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Memorial Parks Celebrity
Graves
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Memorial Parks Celebrity
Graves
Louis B Mayer 1895 - 29th.October 1957
Can be found in the Mausoleum. Cause of Death - Leukemia.
Louis Burt Mayer was an early film producer, generally cited as the creator of the star system within Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) in its golden years. Known always as Louis B. Mayer (pronounced Louie) and often simply as "L.B", he believed in "wholesome entertainment" and went to great lengths to collect "more stars than in the heavens".
Born Eliezer Meir to a Jewish family in Minsk, Russian Empire (now Belarus), his family immigrated to Saint John, New Brunswick, Canada when he was still very young and Mayer attended school there. His father started a scrap metal business and Louis worked with his father in the business until he was in his late teens, when he went to Boston.
On November 28, 1907 in Haverhill, Massachusetts, Louis B. Mayer opened his first movie theater. Within a few years he had the largest theater chain in New England and in 1916 Mayer partnered with Richard A. Rowland to create Metro Pictures Corporation based in New York City. A Hollywood facility was set up in late 1918. Mayer then left the partnership to start his own production company, Louis B. Mayer Pictures, and later became a partner with B.P. Schulberg in the Mayer-Schulberg Studio. In 1924 Marcus Loew bought Louis B. Mayer Pictures and as part of the deal made Mayer head of the new
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.
As a studio boss, Louis B. Mayer built MGM into the most financially successful motion picture studio in the world and the only one to pay dividends throughout the Great Depression of the 1930s. However he frequently clashed with production chief Irving Thalberg who preferred literary works over the crowd-pleasers Mayer wanted. He ousted Thalberg as production chief in 1932 while Thalberg was recovering from a heart attack and replaced him with independent producers until 1936 when he became head of production as well as studio chief. This made Mayer the first executive in America to earn a million-dollar salary. Under Mayer, MGM produced many successful films with high earning stars including Clark Gable, Spencer Tracy, Katharine Hepburn, Lon Chaney, Joan Crawford, Jean Harlow, Judy Garland and many others. Although he had a reputation for ruthless expediency and allegedly narrow views about what subjects were suitable topics for motion pictures, Katharine Hepburn referred to him as a "nice man" (she personally negotiated many of her contracts with him). Some blame Mayer for Judy Garland's drug addictions, but historical support for this is not clear.
By 1948, due to the introduction of television and changing public tastes, MGM suffered a considerable
drop off in its success. Three years without an Oscar award provoked further conflict between Mayer and Nicholas Schenck, president of MGM's parent, Loews, Inc. (Mayer is said to have frequently referred to Schenck as Mr. Skunk). Mayer ultimately sold his collection of thoroughbred horses (among which was Your Host, sire of Kelso, which he supposedly paid more attention to than his MGM responsibilities), worked to control costs and searched for a "new Thalberg", hiring writer and producer Dore Schary as production chief. Schary (who was 20 years Mayer's junior) preferred message pictures in contrast with Mayer's taste for "wholesome" films. Three years later, Mayer reportedly called Loews headquarters in New York with an ultimatum, "It's either him, or me" and Schenck fired Mayer from the post he'd held for 24 years. Mayer tried to stage a boardroom coup but failed and largely retired from public life.
Mayer had two daughters from his first marriage to Margaret Shenberg. Daughter Irene Gladys Mayer, married producer David O. Selznick and second daughter Edith (Edie) Mayer married to producer William Goetz (who became President of Universal Pictures).
Active in Republican Party politics, Mayer served as the vice chairman of the Republican Party of California from 1931 to 1932 and as its state chairman between 1932 and 1933. He and Thalberg played a role in discrediting muckraker and reformist Upton Sinclair's 1934 California gubernatorial bid.
Louis B. Mayer died on October 29, 1957 and was interred in the Home of Peace Cemetery in East Los Angeles, California. His last words (reportedly) were, "Nothing matters."
The Famous Warner Bros. founders of Warner Studios are all buried here in family mausoleums as shown below.
Harry Warner 1881 - 1918. Jack Warner 1892 - 1978. Samuel Warner 1887 - 1927.
