that a baby sister would be just as good as a baby brother, but my preference in genders was unwavering. In the end, after a few trips to the malt shop and a couple of bowls of chocolate ice cream, Ozzie’s gentle counseling won me over.
There was one other very cool perk that I got while working with the Nelsons: watching Rick Nelson, a major rock-and-roll star, premiere new songs like “Hello, Mary Lou” or “Travelin’ Man” on the show. Ozzie was no dummy. He understood the power of the TV medium in selling a product. Whenever Rick was about to release his next single, Ozzie wrote a high school sock-hop scene into an episode so his son could perform the song. A TV audience of thirty million people would hear it, and the record would zoom to number one across the country. It was MTV the Ozzie Nelson way.
Suddenly, I was earning good money with the Nelsons and Stan was pulling down a big weekly paycheck as a series regular on MTS. By law, parents of working children are entitled to a portion of their kids’ earnings but only after a percentage of their salary is set aside and put into a trust account. The child actors can collect the trust money when they turn eighteen. This regulation is known as the Coogan Law, enacted after an early child star, Jackie Coogan, saw his entire fortune squandered by his reckless parents.
My parents generously decided to exceed the minimum requirement of 10 percent set aside in a trust and raised it to 20 percent. The parents could use the remaining 80 percent in any way they deemed necessary. This was fine by my brother and me, especially since our standard of living was on the rise. Not long before the showbiz bucks starting rolling in, we were near the poverty level. Now we were on the fast track toward a respectable middle-class lifestyle.
One of the family’s first luxury purchases was a two-door, canary yellow Cadillac, a beautiful tank. My most vivid memory of the Caddie is how heavy it seemed, particularly the doors after my mom accidentally slammed my hand in one. Fortunately, I was such a little guy that my mitt was only squished and not broken.
My parents also bought a house in Laurel Canyon in the Hollywood Hills. The rough-and-tumble street scene on Wilcox Avenue was replaced by the serene beauty of the canyon.
I enrolled in a new school, too, Wonderland Avenue Elementary. Making new friends was especially hard in the Canyon because everybody lived so far apart; houses were spread out all over the mountain. At my old apartment, I had a slew of pals living right next door. My new home was like an outpost on the moon.
Needless to say, I wasn’t happy until I made a startling discovery. The sprawling property next door to us once belonged to the infamous magician Harry Houdini. His ghost supposedly haunted a burned-down mansion there. Laurel Canyon suddenly got a whole lot more interesting.
Harry Houdini died years earlier, and his abandoned property had become a jungle of plants and shrubs. The ruins of his stately home had been swallowed up by the foliage like some buried Mayan temple. It was creepy as hell. According to legend, Houdini regularly held séances and was able to contact the dead. Some of my new classmates swore that a ghost walked the property every full moon ... armed with an axe. Some even said that Houdini actually died on the property after somebody lodged the same axe in his back. An axe is always a swell schoolyard embellishment. It didn’t take much to convince me that every gruesome tale was true; my imagination was scarred by too many gory Roger Corman monster movies.
As the next full moon approached, a debate raged between my brother and me: should we face our fears and explore the foreboding grounds or was it just too dangerous to mess with Houdini’s ghost? I argued for the latter ... and lost. Younger brothers usually do in such matters. A nighttime excursion was planned with a few old pals from Wilcox Street.
The night of the full
There was one other very cool perk that I got while working with the Nelsons: watching Rick Nelson, a major rock-and-roll star, premiere new songs like “Hello, Mary Lou” or “Travelin’ Man” on the show. Ozzie was no dummy. He understood the power of the TV medium in selling a product. Whenever Rick was about to release his next single, Ozzie wrote a high school sock-hop scene into an episode so his son could perform the song. A TV audience of thirty million people would hear it, and the record would zoom to number one across the country. It was MTV the Ozzie Nelson way.
Suddenly, I was earning good money with the Nelsons and Stan was pulling down a big weekly paycheck as a series regular on MTS. By law, parents of working children are entitled to a portion of their kids’ earnings but only after a percentage of their salary is set aside and put into a trust account. The child actors can collect the trust money when they turn eighteen. This regulation is known as the Coogan Law, enacted after an early child star, Jackie Coogan, saw his entire fortune squandered by his reckless parents.
My parents generously decided to exceed the minimum requirement of 10 percent set aside in a trust and raised it to 20 percent. The parents could use the remaining 80 percent in any way they deemed necessary. This was fine by my brother and me, especially since our standard of living was on the rise. Not long before the showbiz bucks starting rolling in, we were near the poverty level. Now we were on the fast track toward a respectable middle-class lifestyle.
One of the family’s first luxury purchases was a two-door, canary yellow Cadillac, a beautiful tank. My most vivid memory of the Caddie is how heavy it seemed, particularly the doors after my mom accidentally slammed my hand in one. Fortunately, I was such a little guy that my mitt was only squished and not broken.
My parents also bought a house in Laurel Canyon in the Hollywood Hills. The rough-and-tumble street scene on Wilcox Avenue was replaced by the serene beauty of the canyon.
I enrolled in a new school, too, Wonderland Avenue Elementary. Making new friends was especially hard in the Canyon because everybody lived so far apart; houses were spread out all over the mountain. At my old apartment, I had a slew of pals living right next door. My new home was like an outpost on the moon.
Needless to say, I wasn’t happy until I made a startling discovery. The sprawling property next door to us once belonged to the infamous magician Harry Houdini. His ghost supposedly haunted a burned-down mansion there. Laurel Canyon suddenly got a whole lot more interesting.
Harry Houdini died years earlier, and his abandoned property had become a jungle of plants and shrubs. The ruins of his stately home had been swallowed up by the foliage like some buried Mayan temple. It was creepy as hell. According to legend, Houdini regularly held séances and was able to contact the dead. Some of my new classmates swore that a ghost walked the property every full moon ... armed with an axe. Some even said that Houdini actually died on the property after somebody lodged the same axe in his back. An axe is always a swell schoolyard embellishment. It didn’t take much to convince me that every gruesome tale was true; my imagination was scarred by too many gory Roger Corman monster movies.
As the next full moon approached, a debate raged between my brother and me: should we face our fears and explore the foreboding grounds or was it just too dangerous to mess with Houdini’s ghost? I argued for the latter ... and lost. Younger brothers usually do in such matters. A nighttime excursion was planned with a few old pals from Wilcox Street.
The night of the full
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