The Year in Review: Top 10 Iverson Movie Ranch finds of 2016

"Code of the Secret Service" (1939): Iverson Gorge

Here's a Top 10 list counting down the best Iverson Movie Ranch discoveries of the past year ...

No. 10

Joe Iverson's incredible old tractor

 

Joe Iverson rides one of the greatest tractors ever

Joe Iverson, who ran all or part of the Iverson Movie Ranch for 60-plus years, had a lot of cool toys, and his vintage grader/crawler was one of the coolest.

• Click here to see the original post about Joe's tractor, from July 2016.

No. 9

The Roy Rogers rock on top of Cactus Hill

"The Roy Rogers Show" (1952)

An episode of "The Roy Rogers Show" features an unusual rock, which was recently spotted at the east end of Cactus Hill — despite having changed its appearance over the years. The site also has a few things to say about the history of filming in that area.

• Click here to see the original post about Roy's encounter with the rock on Cactus Hill, published in August 2016.

No. 8

The former location of the Hangman's Tree

The Hangman's Tree on the Lower Iverson (from "An Ambush of Ghosts")

While the Hangman's Tree itself did not survive, we were able to determine the exact location where it once stood — and we did find the nearby Hangman's Tree Rock.

• Click here to see the original post about the Hangman's Tree, published in October 2016.

No. 7

Where Jesus walked in Silverland 

 

"The Living Bible" (1952) — Jesus comes to the Iverson Movie Ranch

Jesus and two Lone Rangers — the original, from the 1930s Republic serials, and the more famous one from the 1950s TV series — all made their way to Silverland on the Lower Iverson. But the biggest Silverland find of 2016 may have been the discovery of an important saucer-shaped movie rock.

Saucer, left, and Mushroom Rock in "The Man From Colorado" (1948)

We took a "long, strange trip through Silverland" early in the year and were able to unlock a number of its mysteries by decoding clues contained in its few surviving rocks. One of the biggest surprises was the discovery that the widely filmed rock "Saucer" can still be found.

• Click here to revisit the adventures of Jesus and two Lone Rangers among the fascinating rocks of Silverland — along with the discovery that the Saucer has survived — from April 2016.

No. 6

An amazing Iverson Movie Ranch sequence in "Montana Moon," the first singing cowboy movie 

 

Johnny Mack Brown in "Montana Moon" (1930)

The era of talking in movies had just begun, and when "Montana Moon" came out in 1930, it launched the era of the singing cowboy. The movie includes a great sequence filmed along the western edge of Garden of the Gods overlooking Santa Susana Pass Road — not to mention one of the best buttressing shots ever filmed at Iverson.

• Click here to see the original post about the remarkable Iverson Movie Ranch sequence in "Montana Moon," from October 2016.

No. 5

Joe Iverson's butterfly collection, hunting trophies and other prize possessions are captured on film

Kelly Sullivan in "Death by Dialogue" (1988), with a few of Joe's butterflies

Joe Iverson's museum is on display in the movie "Death by Dialogue." The trophy room alone elevates this low-budget thriller into a unique artifact of movie history.

• Click here to see the original post about "Death by Dialogue" and Joe's vast collections, from June 2016.

No. 4

The "Muffin" rock behind the Grove Cabin has popped its muffin

"Bells of Rosarita" (1945): giant muffin-shaped rock behind cabin

A muffin-shaped rock once stood directly behind the little building known as the Grove Cabin. The rock is still there but it no longer looks like a muffin — and we found out why.

• Click here to see the original post about what became of the giant muffin, from earlier this month — December 2016.

No. 3

The "kill rock" from the Hopalong Cassidy movie "Mystery Man"

"Mystery Man" (1944): Hoppy's gun casts a shadow on the Kill Rock

The Kill Rock in the Hopalong Cassidy movie "Mystery Man" took multiple expeditions to find, encompassing both Lone Pine and the Iverson Ranch. Between me and Don Kelsen, we eventually found the thing hiding in plain sight.

• Click here to see the original post about the "Mystery Man" Kill Rock, from September 2016.

No. 2

A film shoot inside Karl and Augusta Iverson's house in 1935 

"The Outlaw Deputy" (1935) — the view from the Iversons' house on the hill

Film historian Tinsley E. Yarbrough spotted this scene filmed inside the home of Iverson Movie Ranch founders Karl and Augusta Iverson in the Western "The Outlaw Deputy." It may be the only time anyone filmed in the house on the hill.

 • Click here to see the original post about the 1935 shoot inside Karl and Augusta's house, from October 2016.

No. 1

The "grassy knoll" — a mystery from "Little Big Horn" that took 65 years to solve

"Little Big Horn" (1951): Sheb Wooley's sad fate on the grassy knoll

The location where Sheb Wooley's character met his grisly demise in the classic Western "Little Big Horn" has long perplexed movie historians — but a couple of us put our heads together early this year and, thanks to the sharp eye of veteran location researcher Eddie Henn, we finally solved the mystery.

• Click here to see the original post about the discovery of the "grassy knoll" of "Little Big Horn" infamy, from February 2016.

