In 1914, a sanitarium attendant noted, as he was collecting a dish of uneaten jello, that an unusual number of patients were named Susan. He was not seen the following day, or the next, but there is no reason to think that perhaps he did not just quit.
A kitten was found in 1958 behind the Village Inn Restaurant. A local newspaper was notified, but the matter was not pursued beyond an initial article, the editor saying to a disappointed reporter, "Let the matter die."
In 1967, visitors were somewhat surprised when the corpse of a recently buried guest at Forest Lawn Cemetery briefly erupted into a geyser of fluid reaching a point some dozens of feet in the mild summer air.
On July 17, 1976, the patrons of Algemac's Restaurant were dining happily in warm-weather attire only to realize, one by one and with increasing horror, that they were stuck fast to the vinyl booth seats. Bloody Wednesday, as it soon became known, resulted in so much public outcry that the restaurant was eventually closed and demolished, and the chandeliers ended up in the home of Winnifred Springworth, who to this day pretends that they are from somewhere else.
In 1952, a Czechoslovakian conceptual artist conceived of a painting of a sparsely attended Crucifixion, which would then be open to as much of the general public as cared to attend.
Any such thematic rhyming with the attendance at the depicted Crucifixion was entirely coincidental.
In 1952, some trees sprangeth erect in front of the holy Central Church of Christ. Erect with the Holy Spirit! Erect with righteous splendour.
In 1978, Charles Petticoat sat underneath a colorfully upbeat poster and in front of a blaring black-and-white TV, being spoken to like a child, if not unkindly, and staring somewhat lost into cafeteria-style food parked on plates of institutional green. The view pictured here, from his actual childhood, is what was on his mind, though it was less from fondness than it was like a code he was trying and failing to crack. Eight months later, he solved it and quietly expired.
A small incident occurred in 1975 at the Regalodge Motel wherein a man was found to be swimming in the deep end of the motel pool. The other guests looked on with surprise and trepidation from the safety of the shallow end as the man floated uncertainly in the middle of the roped-off remainder. He considered his situation for a few moments and then slowly made his way to the ladder. Management was never made aware, though the possibility was discussed.
A rural hillside in California is the home of the spot where Jesus once tried to teach himself how to read from a wall-sized plaque in 32 AD, which this statue commemorates.
In 1932 a man no one knew slapped his ram with a fish and yelled, "See ya later, motherfuckers!", which this statue commemorates. The town later voted on a name to give him, and "Jean Hersholt" won by a respectable, if not blazing, margin.
In 1985 a guest at the Glendale Mortuary joked that it was more expensive to buy a tiny mahogany keepsake coffin in the giftshop than it was to buy the cheapest real coffin available for burial, but the real coffin, made with care in Taiwan in either red or blue plastic, was, due to the size and shipping, in fact considerably more expensive—so the joke wasn't actually that funny, or accurate enough to hurt.
In 1922, a giant flower turkey marauded the town of Glendale unmolested for three days until it finally wilted in the sun, right in the midst of stomping deliberate claw-marks into some poorly-timed fresh cement.
In 1967, a fresh stain on the carpet was discovered near the concession stand of Harry's Roller Rink, one with the appearance of having resulted from a deliberate act. The lights were thrown on and everyone told to freeze until the matter could be sorted. Billy Spakeforth, age 8, dutifully and non-sarcastically froze in position as he skated, thus causing him to crash into the barrier wall and sustain minor injuries. He was nevertheless interrogated along with everyone else before being released to medical authorities. No parent was present. The culprit was never found, and the venue was closed forever.
In 1965, Jeannette Pastille paused and looked around what would be her new home for the next 14 hours. "Well, I'll be..." she said. "So this is what a hotel room looks like!" In the room next door, a young boy cried until his parents told him enough was enough.
One of the peculiarities of Sam Forth, the proprietor of the Glendale Sanitarium, is that he believed he could not be seen if he sat in the right place under his giant fern, and no one disabused him of this notion until one day in 1938 when the kitchen caught fire and, after he failed to respond to everyone's panicked entreaties, Bill Summs said, "Dammit, sir, we can see ye, we always could."
HERE THEN ENDS CHAPTER ONE OF AN UNKNOWN HISTORY OF THE WORLD