In the three days following his death on November 29, John Drew Barrymore's ghost haunted residents and visitors of the Rodeo Grounds.
Barrymore was born in 1932 after his father, actor John Barrymore, heard an Alaskan superstition that a woman who eats the heart of a bear will give birth to a male child. He desperately wanted a son, so he asked his wife Dolores to try it. She consented, and gave birth to John Drew Barrymore.
Barrymore was a member of the Beat Generation, and worked as a TV actor and performer in the '50s and '60s. His daughter, actress Drew Barrymore, described him as "a cool cat."
Since the '70s, he lived on and off in the Rodeo Grounds with various residents. His oldest friend there, actor Michael Green, was relocated by State Parks in 2002. Barrymore loved to stay at Green's house, spend time in nature and walk over the hill.
A true eccentric, Barrymore is often remembered for annoying people with his acute sense of smell. Perfume, deodorant, incense, and even the smell of most soaps repelled him. If someone walked into the room with the slightest fragrance on, he would throw a fit and chase them out again.
 This is John Barrymore as I remember him. A trippy individual, and kind of ghostly looking in this picture. Michael Green took it, and manipulated the Polaroid by scratching it while it was still developing. |
A few smells he did like, however, were lemon and rosemary. In the Rodeo Grounds, he was often seen washing himself in the garden hose with a raw lemon. Other times, he would cut twigs off Green's rosemary bush, stuff them down his shirt, and walk around looking like a scarecrow.
Barrymore visited the Rodeo Grounds for the last time earlier this year, and died in a convalescent home in Santa Monica.
Barrymore's ghost first appeared in the Rodeo Grounds to Green's former tenant, James Mathers, who still uses Green's art studio, where Barrymore usually lived during his sojourns.
Mathers was in the studio when he heard of Barrymore's death on the radio. At the same moment, a painting fell off of the wall.
In the days that followed, Mathers says he found sure signs of Barrymore's presence in a hose that had been mysteriously turned on, and a lemon wedge lying in the grass.
Another time, he distinctly heard Barrymore's irascible shade shout at him, "You stink!"
Mathers's friend, Dominic, also witnessed Barrymore's ghost.
Twice in the early morning, Dominic said that he saw the ghost of an old man sitting in a chair in the art studio. Both times the ghost knocked stuff off the desk.
"I was really surprised because I didn't even know the guy," Dominic said.
Another morning, Dominic saw the old man run naked across the yard and disappear into a yucca plant.
Lyf, another visitor, said he had heard strange bumping noises, and invisible footsteps walking across the floor. "I felt like someone was watching me," Lyf said.
The Colors, a Lower Topanga punk rock band, heard the same bumping noises and saw brief flashes of light when they were rehearsing in the art studio. Afterwards, while carrying their equipment past Green's boarded-up house, all four band members heard an ominous voice coming from inside that said, "This is the house of Michael Green!"
Everyone agreed that Barrymore's ghost was temperamental, but never hostile or scary.
"I think John's ghost returned to the Rodeo Grounds because he was happiest here," Mathers said.
No more sightings of the ghost have been reported since the third day after Barrymore's death, and Mathers believes that the haunting is over.
