Body Parts Found at Hollywood Sign

Lights! Camera! Action! 

The last few days at the Hollywood Sign could easily have been mistaken for the filming of an episode of any one of the CSI television shows. Unfortunately, the discovery of a human head at the sign on Tuesday, January 17, followed with the hands and feet a day later do not belong to any script, this is a real life homicide. Cadaver dogs were brought to the scene after the discovery of the head, which was reported by a hiker. The dogs found the hands and feet a day later, January 18 not far away from the head. 

Not since the discovery of the body of Broadway actress Peg Entwistle, in September 1932, who committed suicide by jumping off the Hollywood Sign has there been such horror at the sign. 

Hollywood Summer Fun – Hollywood Sightseeing Tour

 

Do you want to have a summer fun day in Hollywood? Do you want to know where they filmed certain movies? Do you want to know where the stars live in beautiful breathtaking mansions?  Well then, you’re way overdue for a Hollywood Tour!

A Hollywood Tour is the perfect way to enjoy Hollywood, entertain the family or your relatives, and learn about Hollywood’s famous.  Be sure to bring a camera and relax while your tour guide drives through Beverly Hills, Rodeo Drive, Bel-Air, and Mulholland Highway.  Mulholland Highway is not really a highway, but a two-lane road that ascends into the local hills, where the stars call home.

A short rest period at the top of Mulholland allows for picture taking and a breathtaking view of the surrounding mountains and the Los Angeles Basin. The Hollywood sign is in the distance and looking in the opposite direction you can see the city of Los Angeles with all of its tall buildings. On a clear day one can see out to the ocean. 

Not such a clear day over the L.A. Basin

The tour guide points out homes of the famous in Mulholland, Bel-Air and Beverly Hills. Be prepared to see the enormous homes of Clark Gable, Elizabeth Taylor, Ronald Reagan, Jacqueline Smith, who starred in television series in the 1970’s Charlie’s Angels and so many more.

The tour guide provides tidbits of information about famous streets, hotels and buildings where actors got their start or met their un-timely death and where they filmed movies. 

One of those buildings featured as the apartment in the movie, Pretty Woman 1990, starring Julia Roberts and Richard Gere. At the end of the movie, he climbs the ladder after a light rain and meets her on the stairs and they fell into each other’s arms, a true romantic moment.  

A Hollywood Sightseeing Tour is an afternoon of fun and excitement. There is something for everyone, of all ages, to enjoy on a Hollywood tour. After the tour, which drops you off right on Hollywood Boulevard, you can walk the Hollywood Walk of Fame and see the famous stars that have made Hollywood, the Entertainment Capital of the World.   

 

Rose Parade Highlights from 2009

Never was there a more likely pair, but the Southern California sunshine and the Pasadena Rose parade. Californian's love their sunshine and the radiant flowers on the floats are even more vibrant in the rays of the sun.

Whether seen on television or in person the parade is as historical as the gold mines of California. This year marked the 120th trip down Colorado Blvd for the five and a half mile parade route and was watched by millions of parade visitors and broadcast worldwide. Once again the familiar vice of Stephanie Edwards and Bob Eubanks narrated the parade and provided interesting historical details. Edwards was missing from the narration of the parade in 2008 and had been replaced by a younger female narrator. This year however, Edwards was once again in the grandstand, brought back by popular demand.



Hats of to Entertainment in books, movies and music was this year's theme. However, there was a theme hidden within the theme and it was the Walk Down Memory Lane. The floats dedicated to that walk down memory lane included the golden oldie days of the 1970's and the short lived Disco music, the Hollywood sign float with the Griffith Observatory behind the sign, the float that contained the movie theater A LEX Theatre that opened in 1925 showing the markee sign that announced the acclaimed movie National Velvet starring Elizabeth Taylor. Hollywood's own band, the Riverside City College Marching Band put on the grand finale at the parade. This was the fourth time the band has participated in the Rose Parade and this time they made the grand finale.
http://www.pe.com/localnews/inland/stories/PE_News_Local_S_rose02.3da0708.html

Thursday Thirteen - Thirteen Facts About the Hollywood Sign

It has had almost as many makeovers as some of the stars in Hollywood. It has helped to promote a town, an industry and a culture. It lures people in with their dreams of being a star. It’s the Hollywood sign that stands high on Mt. Lee in Hollywood, California.

Originally, the sign was created as an advertising campaign to entice home buyers to buy the homes that were built under the sign.

In 1923 the Hollywood sign was erected and read H-O-L-L-Y-W-O-O-D-L-A-N-D.

The letters are 30 feet wide and 50 feet tall and the sign was only to last a year and a half, and has endured for more than 8 decades. The first sign featured 4,000 20-watt bulbs, spaced 8 inches apart. At night the Sign blinked, first, “Holly” then “wood” and finally “land” (the sign no longer flashes today)




The “Hollywood Sign Girl” - In 1932 dreams turned into despair for young Hollywood actress, Peg Entwistle, and she climbed to the top of the letter H and plunged to her death. In a cruel twist of irony, a letter to Peg arrive the day after her death and she was offered the lead role in a play. . . about a woman driven to suicide.

In 1944 the sign became property of the city, but salvation for a facelift would have to wait until after World War II.

In 1949 the letter H in need of repair fell down the hill, leaving only OLLYWOODLAND for all to see. Later that year in 1949 when the H was repaired, the word LAND was removed from the sign.

The sign sits on Mt. Lee and can be seen close up from the grounds of the Griffith Park Observatory.

During the 70’s the town of Hollywood continued to decline as well as the sign, the top of the “D” and the entire third “O” toppled down Mt. Lee and an arsonist set fire to the second “L”.

Pranksters altered the sign’s letters to read “HOLLYWEED in 1973 (advocating loser marijuana laws). Commemorating a visit from Pope John Paul II in 1987 the sign was changed to HOLYWOOD

Before security cameras and electric charged fences surrounded the perimeter of the sign it was the ultimate make-out place to take your date.

In August 1978 the sign was removed for three months to make way for the new re-born sign which had been poised and polished for a new millennium.

Televised coverage on the New Year’s Eve the Sign took its place among the world’s most revered landmarks and was shown on global TV coverage alongside the Eiffel Tower, Times Square and the Great Pyramids of Egypt.

Griffith Park and the mountain where the sign stands suffered two damaging wildfires in 2007 and the hill where the sign stood was left black and not a single living plant grew where the land had burned.





In 2008, the mountaintop property located near the HOLLYWOOD sign, once owned by Howard Hughes was put up for sale. The property offers a stunning 360–degree panorama of the Los Angeles Basin and the San Fernando Valley and has five legal lots allowing for construction of homes. The Hollywood Sign which has stood on Mt. Lee for 84 years has been a symbol of a culture and has been an icon longer than most people in Hollywood have been alive. It survived through the stock market crash and World War II, the Depression Years, Blacklisting in the 50’s, vandalism, natural disasters and made its own Hollywood comeback after numerous makeovers. In the end, the HOLLYWOOD sign may now be obscured from view if the potential house/mansions are allowed to be built on the land above the sign.


For more fascinating facts, pictures and to help save the HOLLYWOOD sign click here