US News
Hollywood's unofficial mayor dies
Jan 10, 2008, 23:43 GMT
Los Angeles - The man known as the 'honorary mayor of Hollywood' for his tireless devotion to promoting the home of the movie industry, was found dead in his penthouse hotel suite in Los Angeles, police said Thursday.
Johnny Grant, 84, was found dead in his rooms at the landmark Roosevelt Hotel and is believed to have died of natural causes. He was best known for managing the Hollywood Walk of Fame induction ceremonies, organizing the Hollywood Christmas Parade and being a friend to the stars.
'There will never be anyone who loved Hollywood as much as he,' actress Angie Dickinson told local TV station KCAL.
In keeping with the tradition he started, flowers were to be laid at his star on the Walk of Fame. According to the Los Angeles Times, he asked for his ashes to be buried at the famous Hollywood sign overlooking Los Angeles.
Grant, who always wore glasses and a beaming smile, was named the honorary mayor of Hollywood in 1980, even though the filmmaking hub isn't officially a city, only a community of Los Angeles.
The position was the main role of Grant's life, even though he had claimed a brief role in the classic 1954 movie White Christmas, where he played a TV host who helped Bing Crosby and Danny Kaye honour their old general. He was the host of the 1940s game show Stop the Clock and a tireless organizer of entertainment shows for US troops in Vietnam and Korea.
Grant even received his own star on the Walk of Fame in 1987 in between Zsa Zsa Gabor's and bandleader Glenn Miller's.
© 2008 dpa - Deutsche Presse-AgenturCOMMENT
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S. J. WILSONJan 11th, 2008 - 21:01:32
So he voted for Ban-Abortion Bush & was best friends with Ban-Bortion Reagan who (as regent) began tuition at our tax-created, tax-maintained landgrant colleges. Bankers funded Reagan campaigns so he enriched lenders who gouged student borrowers. The state constitution bans usung public funds or property to advance religion--but Christmas parades used public streets and taxpaid police for control of traffic & crowds at the yearly public witnessing to the birth of Christ. This, in spite of the fact that Jews were prominent in founding the film industry. 'Desert Storm' was illegal interference in the internal affairs of a foreign sovereign state but Grant celebrated it as a patriotic event. Publicized performances before captive audiences of tax-paid military audiences advanced careers of Hope. Crosby & Sinatra. Hollywood is noted for intellectial liberals who resist 'non-liberal' government policies that use civil courts to enforce church law as was done before 1973 Roe v Wade. Google Canon 2350 to see which law was enforced here with tax money before Roe. The writers strike shows how propaganda convinced many people that unions are BAD, although ORGANIZING workers against ORGANIZED cheapskate bosses was the only way hours were shortened and wages raised. He helped publicize the terrible Holy-War-Inciting lie that all Americans are Christians--and people are dying because of it. Prices of dental and health care are higher partly because Reagan's start of student loans left grads with debt they had to pay off by inflicting reciprocal price gouging. Maybe his ashes belong in the Reagan Library. It enshrines policies that forced childbearing H.S students to leave school & not compete for jobs outsourced to cheap overseas labor.
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