Another Manson Movie Never To Be Seen??

Haunting Charles Manson
Charlie Is My Darlin' (original title) 
(Eviliz feels the same about Charlie being her Darlin)

Nothing to read at IMDB really.  A cast I never even heard of.  You be the judge.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2265203/

Q&A Steve Bekins

QUESTION-From our German friends-

Does anyone know what ever became of Steve Bekins who fled to Portland with Sandy.

I the great Eviliz tried to find him in the CA and OR prison systems but found nothing. 
I am assuming he is dead.

Link about Bekins @ Cats' site.
http://truthontatelabianca.com/threads/steve-bekins.2042/

Sharon pics

Joel Rostau's Senior Class High School Picture

Brookline High School Class of 1954

I also was able to find that Joel was a Freemason. 

A link to the lodge that Joel belonged to-

http://www.massfreemasonry.org/index.tpl?SID=11980091822652772&ng_view=93&ng_id=139

I notice that the date of death is in correct on the card.

The plastic company that Joel was general manager of was Paulson Co. located in Brookline MA.  Joel's mother was the president of the company.

Barbara Hoyt tears Lulu a new one!

From Leslie Van Houten's 2007 parole consideration hearing, Barbara Hoyt wrote a letter to the board. It was an extremely telling letter, which probably sealed Leslie's fate for good in the eyes of the parole board. It sure made me think twice about Leslie ever deserving to get out of prison. Wait a minute! Come to think of it, I never was of the school of thought that any of these scumbags should ever be released....The letter was read in the parole hearing by Los Angeles Deputy District Attorney Patrick Sequeira. Read on:

"Dear Board of Prison Terms. My name is Barbara Hoyt. I testified in many Manson related trials against these defendants for seven years. I also testified before you on 10/20/06 against Bruce Davis. I lived with the Manson Family for six months when I was seventeen years old. One of the ways I have to judge whether or not a particular defendant has changed or is sorry is by how truthful they are in the present about their roles in the past. If they are lying or minimizing their actions, I know it because I was there. I was struck by Leslie's 2006 parole hearing because she made that task more difficult by refusing, (like Sadie) --" referring to Susan Atkins, that's Susan Atkins nickname -- "to discuss the crime events at all. She not only murdered these poor people but she is now playing Manson-esque games, i.e., demanding that their memory cease to exist. This is a major red flag to me. In none of Leslie's prior parole hearings that I have watched has she ever owned up to how aggressive she was, or how aggressive her participation was in these crimes. If there was something she wanted and you got in her way, she could be quite abusive. Her demeanor never changed after the murders. Her affect was never sad to me. According to Sadie, who I overheard talking about the murders to Ouisch, O-U-I-S-H, Leslie forced Mrs. LaBianca into her bedroom, put a pillowcase over her head, and wrapped a lamp cord around her neck and shoved her onto the bed and held her down so Katie, Patricia Krenwinkel, could stab her, which she attempted, but her knife bent on the victim's collarbone. When Mrs. LaBianca overheard her husband being murdered, she jumped up from the bed with a superhuman strength, screaming, 'What are you doing to my husband?' She managed to keep Leslie and Katie at bay by swinging the lamp at them with the cord still around her neck. So Leslie got Tex. She knocked the lamp from Mrs. LaBianca's hands, and Tex, with a large knife, stabbed her, bringing her to the floor. There were several people that lived with the Manson Family who, despite believing that Charlie was Jesus Christ, that despite fearing the coming of the end of the world and Helter Skelter, despite the cult techniques of indoctrination, chose not to harm others, even if it meant not surviving Helter Skelter. There was also a group of Family members who couldn't wait to kill. Leslie was in the latter group. I believe that even without Charlie she would have harmed others in some capacity. I saw an interview with Leslie's father and he stated that, 'He has never asked her about the murders and she has never commented about it, that he has not lost any sleep over this entire -- over this crime, and that he doesn't think about the victims, and that he forgave Charlie Manson a long time ago.' It must be nice. If my child had been involved in a murder, I would have asked a lot of questions and I would have lost a lot of sleep. Leslie's ability to kill --" or, excuse me. "Leslie's ability to feel no concern for others isn't a trait she learned from Charlie but from her father. Charlie just gave her a place to express herself. She chose to kill. She asked to kill. She wasn't a mindless drug-crazed zombie soldier for Charlie, as she described herself in an earlier parole hearing. She had lots of fun. She played games, camped, sang songs, raced in dune buggies, had casual sex with favorite partners. She enjoyed herself. She was not an innocent who was plucked from her home. She came to the Family with her own group, including Bobby Beausoleil and Gypsy Share, who were both involved in another murder and attempted murder. Leslie also at the time knew that what she did was wrong. On the morning following the LaBianca murders I entered the back house of the ranch to find Leslie on the bed counting coins. A call came from the field phone that a man was on his way to the back house looking for Leslie. She told me the man had given her a ride last night from Griffith Park and for me to hide her, which I did. In 1977 Leslie was out of prison for a few months. She came to Paul Watkins' home and I met her there. She demanded of me, 'Did I know what it was like to live under a death sentence?' Having been a victim of an attempted murder, I said indeed I did know, and I wasn't given a trial like she had. I feel from her statements that the only person she feels is a victim here is herself. I compare the Manson story with that of Hitler because there are so many similarities. Both groups consisted of antisocial people who in their blood thirsty quest for personal power were willing to kill innocent people to get it. At least Hitler's cronies were held responsible for their murders despite pleas that they were only following orders, and so should the Manson followers who chose to kill. Both groups have left behind a legacy of evil that haunts us still today. I believe that if Leslie were truly and deeply sorry, she would stop these parole hearings and let the victims' family have some peace and serve her time in silence and dignity. In closing, I would like to say to Leslie that there is a fact that you seem to be unaware of, and that is, that murder is something you can never recover from or make right. The victims never get their lives back. The families never get to stop mourning. The witnesses never again get to live without fear, and the killers spend the rest of their lives in prison. You demanding to be able to leave prison would mean that you would be the only one to be able to walk away from the carnage you caused, and that would be a travesty of justice. Thank you. Barbara Hoyt."

