"Jean Louise, stand up. Your father's been stolen."

[moneyp]

A Hollywood Star Is Torn
# Thieves cut through terrazzo and concrete to carry off the Walk of
Fame's tribute to Gregory Peck.

By Bob Pool, Times Staff Writer

Someone has walked off with Gregory Peck at the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Thieves equipped with a concrete saw cut through terrazzo and concrete
to hoist out the pink, five-pointed star that frames a movie camera
emblem and the late actor's bronzed name, authorities in Hollywood
said Tuesday.

"It happened just before Sunday's Hollywood Christmas Parade. We have
no idea where it is," said Johnny Grant, who serves as Hollywood's
honorary mayor and oversees the chamber's sidewalk salute to
celebrity.

Civic leaders at first thought the 43-year-old sidewalk star might
have been removed as part of some sort of construction project. But
they quickly determined that none of the city's departments was doing
work beneath the Walk of Fame.

"We covered over the hole before the parade so nobody would get hurt,"
Grant said. "We wanted to replace it right away."

The Hollywood Chamber of Commerce hastily began replacing the missing
star with a new one as Los Angeles police late Tuesday began an
investigation. By nightfall, the partially finished star bore the name
"Gregory P."

Peck's star, at 6100 Hollywood Boulevard near Gower Street, is the
fourth star to be stolen since the Walk of Fame was begun in 1960 with
the placement of actress Joanne Woodward's star. More than 2,000 of
them are now showcased along the walkway.

About five years ago stars honoring actors Jimmy Stewart and Kirk
Douglas were taken from Vine Street, where they had been temporarily
dislodged for a construction project. They were eventually recovered,
but not before replacement stars were ordered.

"The police in South Gate called and said they had the two stars in
their evidence room lockup," Grant said. "They'd recovered them when
they arrested a fellow involved in an incident there and searched his
house." It turned out that the suspect was a construction worker
involved with the Vine Street project. The stars of Stewart and
Douglas were found to have been badly damaged and were unusable.

On another occasion, a star honoring Gene Autry was swiped from
another sidewalk construction area. Grant later received an anonymous
call reporting that the missing star was in Iowa.

"The chamber never got that star back. Someday it will end up on
EBay," Grant said. Autry's star was eventually replaced with a new
one.

"Even in the early days they stole the good ones," he said, noting the
A-list celebrity standings of Peck, Stewart, Douglas and Autry.

Peck's star is located near that of the late comedian Lucille Ball.
Ironically, in an episode of her "I Love Lucy" show, Ball once tried
digging up John Wayne's footprints from the forecourt at Grauman's
Chinese Theatre.

Authorities said Walk of Fame vandals sometimes attempt to chisel out
the brass emblems that denote the stars' categories as film,
television, recording, radio or stage.

But new video surveillance cameras being installed along the Walk of
Fame may put an end to that.

"They hadn't gotten to Hollywood and Gower with them yet," Grant said.
"One of the next cameras is supposed to go in right there."

[Doc Martin]

"Step away from the star"

Damian sought for questioning.

Gregory Peck was a man's man, the kind of man you read about in the bible. He had the charisma of Frank Sinatra and the rugged manliness of a lumber jack. Even his last name is manly: "Peck," the phonetic equivalence of a slang term for a man's chest; it's a simple, almost primitive sound like a grunt, straight and to the point without fancy extra syllables and gratuitous punctuation. His default expression is a determined scowl, like he's prepared to introduce you to the business end of his shoe if you look at him wrong.

[John P. Cooper]

I always liked Greg Peck.

I was deeply sorry to see pics of him and his wife visiting Michael Jackson's 'ranch'.