OK, I’ve mentioned this before on my "about me" info but I didn’t go into much detail. I can’t believe I’m outting myself like this on the internets. I have an unusual "hobby", if you want to call it that.
T is for….. Tombstone Tourist.
I tour old cemetaries (and some not so old cemetaries) and visit the final resting places of the rich, not so rich, famous and not terribly famous. I know. Odd. I find it fascinating that some of the world’s most famous are right beside some unknowns and just "blend in". Then there are the stars that want to be big and infamous even in death….as if it matters… YOU’RE DEAD! Death, in many ways, is the great equalizer yet some still want to perform for the crowds via their tombstone.
From Douglas Fairbanks Jr. in Hollywood, California to Jim Morrison in Pere Lachaise to Edgar Degas in Paris to Johnny Mercer in Savannah, GA…. I’ve visited a wide variety. I’ve said hello to O. Henry in Asheville, NC and smiled over the honorary memorial to Hattie MacDaniel (she’s buried elsewhere) in Hollywood.
When Dana started talking about moving up here to Washington one of my first comments was that I could see Jimi Hendrix. So the other day when AG and I ventured off in the rain to the great city of Renton, we were really on a mission. We said hello to Jimi Hendrix.
Jimi Hendrix used to have just a simple headstone. Apparently when he died his father had very little money and almost couldn’t afford to have his remains brought back from London. He managed to gather up some funds, get Jimi Hendrix sent back to Renton and buy a small family plot. A memorial fund/organization of some kind raised the money for this big thing and Jimi was moved there a few years back. The rest of his family was moved there as well.
Jimi Hendrix is buried in Greenwood Memorial Park in Renton, Washington.
The height of my tombstone tourist days were when Dana was still working for Disney Feature Animation and had to travel frequently to Los Angeles. I would tag along. I went to Hollywood Memorial Park , Westwood Village Memorial Park and the both Forest Lawns.
The Forest Lawn people are creepy and cooky… the love to sneak up on you. They try, somewhat, to hide who is actually interred but then invite folks to come and enjoy their funeral art. So, they are really only pretending to hide who is there and who isn’t. They also name their streets and "areas"….Way of Everlasting Peace… that kind of freakiness. Anyway, years ago someone wrote a book about them poking a bit of fun and it is a great book. The book is The Loved One by Evelyn Waugh and it’s about a pet cemetery. I read it during one trip to L.A. and had a great time laughing at Forest Lawn’s expense.
Here’s more photos:
Liberace: Forest Lawn-Burbank (I think it may actually be called Forest Lawn Hollywood Hills.) Bette Davis has an identical "site" just across the sidewalk. It actually looks like they are in some kind of afterlife competition.
Westwood Village Memorial Park
Sammy Davis Jr. (Forest Lawn Glendale)
Westwood Village Memorial Park.
See the pennies on Dean Martin’s plate. I see that quite often but I don’t know why folks do that. I suppose there is some significance but I don’t know what it is.
My "holy grail" was actually trying to locate one person in particular. It took me many trips and come to find out, I had been standing in front of their grave multiple times but didn’t know it. The plate is actually hidden behind a tree. One day the sun shone right on the plate and I saw the metal flash in the light. It’s a bad photo but here it is….
Walter Elias Disney (Forest Lawn-Glendale).
You see some odd stuff doing this and some kind of funny things as well. One of the oddest was Alice Toklas who is buried in Pere Lachaise (Paris) in an unmarked grave. She spent her life following around Gertrude Stein and living vicariously through her. She is buried beside Gertrude Stein in what appears to be an unmarked grave. But if you walk behind Gertrude Stein’s headstone, there is a memorial to Alice. She lived her life in the shadows of Gertrude and had her memorial done in the same manner in which she lived.
Oh man, I didn’t think anybody else liked old cemeteries. I always get fascinated by really old ones, the ones where you can barely read the names and dates. One of the more memorable ones was a very small overgrown, apparently forgotten site where the majority of the markers were for young people and children that had died in the 1918 flu epidemic. Really creepy.
I’ve never seen that done with pennies before but rather stones/pebbles. Some “old country” (as in the old world, not country/hicks) tradition that has to do with showing you’ve been or something. I remember my grandmother telling the story but sadly, I was too young to appreciate it at the time and now she’s gone.
Interesting sights you have seen!
Thanks so much for sharing this. I really enjoyed seeing all the graves. Yes, I’ve seen the stones but never the pennies. The stones are used when you visit the gravesite. They are a “I was here” symbol. Years ago when I worked in a state psychiatric hospital I went past the “do not enter” sign to the cemetary. It was a large site of unmarked graves with numbers. Very eerie.
I’m much more intrigued by the gummy bear than the pennies
Great post Kris, very interesting!
I think that is a rather fun hobby! We enjoyed finding graves of the famous in England – Charles Dickens, Lord Nelson, many kings and queens, and my favorite – Jane Austen!
I always thought the pennies on the grave had to do with the song ‘pennies from heaven’