Kitty Throughout The Years

 

Kitty as a baby with her mom & sis.

We can see where she gets her classic good looks.

 

 

Kitty on right with kitties.

 

Kitty as a young teen on the right.

 

Kitty on the left.

 

Kitty on the left (1986)

Fairly recent, but exact date unknown.

Another fairly recent, but exact date unknown.

Seed Bombs

Two years ago this month, Charles Manson gave an interview to NUG magazine that read in part:

"The Savior or Savior Project is an idea of Charles Manson’s for a seed gun: a gun that anyone/everyone can use to quickly and effectively plant seeds over a vast area. Currently, the project is developing functional loads and proper seed/compost mixtures to be used universally in common paintball guns. Mr. Manson has expanded the invention to include M-80 block guns converted to seed loads, seed-mortars, seed-bombs dropped by helicopter, seed artillery, etc."

You can see that article here. At the new ATWA website, they discuss the Savior Project in more detail, and state that "The Savior is not a patented invention, but more of an idea to be developed and spread."

Patty had this in the back of her mind when she visited the offices of a friend and saw the vending machine at right in the lobby. Seriously! There was a seed bomb vending machine right there: the last thing Patty was expecting to see in an otherwise non descript little office building. The seed bombs cost 50c each and are handmade in Covina, CA by an organization called "Greenaid Seedbombs." The Greenaid Website reads in part:

"Since 2010, Greenaid Seedbombs has been committed to making guerilla gardening more accessible to the general public with a growing line of seedbomb products that allow anyone to plant something in their local neighborhood or yard."

