WELCOME TO
The San Diego Death Tour Page
San Diego Edition
WHAT IS THE DEATH TOUR?
The Death Tour is an odd annual Christmas tradition in our family. It got started years ago because we were looking for something different to do on Christmas Eve. We used to go driving around looking at the different displays of holiday lighting around L.A. but soon realized everyone else was doing the same thing, creating big traffic jams.
We tried the Death Tour one year (which was originally intended for Halloween) and everybody had so much fun it has become an annual tradition to load up everybody we can fit in a van & go out every Christmas Eve.
So what is it? What we do is go and see famous & infamous death sites. We tend to stick with places where famous people have died or infamous murders have been comitted. For example, one year we visited the sight where Bugsy Seigel was gunned down and where the Menendez brothers committed their crime (which, coincidentally, are right around the corner from each other).
Well, the Los Angeles tour has been such a success that we knew we'd have to eventually branch out. Here is our first out of area Death Tour for our neighbors to the south, San Diego. This is a complete tour, unlike our monthly L.A. edition which comes in 2 parts each month.
San Diego is a great place & has no desire to be like Los Angeles in any way. Sitting on the ocean with it's navy bases and abundant sunshine, San Diego has nonetheless had it's share of death.
PSA AIRLINES 727 CRASH
Ask pilots what U.S. airport is the scariest to fly in & out of and inevitably San Diego's Lindbergh field is at the top of the list. You must approach it from over the hills east of the runway near Balboa Park and take off over the hills of the Point Loma peninsula. This makes for very steep approaches & takeoffs. You can also cross paths with planes from nearby North Island Naval Air Station and a municpal field. On top of that, some real forward thinking politicians allowed an 8 story parking structure to be built at the east end of the runway!
It was into this airport that a Pacific Southwest Airlines (PSA) 727 airliner was making an approach on September 25, 1978. Unfortunately, a stray private pilot bumped into the airliner sending crashing into the neighborhood below. At the time, this was the worst air disaster in U.S. history.
From downtown San Diego, take Interstate 8 east to Interstate 805. Go south to University Ave. Turn left from the on ramp onto Boundary St. Turn left again on Myrtle Ave. and then another left on Nile St. Go one block to the intersection of Dwight St. and Nile St. This is where the plane came down.
Pictured above left to right: Jones, Brian Keith, and Johnny Whitakker
ANISSA JONES - "BUFFY"
Best remembered as one of the orphans on the 60's sitcom hit "Family Affair". Jones was the first cast member from the show to die.
As happens way too much to child actors, Jones slipped into drug addiction and was frequently seen on the streets of San Diego's Pacific Beach area. Although no one knows for sure, suicide is suspected in the drug overdose of Jones. Her body was found under the Pacific Beach's Crystal Pier on August 29, 1976.
As noted before, Jones was the first cast member but not the last to die...not even the last to take their own life. Sebastion Cabot, who played Mr. French, died the next year from a heart attack and just this July, (1997) veteran actor Brian Keith, who played the bachelor guardian of the orphans, took his own life at his Malibu home.
The other two cast members have moved on from acting. Kathy Garver, who played Cissy the oldest orphan, is married and enjoying family life in Northern California occasionally doing voice-overs. Johnny Whittaker, who played Jody, hasn't officially "retired" from acting but has not participated much in the business lately. He's working on a script for "Family Affair - the Movie" (is there any sitcoms left to be turned into movies?) and makes his bread and butter with a computer company and a production company that he owns.
From downtown San Diego, take Interstate 5 to Garnet Ave. off-ramp. Turn left (west) on Garnet and follow it to the end where it dead-ends at the Crystal Pier.
HEAVEN'S GATE
Yet another Southern California cult you say? Well...yes...they were here but consider that most cult's here (and this one was no exception) are mainly populated not by Southern Californians but from disaffected persons from other states. Like I heard in the gym one time, "it's not the people in Southern California who are crazy...it's the people that come here."
There seems to be some truth to that as people flock to the state and try to live that sterotypical life. Well, enough of the soap box...
The Heaven's Gate cult, led by Marshal Applewaite, was a little different in that they were a computer geek cult. They supported themselves by designing web pages for paying clients. By all accounts, they did very good work and had a great work ethic.
Spurred to action by their leader, they believed that a flying saucer trailed behind the Hale-Bopp comet which appeared in the skies in the spring of 1997. To gain admittance on this ship, they only needed to shed their earthly "containers". They did this by eating poison-laced applesauce and then covering their heads with plastic bags. A few days later, over 30 cult members were dead, making the news with their purple-cloaked bodies and their brand new Nike shoes.
The cult was located at a beautiful mediteranean style home in the wealthy suburb of Rancho Sante Fe. Take Interstate 5 north from San Diego to Encinitas Blvd. in Encinitas and head east (right). Turn left at Rancho Santa Fe Rod and then turn right on El Camino Del Norte. About 1/2 mile ahead, turn left on a clu-de-sac called Colina Norte. The Heaven's Gate house is located at 18241 Colina Norte.