12305 Fifth Helena Drive, Brentwood: the house where actress Marilyn Monroe died of an overdose on the evening of August 4, 1962.

3400 Wilshire Blvd., Los Angeles: the Ambassador Hotel, where Presidential candidate Senator Robert F. Kennedy was assassinated (in the hotel pantry) after he won the 1968 California Primary.

Near Sunset Blvd and Whittier Drive, in west Beverly Hills: the story of "Dead Man's Curve," made famous in the Jan & Dean song, ironically came true near this site (the home of Buddy Hackett), on April 12, 1966, when singer Jan Berry had a near-fatal car accident here. It left him permanently disabled.

(This was the scene of Jan's accident. The infamous curve originally mentioned in their hit song was on Sunset Boulevard, near Groverton Place, just north of UCLA.)

10050 Cielo Drive (now changed to 10066), Beverly Hills: the house where the Manson Family cult slaughtered actress Sharon Tate and five others (including her unborn child, Paul Richard Polanski) on August 9, 1969.

The murders were the basis of the 1976 movie, "Helter Skelter." Before the murders, this house had been the home of Henry Fonda and was the site where Cary Grant & Dyan Cannon honeymooned in 1965.

(Since new buyers were reluctant to live there, in 1994, the owners tore down the original home and built a new 17,000 square foot Mediterranean villa on the same site.)

off Santa Susana Pass Road west of Topanga Canyon Road, Chatsworth, CA: the Spahn Movie Ranch, a deserted former studio ranch (in the rocky hills of the northwest San Fernando Valley) where Charles Manson and his "family" lived before the Sharon Tate murders.

Years earlier, Tom Mix movie Westerns were shot there. The remaining ranch buildings burned back in 1970, during the Manson trial.

The main buildings of the movie ranch were roughly where the map says "Santa Susana Pass Road". Between Santa Susana Pass Road and Stagecoach Road, the land dips down into a bowl that stretches across to the main ranch area.

The Church of Rocky Peak was bought the property, where they built a church and Christian day-care center.
 (map approximate) *

8787 Shoreham Drive, West Hollywood (near the Sunset Strip, at Horn, just above Spago), : the sixth floor apartment from which Art Linkletter's daughter, Dianne, jumped to her death in 1969. Her family has insisted that she had been on drugs (LSD) at the time, but an autopsy showed no evidence of drugs in her system.

3110 Laurel Canyon Drive, Los Angeles: the Hollywood Hills home where silent screen actor Ramon Novarro ("Ben-Hur") was found murdered on Halloween night of1968. Two young thieves, looking for hidden money (which didn't exist), tortured the 69-year-old actor in his home, and eventually beat him to death. It is said that his ghost still haunts the house.

2126 El Roble Lane, West Los Angeles: the home where Nick Adams (star of TV's "The Rebel") died of an apparent overdose in 1968. However, there were no open pill bottles, needles, or any other drug-related items found at the scene, so his death remains something of a mystery.

8825 W. Hollywood Boulevard, West Hollywood: the home of controversial stand-up comic Lenny Bruce, where he killed himself with an overdose of drugs in 1966.

His story was told in the 1974 movie "Lenny," starring Dustin Hoffman.  

Hollywood Blvd and Ivar Avenue: the corner where actor William Frawley dropped dead on the street of a heart attack in 1966. Frawley, who had played neighbor 'Fred Mertz' in the classic TV show "I Love Lucy" (and 'Bub' on "My Three Sons") had been out to see a movie, and collapsed on his way back. A nurse dragged him into the lobby of the Knickerbocker Hotel, but he was DOA. Ironically, his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame is located just a half block away, on the south side of the street.  

1776 N. Sycamore Avenue (above Hollywood Blvd.), Hollywood: the apartment of Bobby Fuller, the singer who (as lead singer of 'The Bobby Fuller Four') gave us "I Fought The Law (And The Law Won)." In 1966, just five months after that song hit the Top Ten, Fuller died mysteriously from gasoline asphyxiation in his car (at age 22), while parked outside his apartment, just around the corner from Grauman's Chinese Theatre. Police labeled it a suicide, but the possibility of foul play has also been mentioned. According to his road manager at the time, "Bobby was found in his mother's car on the vacant lot north of the building, where there is now a small park - about 50' from Franklin & about 50' from Sycamore and about 50' from the apartment house."

The corner of Beverly Glen Blvd and Santa Monica Blvd: the intersection where comic genius Ernie Kovacs died on the morning of Jan 12, 1962. He was heading home from a party for Milton Berle, driving his white Corvair south on Beverly Glen, when he tried to negotiate a left turn onto Santa Monica Blvd at 50 mph. He may have been trying to light one of his trademark cigars at the time, since one was found next to his body. Whatever, he lost control of the car on the rain-wet street and the driver's side of the car smashed into a utility pole, killing him instantly.