former homes of the great stars walking TOUR

The Beverly Hills Historical Society welcomes you to our walking tour of the former homes of the great stars. Below you'll find the route map and list of addresses on the tour. To enhance your tour experience, please listen to the audio clips connected to each stop along the route. Some stops also include a short video.

The tour begins at Will Rogers Park on Sunset Boulevard. Across the street is the Beverly Hills Hotel, the City's first business, there since 1912. Hotel founder Margaret Anderson donated this parkland and fountain as the first municipal park in Beverly Hills.

For more about the colorful, early history of Beverly Hills, watch the video below.

East of the hotel, were the long-gone mansions of silent screen legends Gloria Swanson, on Crescent, and Will Rogers, on Beverly Drive. She is best known for the movie Sunset Boulevard, and he was a hugely popular movie star, radio personality, political humorist, and the first honorary mayor of Beverly Hills. Rogers had a Polo field on his property and when the riders were done, they’d walk across the street to the hotel bar. When Rogers died, the hotel named that bar in his honor and the Polo Lounge was born.

To learn more about the first honorary mayor of Beverly Hills, watch the video below.

As you leave the park and cross Sunset, you’ll notice the pink bus stop built for the Dinky Train that brought visitors up to the hotel 100 years ago. The trolley is long gone, but the shelter is still in use. The green strip that divides Sunset was originally a bridle path for horseback riding when most houses had their own stables and you could ride into town for groceries.

As you walk along Sunset west of the hotel, the house on the right was once owned by then Disney Chairman, Michael Eisner. The next corner, at 901 North Camden, was the filming location for the 1989 movie Troop Beverly Hills with Shelley Long. It is currently the consulate for the Central African Republic.

This is one of the City’s most legendary star residences. It’s a 6,000 square-foot house with five bedrooms and was built in 1924. When Loretta Young owned the home, she rented it to Gene Kelly, Greta Garbo, and Rex Harrison. In later years, Ava Gardner lived there with her husband Artie Shaw. Other celebrity tenants included Frank Sinatra, Barbra Streisand, Ringo Starr, and Joe Bologna with his wife, Renée Taylor.

Further north, on the other side of the street, at 913 North Bedford, are the remains of what was once Marlene Dietrich’s mansion.

This is Local Landmark No. 14 on the Beverly Hills Register of Historical Properties. It’s the only remaining Greene and Greene designed home in the City. It was built in 1909 for Packard dealer Earle C. Anthony, and then moved to Bedford Drive in 1923 by silent film star Norman Kerry and his wife. Kerry is best known for The Phantom of the Opera (1925) and Tod Browning’s The Unknown (1927). More recently, the four-bedroom, five-bathroom Craftsman was owned by screenwriters Leslie Dixon and Tom Ropelewski, famous for Mrs. Doubtfire (1993) and Look Who’s Talking Now (1993).

The first mansions in Beverly Hills were built in Benedict Canyon by silent movie stars. Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks named their luxurious home Pickfair. Harold Lloyd’s massive estate was called Green Acres. Soon, Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, Rudolph Valentino, and many other film greats had fabulous canyon homes.

Over the years, the lure of country living in the middle of the city attracted Tom Mix, Ingrid Bergman, Fred Astaire, Ann-Margret, Danny Kaye, Jack Lemmon, Raquel Welch, Sammy Davis, Jr., Barbara Eden, Eddie Murphy, Gene Simmons, Kim Kardashian, Bruce Springsteen, and many more. It was also the site of notorious activities at the homes of Jean Harlow, George Reeves, Sharon Tate, Heidi Fleiss, and Susan Berman.

After you make the left turn at Lexington Drive, you’ll walk past the home of Charo and her late husband Xavier Cugat. Next to them lived legendary RKO studio chief Pandro Berman.

This was the home of the most beloved red-headed resident of Beverly Hills. Not only did Lucy and Desi live here, and raise their kids (Lucie and Desi, Jr.) here, they also used their house in an episode of I Love Lucy. It’s the one where Lucy and Ethel sneak into actor Richard Widmark’s backyard to steal a grapefruit. It was actually Lucy and Desi’s backyard. Lucy was the first woman to head a TV production company, Desilu, which she formed with Arnaz, and I Love Lucy was the first show to film before a live studio audience. Desilu produced other popular TV shows including Mission: Impossible and Star Trek.

To find out how Lucy dealt with the tourists who visited her house, watch the video below.

Lucy and Desi’s next-door neighbors were radio and television stars Jack Benny and his wife, Mary Livingstone. Benny was known for his comic timing and his ability to elicit laughter with just a pregnant pause and stoic expression.

Benny’s trademark character stubbornly claimed to be 39-years-old despite being much older, and was the cheapest man in the world. In real life though, Benny was famous with neighborhood kids for giving away silver dollars on Halloween.