Jack Warner (J.L. for short) (August 2, 1892 – September 9, 1978), born Jacob Leonard Eichelbaum in London, Ontario, Canada, was the president and driving force behind the highly successful development of Warner Brothers Studios in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California. The other Warner brothers were Harry Warner (1881–1958),
and Sam Warner (1887–1927).
The youngest of 12 children of Jewish immigrants, his older brothers had all been born in Krasnosielc, Poland.
When Warner Bros. was formed in 1918, Jack was co-head of production along with elder brother Sam. Sam died in 1927 (just before the premiere of the first "talking" picture, The Jazz Singer), and Jack became sole head of production. He ran Warners' Burbank studio with an iron hand.
In 1956, Jack & Harry announced they were putting Warner Bros. on the market. Jack secretly put together a syndicate that bought control of the company. By the time Harry learned of
his brother's dealings, it was too late. The brothers had gotten into numerous arguments over the past decades, but this subterfuge was too much even for Harry, they never spoke
again. Jack was the second studio chief to also serve as company president, after Columbia Pictures' Harry Cohn, but could not keep up with changes in the industry. He sold the studio to Seven Arts Productions in 1967, but remained active as an independent producer until the early 1970s.
In 1936, Jack Warner married Ann Boyar, the former wife of actor Don Alvarado and mother of actress Joy Page. They remained together for forty-two years until his death in 1978.
For his contribution to the motion picture industry, Jack Warner has a star on the
Hollywood Walk of Fame. He also has a star on Canada's Walk of Fame in Toronto, which honors outstanding Canadians from all fields.
Jack Warner died on September 9, 1978 in Los Angeles, California and is buried in Home of Peace Cemetery in East Los Angeles, California. At the time of his death, he was the last surviving Warner brother. Aged 86 by the time of his death, he was also the longest lived of all Warner brothers.
Harold ("Harry") Morris Warner (born Hirsch Eichelbaum), December 12, 1881 Krasnosielc, Poland – 25 July 1958 was one of the founders of Warner Bros. and a major contributor to the development of the film industry.
After the opening of movie theatres in Pennsylvania and Ohio in 1903, Harry Warner and his three brothers moved to California in 1918 to create a wider distribution studio. They were convinced that they would have to make movies themselves if they were to ever have success at showing them and generating a profit. Though the brothers struggled initially, they were eventually able to secure financing from the east coast that allowed them to take a gamble on the new idea of "talking movies.". Harry had initial reservations about the idea, in which he is memorably quoted as saying "Who the hell wants to hear actors talk?" when his Brother, CEO Sam Warner proposed the idea to him. Under Harry's and his brothers leadership, the company came to own and operate some 250 theatres in which to screen its films, and, more importantly, was a successful pioneer of the sound film industry and the company still thrives today.
Harry Warner also occupied a formidable central place in the Hollywood-Washington wartime propaganda effort during the Second World War. He was close friends of FDR and was a key proponent of interventionism in Europe.
Harry Warner died on the 25th July, 1958. For his contribution to the motion picture industry, Harry Warner has a star on the
Hollywood Walk of Fame. In 2004 the Slippery Rock university in Pennsylvania dedicated a film institute to him. They also host an annual Harry Warner film festival.
Sam Warner, born Samuel Eichelbaum (August 10, 1887 – October 5, 1927) was a co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Warner Brothers film company. The other Warner brothers were Harry Warner (1881–1958), and Jack L. Warner (1892–1978).
His interest in film came after seeing Thomas Edison's The Great Train Robbery while working as an employee at Cedar Point Pleasure Resort in Sandusky, Ohio.
Sam Warner can be credited as the brother who brought sound to Warner Brothers theaters, after tricking his brother Harry into attend a convention on the matter. Sam Warner placed all his efforts into developing sound for the company and some say it contributed to his early death due to a chronic sinus condition.
Unfortunately, Sam died the day before The Jazz Singer made its debut in New York City and he never saw his creation come to the theater, nor for that matter the enormous impact it had on the motion picture business.
For his contribution to the motion picture industry, Sam Warner has a star on the
Hollywood Walk of Fame.