Here are a few finds from the past year that didn't quite make it into the Top 10 — click on the text to be linked to the original blog items ...

• The rediscovery of an old movie road on the north side of Cactus Hill

• Promo stills from the John Wayne movie "The Fighting Seabees" with surprising details hidden way in the background

• The crack where the Japanese sniper was stationed in "The Fighting Seabees"

• Some overlooked rock survivors found in the Iverson Gorge

To catch up on additional discoveries on the Iverson Movie Ranch in recent years, here are links to past "Year in Review" posts ...

Top Iverson Movie Ranch finds of 2015

• Click here to review the major discoveries of 2015, when an Elvis Presley filming location, a fake cave house from the silent era, Burgess Meredith's "Siedry-Bert" inscription, a wonderland of old movie footholds and the location of the Chinese Bridge from the 1926 movie "Tell It to the Marines" all made the list.

Top Iverson Movie Ranch finds of 2014

• Click here for a look back at 2014, a year in which Bear Tree, the Hobbit House, the remains of Freddie Frog, the Charles Bronson Hanging Tree and Tom Mix's bootholes from the 1935 Mascot serial "The Miracle Rider" were among the year's biggest discoveries.

"Little Big Horn": Tracking down the infamous grassy knoll where Sheb Wooley met his demise in the 1951 Lloyd Bridges-John Ireland movie

"Little Big Horn" (1951): A grisly end for Sheb Wooley's character on the grassy knoll

Film historians have struggled over the years to find the location for the haunting scene in the 1951 Western "Little Big Horn" in which the brutalized body of Sheb Wooley's character, "Quince," is found propped up on a stick. But I'm excited to report that the grassy knoll where the scene was filmed has now been found.

"Little Big Horn" — closeup of Quince's body

The closeup of Quince provides clues to the location, with the landmark Elders Peak, south of the Iverson Movie Ranch, seen in the background. "Elders Peak" is my research term for this frequently filmed hill, which has also been known by a number of other names including Sunset, Retz Peak and Rockridge.

Note the alignment of background features in the red circle

Veteran movie location hunter Eddie Henn was the driving force behind the discovery. Eddie noticed the alignment between Elders Peak and a distinctive notch in the ridgeline atop the Santa Monica Mountains, which form the southern boundary of the San Fernando Valley.

The same features as they line up today — from the grassy knoll

Eddie and I got together in January for an expedition onto the former Upper Iverson to see whether we could locate the sweet spot where the background hills would line up. As we approached our "target zone" at the west end of Cactus Hill, suddenly there it was: the grassy knoll.

Wider shot of the grassy knoll

At the top of the knoll it quickly became obvious that it was the filming location for "Little Big Horn," as everything matched up. The above shot provides a wider view of the grassy knoll with its contemporary background.

"Little Big Horn"

I don't know of any other movies in which the grassy knoll has been used for filming, but it's such a nondescript setting that it would be easy to miss. While the Iverson Ranch as a whole is defined by its rock features, the grassy knoll is virtually rock-free.

Looking south from the Grassy Knoll (photo by Jerry Condit)

On a return visit to the site within days of the discovery, we brought along another intrepid location hunter, Jerry Condit, who took a black-and-white photo that nicely matches the closeup of Quince from the movie.

Quince on the Grassy Knoll — "Little Big Horn"

Here's another look at the haunting Quince closeup to facilitate comparison with Jerry's photo above this one. The detail in Jerry's shot reveals that much of the background remains virtually untouched, even 65 years later.

The view from behind Sheb Wooley, which also appears in the movie, provides more insights. With the camera looking north toward a portion of the former Upper Iverson, some of the rocks at the west end of Cactus Hill come into view near the right of the frame.

This is what the view looks like today. A few of the estate homes that now occupy the former Upper Iverson can be seen here, along with Oat Mountain filling the top of the frame.

Note the two rocks identified here as "A" and "B."

The same rocks can be seen in the recent photo, although the trees surrounding Rock "A" have grown considerably in the intervening years, and now conceal much of the rock.

Both the 1951 screen shot and the 2016 photo also feature two distinctive foothills situated just to the north of the Upper Iverson. My nickname for these hills is the Tetons.

The Tetons as they appear today are identified in this shot.

The approximate location of the grassy knoll is noted on this Google aerial. The location remains on private property today, and access is restricted.

The Upper Iverson's Cul de Sac area and the northern slope of Cactus Hill, as seen through the lens of Oscar-nominated cinematographer Ernest Miller in "Little Big Horn"

"Little Big Horn" (1951) — filmed by DP Ernest Miller

At the suggestion of blog reader Steven Dwyer, I recently revisited the astonishingly good Iverson movie "Little Big Horn." The movie is an embarrassment of riches for an Iverson researcher — it's not just that virtually the entire movie was shot on the location ranch, but, more important, that the movie was shot by Ernest Miller, one of the greatest Iverson cinematographers and a man with a keen eye for the drama and the rugged beauty that was the Iverson Movie Ranch. The above shot, using silhouettes of the Garden of the Gods rock towers, at right, as a framing device in combination with an angry sky, is a prime example.