For a sweet treat, watch the video below to see how Beverly Hills celebrates Halloween.

Next door to the former home of Jack Benny and Mary Livingstone is the house once owned by actor Peter Falk who is best known for playing legendary TV detective Lt. Columbo. He was the first actor ever nominated for an Oscar and an Emmy in the same year. He achieved this feat twice, in 1961 and 1962. Falk, also a talented artist, had a studio above the garage and his work often sold for thousands of dollars. He and his wife, actress Shera Danese, were together for 33 years until Falk’s death on June 23, 2011.

Brothers George and Ira Gershwin lived in the Spanish Colonial Revival house at 1019 Roxbury where they wrote such immortal songs as They Can’t Take That Away From Me, Shall We Dance, and Our Love Is Here To Stay. When George died, Ira moved next door to 1021. In 1953, actor José Ferrer and his wife, singer Rosemary Clooney, brought 1019 and her nephew, actor George Clooney, lived there for a time.

Actress Agnes Moorehead lived at 1023 Roxbury and thrilled kids on Halloween by dressing as her Bewitched character, Endora. Built in 1926, it was also once home to Spencer Tracy. The 11,700-square-foot house had vaulted ceilings, a billiards room, lighted tennis court, and swimming pool.

Unfortunately, all these homes have been demolished and replaced, as has the corner house at 1014, former home of singer and congressman Sonny Bono, then real estate mogul Kirk Kirkorian, and most recently, Jennifer Lopez. If you venture all the way to the corner, the house across the street at 1006 Hartford Way is the former residence of Oscar-winning movie villain Jack Palance.

Commissioned in 1926 by Columbia Pictures founder Harry Cohn, and designed by Wallace Neff, architect of Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford’s estate, Pickfair, this house embodies the best of Spanish Colonial style. When Cohn moved out, the most popular female star of WWII, Betty Grable, moved in with her husband, bandleader Harry James.

It was later owned and renovated by actress Diane Keaton who sold the 7-bedroom, 8-bath property to Madonna for $6.5 million. David and Victoria Beckham later lived here. With its luxurious pool and two guesthouses, it could sell today for $12 million.

The home of Jimmy Stewart and his wife once stood at the southeast corner of Roxbury and Lexington. They were often seen riding their bikes or walking their dogs in the neighborhood. Their house was demolished and replaced with the edifice that sits there now. Stewart had two lots, one for his house, and the other for his vegetable garden. When a neighbor complimented him on his beautiful produce and asked if she could hire his gardener, Stewart replied, “Nope. You can’t afford her. The gardener is Gloria, my wife.”

For many years, child star Ricky Schroder was Jimmy Stewart’s neighbor across the street at 921 Roxbury. Decades earlier, actress and scientist Hedy Lamarr lived at 919 Roxbury. She co-invented the spread-spectrum techniques that led to WiFi and Bluetooth technology. Near the corner of Sunset is 906 Roxbury, a down-to-earth cottage that singer, dancer, and Oscar-winning actress Ginger Rogers once called home. Ginger rarely drank alcohol, so she installed a fully stocked ice cream soda fountain in her home instead of a bar.

• TURN LEFT TO RETURN TO WILL ROGERS PARK

• TURN RIGHT TO CONTINUE THE TOUR

You’re now approaching Sunset and Roxbury, the turning point in the tour. Those who are a little tired or need to use the bathroom should TURN LEFT and head back to Will Rogers Park. The rest should make a RIGHT TURN and then cross at the corner of Whittier and Sunset to enjoy the second leg of the tour. It takes approximately 20 minutes and includes some of the darker chapters in Beverly Hills history.

This dangerously sharp turn on Sunset Boulevard is immortalized in the 1963 Jan & Dean hit song Dead Man’s Curve. In the old days, if you were going too fast, you’d end up in a pile of twisted metal. As the song’s lyrics say:

"He passed me at Doheny, then I started to swerve, but I pulled her out and there we were at Dead Man's Curve. I still can hear 'em say, ‘You won't come back from Dead Man's Curve.’"

This intersection was also the scene of the senseless drive-by murder of power-publicist Ronni Chasen in 2010. As the tour continues, you’ll see that’s only one of the tragic events in the City’s past.

Gangster and Las Vegas developer Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel was murdered here in the home of his girlfriend, Virginia Hill, on June 20, 1947. The killer snuck up the driveway next door and blasted Siegel through the living room window while he read the newspaper. The Beverly Hills police chief said he solved the case, but accused the Las Vegas Police of sheltering the mob-connected killer. Years later, a deathbed confession claimed the murder was committed to protect an adulterous lover who Siegel had vowed to kill. It is the stuff of gangster legend, never to be solved.