Patty is curious to know if Greenaid knows that Charles Manson claims to have invented their product? You might also be asking yourself right about now, what the heck goes into those bombs, anyway? ATWA has their original, unpatented recipe for you, right here:



"How To Make Seedballs - Basic recipe Ingredients:

2 parts potting soil or fine compost 5 parts pottery clay mix from your local art store 1-2 parts water 1-2 parts native seeds of your choice A tablespoon of Cayenne Pepper (add more depending on how large the batch) Large tub to mix ingredients Large box to dry and store seed balls

Directions: Mix the soil, clay and 1 part water thoroughly. There should be no lumps. Slowly add more water until the mixture is the consistency of the toy store molding clay that comes in a can. Add seeds. Keep kneading the dough until the seeds are well mixed in. Add more water if necessary.

Take small bits of the clay mixture and roll into ball about one inch in diameter, or desired size. The balls should hold together easily. If they’re crumbly, add more water. Dry seed balls for 24-48 hours in a shady place before sowing or storing. They store best in a cardboard box. Do not use plastic bags."

Of course, if you don't want to make them yourselves, the people at Greenaid will surely oblige. They do not have any M80s or paintball guns on their website. You can, however, get a slingshot! And they appear to be doing socially responsible things with their profits, so good for them.

And...for those of you who like the ooEEoo as much as Patty does, you will be interested to know that the vending machine was gone within an hour after Patty photographed it. No, really! Was it real, or just a dream? Did photographing it make it disappear, like a quark? Did Mr. Patty drop Orange Sunshine into her coffee this morning? A quick email to Patty's friend confirmed that her coworker's husband took it home for a weekend block party. So, sometimes a seed bomb is just a seed bomb, as they say.

Thanks to Stuart and A.C. for the heads up about the redesign and official California non-profit 501(C)(3) status of ATWAEarth.com.

High Society Manson Interview June 1985

This interview appeared in the June 1985 issue of High Society magazine.  It is the second part of a two part interview by Linda Francischelli.  The first part, which was in the May 1985 issue, can be found at various places online.  This second part of that interview is a lot harder to come by and certainly less read.  It's a great, informative interview, not at all bat shit crazy.

CHARLES MANSON

In a candid conversation with HIGH SOCIETY Charles Manson talks about drugs, Presidents Reagan and Nixon and late Beach Boy Dennis Wilson.

Last month, in High Society's exclusive interview with Charles Manson, he discussed the 1969 Hinman/Tate/LaBianca murders, the origin of the circle of friends -- a hippie cult known as the Family -- and Los Angeles Deputy District Attorney Vincent Bugliosi's explanation of the crimes' motivations -- a gory tale he called "Helter Skelter."   Bugliosi convinced a jury that it was an interpretation of the Beatles' "White Album" that drove Manson and Family members t take the lives of eight people.  Charles Manson disputes this, however.  "Helter Skelter is a night club in the desert," he said.  "And the D.A. took it and made it into a motive for a crime -- and he sold it."  Manson also did not like the use of the word Family.  "What's the Family?" he chastised.  "The D.A. had to have the Family in order to win the conviction.

Part II of this interview focuses directly on three of the most publicized crimes of this century and delves into Beach Boy Dennis Wilson's involvement with Charles Manson and his circle.  It was Wilson who introduced Manson to Gregg Jakobson, a talent scout who was married to veteran comedian Lou Costello's daughter, and who, on August 9, 1968 -- exactly one year to the day before the Tate murders -- had arranged a recording session for Manson at a studio in Van Nuys.  Jakobson introduced Manson to actress doris Day's son, TV/record producer Terry Melcher.  Jakobson tried to persuade Melcher to record Manson, but after listening to his groups unusual music, Melcher decided against doing the session.

As we approached the California Medical Facility in Vacaville where Charles Manson is incarcerated, for the first time since we had secured the interview, I felt apprehension.  It's an awesome place, rows of sprawling buildings enclosed behind fences, complete with a watchtower and armed guards.  The guns pointed down at us reminded me of a prison scene breakout scene from an old Cagney movie, but we were very aware of their seriousness.  There are a lot of violent hostile people housed in the Vacaville compound, and for one brief moment I wondered why I had not listened to my mother when she said: "Do you have to do this crazy thing?"

