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The Truth
Most of these are true although Robert
Blake did not play Spanky in the series of films that were both
known as Our Gang and The Little Rascals between 1929
and 1938.
Whether these add up to a "curse" is up to the observer,
but various stories about the Our Gang cast have circulated
for years.
Let's take them one at a
time from the eRumor:
Alfalfa -- Carl Switzer was shot to death at age 31-Truth!
According to
OUR
GANG - LIFE AND TIMES OF THE LITTLE RASCALS by MALTIN AND BANN,
Switzer was wounded in Jan 1958 when someone shot him as he was
getting into a car.
Then the next year, a fatal shot was delivered in a struggle over
$50 with an ex-partner in a big game hunting business.
Chubby -- 300-pound Norman
Chaney died at age 22 following an operation-Truth!
His death was actually at 18, not 22 and it followed surgery for a
glandular condition.
Buckwheat -- William Thomas
died at age 49 of a heart attack-Truth!.
He died in Los Angeles in 1980 after a successful life as a film lab
technician in Hollywood.
Darla Hood -- The Our Gang
leading lady contracted hepatitis and died at age
47-Truth!
She died on June 13, 1979.
Brisbane -- Kendall McCormas, known as Breezy Brisbane, committed
suicide at
age 64.-Truth!
The correct spelling of his name is McComas.
According to published reports, he gave up show
business to be an electrical engineer at the U.S. Naval Weapons
Center in China Lake, California.
He committed suicide two weeks before his retirement in 1981.
Froggy -- William Robert Laughline was killed in a motor scooter
accident at
age 16.-Truth!
Laughline was killed in a motor scooter accident near Huntington
Beach, CA in the early 1950’s
Mickey Daniels -- He died of
liver disease at 55-Truth!
His real name was
Richard Daniels, Jr.
He died alone in a hotel of cirrhosis of the liver on August 20,
1970.
Stymie -- Mathew
Bear led a life of crime and drugs. He died of a stroke at
age 56-Truth!
& Fiction!
After leaving the Our
Gang series as a child, Stymie reportedly acted through high
school.
He became addicted to drugs, especially heroin and spent much of his
young adult years in an out of jail.
In the 1980's got clean of drugs and both went back into
acting and traveling doing drug abuse lectures.
He died of Pneumonia.
Scotty Beckett -- He
died at age 38 following a brutal beating-Unconfirmed!
According to Maltin and Bann's
book, "The last 10 years of his life were filled with
unpleasant stories of divorce, violence, drugs and arrests."
He checked into a Hollywood nursing home on May 8, 1968, needing
medical attention after suffering a serious beating.
He died two days later.
Although pills and a note were found, no conclusion was made by the
coroner as to the exact cause of death.
According to the Internet Movie Database, he died of an overdose of
barbiturates.
Wheezer -- Robert
Hutchins was killed in an airplane accident at age 19-Truth!
According to findagrave.com, he was killed during the last
thirty minutes of his basic training at the Merced Army Air Corps
field in California when his plane crashed on landing.
Pete the Pup -- He was poisoned by
an unknown assailant-Unproven!
There were actually
several different dogs used through the years as Pete the Pup, the
canine star of films.
There are several reports that the original Pete the Pup was
poisoned by someone who gave him meat laced with glass.
There is also an urban legend that Pete the Pup was buried with
Alfalfa but we've found no evidence of that and Pete the Pup died
long before Alfalfa.
Alfalfa loved hunting and apparently there is a dog on his tombstone
that reflects that so that may have been a part of what prompted the
urban legend about Pete the Pup.
And
Spanky. . .Robert Blake - is accused of murdering his wife-Fiction!
First, Robert
Blake did not play Spanky in the Our Gang series.
Spanky was played by George McFarland who went on to become a Forth
Worth, Texas businessman before his death of a heart attack in 1993.
Robert Blake was found innocent by a jury of the charges of killing
his wife, Bonny Lee Bakley. He was later found liable for her wrongful death by a California
civil court.
Blake did
appear in some of the later Little Rascals episodes and
played Mickey.
According to crime writer David Lohr, there are some additions to
the Our Gang death list:
Robert H. Young "Bonedust" (9/15/17 - 9/10/51)
Died in a hotel fire, which started when he fell asleep smoking
in bed.
Dorothy Dandridge "Dorothy" (11/09/23 9/08/65)
Committed suicide after an investment scheme caused her to go
bankrupt.
Harold Switzer "Deadpan" or "Slim" - (1/16/25
- 4/14/67)
As was the case with his brother, Harold was also killed following a
dispute with another man.
Darwood Kaye "Waldo" - (9/08/29 - 5/15/2002)
Killed by a hit and run driver while walking on the sidewalk.
Jay R. Smith "Jay R" - (8/29/15 - 10/05/2002)
Stabbed to death and left in the desert by a homeless man he had
befriended.
Thomas
Bond who played "Butch"
Bond is not mentioned in the eRumor, but just for the record, he
died on 9/24/05 in Los Angeles of complications from heart disease,
according to an Associated Press article on 9/25/05. He was
79.
Updated 11/12/12 |