The protagonists of "Little Big Horn" speed past what is now the Cul de Sac area on the Upper Iverson

The movie stars Lloyd Bridges and John Ireland, with Charles Marquis Warren directing for Lippert Pictures. But to my eye the film is above all a showcase for Miller. I've blogged previously about him, talking about how he used Iverson's rocks in ways that almost no one else did, consistently showcasing them as artistic elements. As I mentioned in a post not long ago, Miller was one of two DPs to receive an Academy Award nomination for cinematography for the movie "Army Girl," which he also filmed at Iverson.

This action sequence shot by Ernest Miller not only captures the drama of riders in full flight on one of the Upper Iverson's broad chase roads, but also depicts some key rocks in juxtaposition to each other in a way that is helpful to film location research. Even though the background rocks are located in the heavily filmed Cul de Sac area, this shot pinpoints the position of at least one of them, Shoe Fluffer, with a degree of certainty that is rare in shots of this area.

"Fury" TV series — "Joey and the Wolf Pack" (premiered Nov. 3, 1956)

This shot from the TV show "Fury" is one of surprisingly few other examples I've run across that give a good idea of the location of Shoe Fluffer — seen here filling up the foreground of the shot with Lobsterclaw in the background, at the right.

Shoe Fluffer, so named because its shape is similar to those wooden devices that go inside of shoes to help them hold their shape, did not survive the development of the Upper Iverson, but its neighbor Lobsterclaw remains in place today — albeit on private property as part of someone's landscaping.

Lobsterclaw in modern times

This is what Lobsterclaw looks like in its contemporary setting, in a planter next to a circular driveway. The rock fared better than its neighbor Shoe Fluffer, which would have been out in the middle of the street and therefore had to be removed.

"The Golden Stallion" (1949)

Here's another production where Shoe Fluffer and Lobsterclaw can be seen — in color this time — along with the twisted rock tower that dominates the rock formation I call the Cul de Sac Crew. The shot comes from the Roy Rogers B-Western "The Golden Stallion," from Republic Pictures.

All of the labeled features remain in place today with the exception of Shoe Fluffer. I should point out that while "Oat Mountain" is the formal name for much of the mountain ridge that appears in the background to the north of the Upper Iverson, in many cases the names I use for various Iverson features are either my own creation or adopted from common use among film location researchers. When it comes to rock naming in the Cul de Sac area, most of the terms I use have evolved from my own research and are simply used for convenience.

The Cul de Sac Crew in modern times

In its contemporary setting the Cul de Sac Crew has some modern annoyances in its environment such as a chain-link gate and a property marker, but it also has a cool oak tree up above, and a nice flowerbed below.

The Cul de Sac Crew today is located at the end of a residential cul de sac, which is how it got its name.

Another view of the Cul de Sac area from "Little Big Horn" adds perspective to how the various rocks were positioned. With Eagle Beak Rock towering over the scene at top center, we can again see Shoe Fluffer, to the left of the frame, along with a portion of another relatively frequently seen ground rock at right, which I call Nautilus.

Here's the same shot with the key players identified. While neither Shoe Fluffer nor Nautilus has survived, the rocks in the background, positioned a short distance up Cactus Hill, remain in place today.

Eagle Beak Rock as it appears today

Eagle Beak Rock today is part of the same residential landscape as Lobsterclaw, and is easy to spot at top center in this shot from 2011. Shoe Fluffer and Nautilus are no longer anywhere to be found, but you can see the tip of Lobsterclaw jutting into the frame near the bottom left corner.

A wider shot of the area from a visit later in the day reveals more of Lobsterclaw, near the center of the shot, along with the Cul de Sac Crew at the left, while Eagle Beak Rock oversees the setting from its elevated perch at top right. These heavily filmed movie rocks are all clustered around the same cul de sac on the former Upper Iverson.

Here's the same recent shot of the Cul de Sac area with the key rock features identified.

"Little Big Horn" — Cowbones

Moving to higher ground, this shot from "Little Big Horn" is taken just above the Cul de Sac area, along the northern slope of Cactus Hill. While the familiar and heavily filmed Turtle Rock lurks in the background, a far less commonly photographed, but I think equally interesting, rock can be seen filling much of the left half of the shot. This largely overlooked rock feature hovering above the South Rim reminds me of a bleached set of cow bones, and that's what I have been calling it: "Cowbones."

Here's the same shot with Cowbones identified, along with a couple of the key rock features seen in the background.

Cowbones as it appears today

I found Cowbones on a recent visit to Iverson. It's perched near the northern edge of Cactus Hill, above the South Rim of the Upper Iverson. The rock in the lower right corner can also be seen in the "Little Big Horn" shot. For readers who saw my recent entry about the Snakeskin Mine Shack, Cowbones is in the immediate vicinity of the shack location, just out of the picture in "Gun Belt" but just to the northeast of the shack.

There's plenty more to appreciate in "Little Big Horn," but I'll save the rest for upcoming posts. In the meantime, the links below will take you to DVD versions of "Little Big Horn" on Amazon, in case you're interested in obtaining a copy. The first one links to a two-movie DVD set that includes "Rimfire," which also contains a little Iverson footage.