For more about the notorious murder, watch the video below.

This was the scene of the biggest disaster in Beverly Hills history. On July 7, 1947, the experimental plane Howard Hughes was piloting had engine trouble. Hughes tried to land on the nearby golf course, but missed it by two blocks and instead destroyed three houses in a fiery crash. It attracted 50,000 onlookers who gridlocked the City causing almost as big a disaster as the crash itself. William Durkin, a soldier on his way to a date, saved Hughes from the burning wreckage. Durkin and Hughes became friends, but Durkin always refused a reward saying, “You shouldn’t get paid off for doing what was right.”

For more about the crash that inspired Martin Scorsese’s movie The Aviator starring Leonardo DiCaprio, watch the video below.

On April 4, 1958, Lana Turner and her lover, gangster Johnny Stompanato, were quarreling when a knife was suddenly thrust into Johnny’s stomach, killing him. Did Lana do it in a fit of passion? Or did her daughter, Cheryl Crane, stab Stompanato defending her mother? Cheryl took the rap and spent time in juvenile hall, but a jury deemed the killing justifiable homicide and exonerated her. She went to work as the hostess for a local Hawaiian restaurant, The Luau, owned coincidentally by her father, actor Stephen Crane.

Review the evidence and decide for yourself by watching the video below.

You’re now headed toward legendary Rodeo Drive and the final leg of the tour. Although Rodeo once had an equestrian bridle path running down the middle, it’s name has nothing to do with horses. Spanish explorers called the region El Rodeo De Las Aguas (which means “gathering of the waters”) because several streams ran down from the canyons above and emptied into the area.

You can watch our video about the early settlers of Beverly Hills by clicking below.

The home Gene Kelly bought with his first wife, Betsy Blair, became the weekend clubhouse for the MGM family of actors. Kelly, famous for his athletic ability and notorious competitiveness, would invite his friends over for touch football, volleyball, and charades. Evenings would conclude with sing-alongs at the piano attended by the likes of Judy Garland and Hoagy Carmichael. A tragic Christmas tree fire in 1983 destroyed the house and everything in it. Kelly built a new one exactly like the original and died there February 2, 1996.

This is the final home of actress Lupe Vélez, nicknamed The Mexican Spitfire, and known for a succession of stormy, high-profile romances. She lived in this house with her husband, Tarzan actor and Olympian Johnny Weissmuller. Previously, she lived next door with actor Gary Cooper. When Cooper broke off their tempestuous relationship, it’s said Vélez followed him to the train station and fired a pistol at him. She died in this house by her own hand, pregnant and unmarried, on December 13, 1944.

This Craftsman-style house was designed and built in 1914 for the first City Recorder, Judge Edwin Locke. In the late 1920s, it was home and office to Joseph P. Kennedy, father of future president John F. Kennedy. While in Hollywood, the senior Kennedy made some 80 films and had an affair with his business partner, actress Gloria Swanson. The home’s second owner, Edwin Blum, was a well-known screenwriter who wrote Stalag 17 with Billy Wilder. Blum was also a speechwriter for prominent Democrats. His family still lives here. This is Local Landmark No. 11 on the Beverly Hills Register of Historical Properties.

French singer and actor Maurice Chevalier, and later Hollywood legend Fred Astaire, lived in the house at 806 Rodeo before Tarzan creator Edgar Rice Burroughs purchased it. The house to the south, at 804 Rodeo, was once owned by child star Jackie Cooper. Across the street, 807 Rodeo was the residence of Barbara Stanwyck and Robert Taylor. Later, song-and-dance man George Murphy moved in before becoming the first actor elected to the U.S. Senate in 1964.

If you'd like to extend your walk, instead of returning to Will Rogers Park to the north, continue south on Rodeo and visit the commercial district between Santa Monica Boulevard and Wilshire, home to some of the most elegant stores and luxury brands in the world. Do movies stars shop there? Yes. But they come in the back and go upstairs. A guided tour of the area is available elsewhere on this website.

RETURN TO WILL ROGERS PARK / END OF TOUR

The Beverly Hills Historical Society thanks you for joining us. We now return you to Will Rogers Park and encourage you to enjoy the wonderful plants and animals there. You will also find plaques situated around the fountain with QR codes that allow you to access five of our historic videos and a panorama of the legendary Beverly Hills Hotel on your smartphone or tablet.

• “Beverly Hills: Then & Now”

• “Rancho Days: Cowgirls & Indians”

• “Who Was Will Rogers?”

• “Beverly Hills: Birth of a City”

• “Beverly Hills Hotel 1913 Panorama”

• “Charlie Chaplin: Making Movies In Beverly Hills”

We hope you enjoy your visit to Beverly Hills.