.

There’s a mural opposite the bar towards the back – a wall reproduction based on the works of cartoonist Al Hirschfeld – and she recalled that a few years ago they had a young artist in restoring it.

This artist would work 6am to midday in order to work in quiet, but on the first night she heard loud banging and thumping upstairs (perhaps Howard Hughes wanting some peace himself?).

She was red faced and crying, really upset, and wanted to leave, so, in order to calm her fears (and because I wanted her to finish the work, Gita laughs), I told her it was the sound of a compressor.

In the fictional world the Frolic Room is the favorite hangout of Kane Pryce, hero of supernatural thriller novels by FJ Lennon, though Lennon himself has written about his own haunting experience at the Frolic Room on his blog.

The Man in the Mirror

In 1999 he was at the bar and not drunk (yet) when he went to the jukebox. On coming back to his seat he "glanced into the mirror