Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Hollywood Hills)
Forest Lawn Memorial Park – Hollywood Hills is one of the six Forest Lawn cemeteries in Southern California. It is located at 6300 Forest Lawn Drive, Los Angeles, California 90068, in the Hollywood Hills neighborhood of Los Angeles. History. The first Forest Lawn, in Glendale, was founded in 1906 by businessmen who hired Dr. Hubert Eaton, a firm believer in a joyous life after death. He believed that most cemeteries were "unsightly, depressing stoneyards," and pledged to create one that would reflect his optimistic beliefs and be "as different, as unlike other cemeteries as sunshine  is unlike darkness, as eternal life is unlike death." He stated "I shall try to build at Forest Lawn a great park devoid of misshapen monuments and other signs of earthly death, but filled With towering trees, sweeping lawns, splashing fountains, beautiful statuary, cheerful flowers, noble memorial architecture with interiors full of light and color, and redolent of the world’s best history and romances". Forest Lawn Hollywood Hills is the second oldest of the Forest Lawn cemetery property chains. By 1946, Forest Lawn at Glendale had bought some of land which had been known as the Lasky Ranch, the  Providencia Ranch, which had a house and outbuildings, including stables and corrals, and part of the Hudkins Ranch, also known as the Old Lasky Ranch. The Lasky Ranch had been used as a film location since the early 1910s, and films made there included "All Quiet on the Western Front" (1930) and several of Charlie Chaplin’s early comedies, including "Sunnyside" (1919). The Old Lasky Ranch had also been used for filming many movies, and Warner Brothers had leased it in 1929. D. W. Griffith’s "The Birth of a Nation" (1915) had been largely filmed on the Providencia Ranch . In 1950, after a four-year permit process, Hubert Eaton began construction of a new cemetery on his land at Hollywood Hills. A curving and irregular road, laid out by 1951 among the rolling green hills, gave a rural effect in the heart of the Los Angeles metropolitan area. The first buildings, a mortuary, an office, a garage, and a maintenance warehouse, were also built in 1951, and the new cemetery was opened for burials on March 4, 1952. Part of a mausoleum called the Court of Remembrance was constructed in 1957. Features. Portions of the cemetery include: Plaza of  Mesoamerican Heritage. The Plaza of Mesoamerican Heritage has indigenous/non-Christian sculptures by Meliton Salas Rodriguez, of Guadalajara, Mexico. Salas used hand tools to first quarry, then work, the native Mexican stone into precisely scaled, detailed replicas of artwork and artifacts that are representative of the Aztec, Huastec, Maya, Mixtec, Olmec, Teotihuacan, Toltec, Totonac, and Zapotec civilizations that preceded both Spanish colonialism and modern Mexican culture. The Plaza stands in contrast to the Christian and patriotic American themes which were originally reflective of the culture at Forest Lawn Hollywood Hills and other Forest Lawn Memorial Parks since their inception by  Christian American businessman Hubert L. Eaton. A smooth Olmecan head, an intricate Aztec sun calendar and a sinuous Teotihuacan bas relief are some of the sculptural features of the plaza that are set off by crushed stone walkways and complemented by groupings of Mesoamerican plants. The entire display, however, has been removed and placed in storage. Notable interments. Many prominent people, especially from the entertainment industry, are interred there.