It took over three months to finalize our negotiations and all the details with the prison officials.  Because it is so difficult to communicate with someone in prison, especially on a daily basis by telephone, we relied heavily on the assistance of a close personal friend of Manson's.  When we arrived, it was late in the day, and we decided to take advantage of the fleeting light and get some pictures of the facility from the road.  No sooner had our photographer begun to when armed guards came running, one of them with his hand on his gun in a practiced precautionary measure.  "You're taking pictures!" he yelled.  "That's not allowed."  The reason for this security is to prevent prison escape routes from being documented on film, but we were granted permission for a few shots.

Next came the search.  This is when I found out that the contents of my pocketbook were more significant than I had ever considered.  No opened packs of cigarettes, no cash over $20, no credit cards, emery boards or postage stamps, and so on.  We had been told in advance that we should not come dressed in denim clothing.  The inmates wear denim and it identifies them to guards and prison officials who are constantly on watch.

The wait for Manson to be brought down from housing to the attorney's visiting room, a small, glass enclosed cubicle where our interview was conducted, was a long one which dissipated some of my anxieties.  Charles Manson is a notorious legend in American history, and I looked forward to meeting him face to face and looking him straight in the eyes -- despite warnings by well meaning friends who believe Manson is capable of mind-control.  It is important, I think, to say that no time during the interview did I see a single trace of the raving lunatic I was led to believe Charles Manson is.  He was animated, very talkative, and sometimes rambled from one subject to the next, but was lucid, keen minded and very articulate.

High Society thanks Charles Manson for this interview and hopes you will find it as interesting as we did.

HIGH SOCIETY: Bobby Beausoleil was arrested for the Gary Hinman murder on August 6, 1969.  He called you the next day and asked for help.  Were the Tate murders which took place on August 9th, then planned to be similar to the Hinman murder, to throw the authorities off the track and convince them Bobby was innocent?

CHARLES MANSON:  The final tip on that circle was, get your brother out of jail.  How do I do that?  What the hell do I care how you do it?  Pay him!  Pay him what you owe him, or I'll pay him what you owe him.  Someone says, "We'll get him a lawyer."  And someone else says, If you get him a lawyer, all lawyers do is lie and take the money."  So then you go back into your system, and you ask who killed those people?  The lawyers, because we can't get no representation.

HS: Then you did send Charles Watson, Susan Atkins and the others to the Tate house?

CM:  Wait a minute, man.  I didn't say I sent anybody anywhere.  This is just a conversation in that circle.  Then I said, "I'm leaving this circle, because this is going straight back to the penitentiary, and I'm not going back to jail for none of you assholes."  They said, "Oh, brother, don't leave us.  We need you.  We love you."  And I said, "Look, man, don't put tags on my toes.  I've been through this before.  I'm solo on this outlaw trail, and I'm walking on my own ability.  Do what you do.   Pay your debts the way you pay them.  I had to fight four times for you, put my life on the line.  Here, you lock your hands and stand up for yourselves.  Don't ask me to stand up for you."

HS: But before Sharon Tate moved into that house, Terry Melcher lived there and --

CM: This interview isn't suppose to be about all this madness.  Do you want me to evoke all that bullshit again?

HS: What I'm trying to get at is --

CM:  Look here, if we had two or three weeks to sit down and sort it all out to where it is explainable....

HS:  I'm trying to ask you about the connection between Hinman, who was a musician, and --

CM:  Hinman was not a musician.  He never played anything in his life.  He played a little piano for his mother when he was about six years old, and he got a job teaching.  Bobby was a musician.  Hinman taught little kids.  You go to a studio musician and ask him what kind of a musician teaches on consignment for a music store.  It's a sham, you know.

