Hollywood Artifacts Rescued From Blaze

Quick-working Los Angeles firefighters saved Charlton Heston’s chariot and other irreplaceable film memorabilia early Wednesday when flames raced through the Hollywood Studio Museum, a century-old barn that served as the studio for Hollywood’s first feature-length movie.

The fire charred the rear and roof of the structure across from the Hollywood Bowl, while smoke and water damaged several movie antiques, including a camera used by Charlie Chaplin and a delicate wool shirt worn on screen by Rudolf Valentino.

Los Angeles Fire Department arson investigators did not immediately determine the cause of the fire and a department spokesman gave an initial damage estimate of $35,000.

The museum’s curator said she suspected that the fire was started by transients who use an open area behind the Highland Avenue building.

The blaze unfolded in dramatic fashion.

Firefighters received a call at 4:51 a.m. Realizing they were dealing with irreplaceable Hollywood treasures, they doused the flames and simultaneously rushed in with plastic tarps to cover the museum’s artifacts, including Heston’s red chariot from “Ben-Hur.”

Firefighters also pulled an antique projector and fragile cameras from a glass case just feet from the burning rear wall as others threw sawdust on the carpeted floor to soak up water from fire hoses and ceiling sprinklers.

The 60 firefighters sent to the scene contained the fire and covered the museum pieces in about 15 minutes, Capt. Steve Ruda said.

“The value of this building is important for us,” said Ruda, commander of Station 27, which is about two miles from the museum. “We knew we had serious salvage problems because of the historic content.”

Curator Hanna Jola Mart-Shani, who arrived at the scene wearing a yellow jogging suit over a blue nightgown, praised the firefighters for saving the precious memorabilia.

“I never saw people act so fast,” she said. “I really admire the Fire Department.”

The yellow barn originally served as Cecil B. DeMille’s movie studio when he filmed the first feature-length motion picture ever made in Hollywood, “The Squaw Man,” in 1913.

The structure, which became known as the DeMille Barn, was located on what at the time was farmland at Selma Avenue and Vine Street.

“It’s the birthplace of movie making in Hollywood,” said Steve Sylvester, a member of Hollywood Heritage, a nonprofit organization that operates the museum.

The barn was moved to the site of the current Paramount Studios in 1926 when DeMille and his partners, Jesse Lasky and Samuel Goldwyn, founded Paramount Pictures.

The structure was declared a California landmark in 1956 but did not arrive at its latest destination, across from the Bowl, for nearly three more decades, when Hollywood Heritage began restoring it in 1982.

The group’s volunteers opened the Hollywood Studio Museum three years later--featuring props, photographs, cameras, costumes and other memorabilia chronicling the history of the film industry.

The volunteers spent Wednesday scrambling to save the museum pieces, including a pharaoh’s chair used in the “Ten Commandments.”

They also were arranging to board up the windows, erect a fence around the building and clean up floors blacked by a mixture of soot, water and sawdust.

The workers were uncertain how long repairs would take but vowed to restore the structure just as they did once before. On Wednesday afternoon, they were still assessing the damage to the building and its contents.

“It’s a disaster,” Sylvester said of the fire. “But it could have been worse. We’ll survive.”