My Grandpa Bud and Hollywood

What an amazing day. Where to start?

My Grandfather did special effects and photographic effects for several big movies. The photo above is the bridge he blew up in The Wild Bunch. The director (Sam Peckinpah) was so happy with his work that he insisted Bud get a credit. Bud became the first from Warner Brother's special effects to get his name on a Warner Bros. film.

Several years ago The Warner Brothers museum contacted my Mom about her father and wanted to know if she would be willing to loan them some of his items for their museam. My Mother was more then happy to and has loaned them several items.

Jump forward 15 years...my Mom, sister and I are all back in Burbank for my Aunt's funeral. My Mom called the curator and asked if she could bring her grandkids by to view the exhibit. He said that they currently have all the Harry Potter costumes and props on display, but he would be happy to take us to the studio archives to see their Great Grandfather's things. First we took all the kids to see the Harry Potter exibit- oh so cool. Everything is out not under glass, so children are normally not permitted, but with the curator as our tour guide all our children we able to go. It was quite the olympic event making sure the younger ones did not touch anything. We were not allowed to take any photos, but he had someone take a polaroid of each o the kids with the sorting hat on. Then we did a group photo with the hat on my Mom. They also had a display with tons of stuff from the show Friends. Oh I loved it!







After we finished at the Museum we all drove to the archives. This was a huge unmarked building in Burbank just filled with unbelievable treasures.
Such a once in a lifetime opportunity.



There was a wall full of original schetches, he pulled out one of Scooby Doo. As the curator he was full of all kids of intresting facts. Like that when they presented the original concept for Scooby Doo it was not well liked, so they added a dog and called it Scooby Doo.



These were some items that were on a shelf next to the boxes with my Mom's name all over them. If you can zoon in on the photo, you may recognize some of the films... My Fair Lady... Casablanca, ever heard of those?



An original movie poster from one of my Grandfather's movies.



Next the highlight of the day for me. We are ohhing and aweing over all the cool stuff and he starts taking out some paper filing boxes and looking through a file, He pulled out my Grandfather's employment information. The original paper he filled out when he started with Warner Brothers, his pay information. It was so cool to see his handwriting. I was completly shocked to see that he made $675 a week in 1969! ***Edit**it was 1949. My Mom used to joke that he made $100 a day and her Mom spent $110 dollars a day. I just thought that was a figure of speech.



Here are a few props you might recognize:


One of the red scooters from Willy Wonka with the fake glue on back that they used to put up the signs. We also saw a Wonka bar and some Umpa Lumpa glasses on someone's desk. So cool!





The outfit that our Governor used to wear


A huge room with racks and racks up to the celing with clothes from TV shows (like Friends) and tons of movies.




The clothes from Willy Wonka


Ruby in front of the bat girl costume


We ended the day with dinner at the Bob's Big Boy on Riverside- one of my favorite places to eat as a kid.






I took so many photos and saw so many cool things, it was really an amazing day, I hope that my kids will remember. I'm sure my plethora of photos will help.

***EDIT- I forgot to mention that Ruby pointed to the original Wonder Woman costume on a mannequin and told the curator "That is not modest", he agreed.