Did you know Cecil B. DeMille had a 'secretive' ranch near Tujunga?
A few days ago I happened upon this bit of ephemera concerning an organ that Mr. DeMille had purchased.
www.periodpaper.com
In 1916 DeMille had his attorney, Neil McCarthy, check out an advertised piece of property in the Angeles National Forest.
McCarthy told DeMille that it was the "wildest, most terrible place" he ever saw in his life. But DeMille bought it anyway.
It was exactly what he wanted--secluded, with a stream, and only 25 miles from home.
The ranch grew as DeMille bought more land--mountainsides and a "Middle Ranch," where he stabled his horses on flatter ground.
He built the main ranch house with a 60-foot-long living room, added a stone cottage for himself with a mirror over the bed,
and dug a swimming pool that he filled with the numbingly cold water of a brook he dammed up. DeMille named it Paradise Ranch.
In 1923, DeMille shipped a $25,000 Wurlitzer pipe organ to the ranch so his composer, creating the scores for upcoming films,
could work in solitude. Screenwriter Jeannie Macpherson periodically moved herself into one of the cabins for weeks at a time
as she wrote and collaborated on 90% of DeMille's films.
DeMille's wife, Constance, did not like the ruggedness of the ranch so Mr. DeMille recruited his longtime mistress, actress Julia Faye,
to travel with him and spend weekends at the ranch. Female guests often found oysters seeded with cultured pearls in front of them
at the dinner table.
condensed from an 1997 article in the
L.A. Times
& I'll add this:
but no mention of Julia Faye
Cecil B. DeMille: His Life and Art
The ranch also housed DeMille's private library, including a mint collection of European
erotica.
A guest described the books as "beautifully bound and illuminated" and included a "privately printed
three-volume edition of shockingly illustrated works of Francoise Rabelais."
I didn't didn't know Cecil had a kinky side.
I wonder where all these erotic books ended up?
I almost forgot the organ....where do you suppose it is?
also this
land and farm