At first, going back to Evansville every summer wasn’t a big thing. Sure, my mom would go into a meltdown for weeks before I actually left Santa Monica. It wasn’t pleasant to be part of it because I couldn’t help but feel responsible for causing her so much pain. She’d break down in tears and smother me with hugs and kisses as if I was never coming back. Then she’d get angry and rail against my dad. She’d make me promise I’d never call Mother Alice ‘mom’ or Mother Alice’s parents ‘grandma’ or ‘granddad’. And I was to report back to her if they asked me to. It was like I was her secret agent infiltrating the enemy camp. I grew up with guilt and guile.
The real issue came once I started going to school and making friends. After second grade I became a Cub Scout and our cub den mother was actress Edith Barrett, who’d recently divorced actor Vincent Price. Their son was one of my best friends.
And it is what made going to Evansville every summer a bigger thing than it needed to be. Growing up where I did, when I did meant that I was surrounded by celebrity. My stepdad was friends with many of them, so they were part of my life. He became Exalted Ruler of Elks Lodge 906 in Santa Monica and the membership was full of entertainers, musicians, actors and showbiz people.
Supermarket openings used to be major events modeled on Hollywood movie premieres only even more lavish. Klieg lights, banners, circus animals, free food and drinks, cowboys, indians, horses and live music plus “special” appearances by film and television stars, musicians and popular wrestlers like Gorgeous George. My stepdad organized the whole shebang using his connections.
Daddy Bob’s friend Leo Carrillo would park his distinctive convertible outside our house while he dropped in to visit my stepdad and another friend three houses down the street. He’d let me stand behind the wheel and honk his horn that sounded like a baying bull.
When Mimi and I would accompany my mom and stepdad to their favorite restaurant, the Fox and Hounds, we’d get introduced to the celebrities who would greet my stepdad and mom. I shook hands with Victor Mature while he was enjoying the success of Samson and Delilah. To me he looked like someone who could easily bring down a temple with his bare hands.
If I started naming all the famous people I’d met growing up my fingers would wear out. Vincent Price, of course. He’d visit his son when I was at his mother’s house just off Euclid up Carlyle in Santa Monica. We were on 9th near Carlyle.
Probably the most amazing experience for me was getting to talk with my numero uno television hero, Hopalong Cassidy. My mom, stepdad, Mimi and I were already seated at their favorite corner booth when William Boyd and his party arrived and were waiting at the bar for their table to be cleared. Mr Boyd and Daddy Bob exchanged waves. Thinking about it now, I wonder if my folks liked that table because they could see everyone who entered and vice-versa.
Daddy Bob sat me on the bar so I could talk to ‘Hoppy’ more or less face to face. It was several years before I figured out why everyone laughed when I asked him where he’d parked ‘Topper’ and he answered, “Out in the parking lot next to you dad’s Packard.” By the time we returned to the car Mimi and I were asleep and put on the back seat for the ride home. So I’ll never know if my hero was telling the truth.
Santa Monica vs Evansville © Robert R. Feigel 2022 – All Rights Reserved
Pieces from a Puzzling Life 