Wagons in vintage Street scenes

Still doesen't ring a bell. The Mid-West didn't get to see everything what was broadcast out West. We got Gunsmoke, Lassie and Bonanza

 

And a ton of the character actors from back then, all had one, two or three episode appearances, just like other long-running shows.

 

I love listening to those old shows on satellite radio.

 

Kinda morbid...

 

And, as I've found out over the last several years, the accident that killed Mr. Dean was likely not his fault. It's been studied by modern-day investigators who pointed out that the driver of the other car (which I think was a wagon), may not have seen Dean's aluminum Porsche, for the possibilities that the car sat too low, and the rising sun that morning obliterated the other driver's vision anyway.

 

What Dean needed was a modern set of MGTF rollbars

 

I must have read that same study. It was very detailed. They couldn't do a 'recreation' of the accident because the actual intersection where it happened has been changed quite a bit in the years since.

That pic of James Dean and the Porsche is, I believe one of the last pics ever taken of him, The Porsche was on the trailer hooked to the Country Squire, and some friends of his were in the Cadillac. They caravaned overnight up to the San Juaquin Valley, and Dean was running the Porsche Highway 46 that ran over to Hwy 101 and the coast near Paso Robles. Accident happened in the little town of Cholame, CA. Look it up on the map and you will see the 'Y' intersection where it occurred.

Lots of material on the web about the accident. For anyone interested, do a search.

 

Maybe, he knew too much about Hollywood weirdness and had to get bumped off, because of it. The intersection was evidently changed, in order to protect the guilty