HS:  What I see is Hinman killed, then people at the home where Terry Melcher had lived, and then the LaBianca's, whose former neighbor happened to have been Harold True, and it was at True's house that you and members of the circle had attended LSD parties before True moved to another location.  Were the Tate/LaBianca murders errors?  Were they to be, instead, Melcher or True -- revenge murders for the music deals that had gone down bad?  Didn't you want to be a rock singer?

CM:  See, again you got it backwards.

HS:  Explain it to me.

CM:  As I explained, man.  I was raised up playing Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby, Mel Torme, Eddie  Gorme.  I wanted to be in a Marrakech band at one time.  I wanted to be a bullfighter at one time.  I wanted to be a racecar driver.  I had a million fantasies, you know, but when I grew up and I faced the reality of what is, I felt differently.  I'll give you an example.  I went to the Troubadour when I got out of jail, and I was standing in line with my guitar, and I had some 1950 songs.  A guy took me over and showed me what acid rock was doing.  The biggest in my mind was "Cherry Pink and Apple Blossom White."  When I came out and heard The Grateful Dead, I threw my guitar away.  Man, music had run off and left me.

HS:  You didn't want to become part of the music scene?

CM:  I wanted to when I first came out.  I checked out the music scene.

HS:  But weren't you negotiating with Terry Melcher?

CM:  No.  That was Gregg Jakobson's idea.  Gregg Jakobson was broke.  Dennis [Wilson] had fired him.  He was good at what he does, and he wanted to produce an album.  He wanted to make the money, and had the connection with Terry Melcher.  They came to me.  I didn't go to them.  If I was after a career, wouldn't I be at his house saying, hey, look at what I can do?  So what's he coming to me for?

HS:  Melcher went to see you at the ranch?

CM: Yeah, he came out there.  He sent a truck out there with somebody that was suppose to record, but this guy went out of his mind.  the music was too much for him, he couldn't deal with it.  He had never heard music like that before, and he went crazy.  In the weeds, we play some pretty wild music, music that you ain't heard on the radio.  Now, I'll tell you something else.  When that murder jumped off, I was in San Diego with a girl named Stephanie.  I had picked her up in Big Sur.  I had a milk truck I was riding around in.  I hadn't even been living at the ranch.  I had been on the road.  I even had a traffic ticket, but they tore it up and transferred the highway patrolman.

HS:  Someone testified that you offered him $5000 and a three-wheeled motorcycle to kill Melcher.  He agreed, but then the next day he went home to Texas.

CM:  Let me tell you something.  Every rumkin, including your Danny DeCarlo, had five auto thefts, three burglaries, four sales and anybody would say anything.  The D.A. would knock all the cases off.

HS:  Danny DeCarlo, a member of the Straight Satans -- was he your bodyguard?

CM:  My bodyguard? [laughter] Danny was half-scared all the time.  He walked around with a pistol in his pocket.  His wife comes up and says, "Where's my husband?"  I say he's out in the barn, and she goes over by the barn and comes back.  She says, "You tell my husband to come back downtown."  He's up here, and he's telling her, "I'm not going back because I'm staying here with Charlie."  He's hiding behind me, you dig.... As soon as she would come, in would come all that negative force.  Downer freaks started coming in.  I've always drawn the line -- smoke a little grass, a little hash and some acid now and then.  Every once in a while, if you got something to do and you want to drop some bennies, that's reasonable.  I'm into crime long enough to know where to draw the line and where it's safe.

HS:  You don't approve of other drugs?

CM:  I don't approve or disapprove of anything.  I don't like what goes along with them.  I don't like downer freaks because they generally end up causing trouble, and them you have to beat one of them up, and when you beat one of them up, they can't feel it anyway.

HS:  There's a different kind of drug usage today than there was in the late sixties.  What do you think about today's drugs?

CM:  I think everything is good if used properly.  You have to go all the way back to the fifties to understand where the problem started.  I remember when there was nobody in jail for drugs.... Remember when they put out that movie "Reefer Madness"?  All that insane bullshit, and then everybody started putting all their problems off on drugs and blaming the drugs for their behavior.  All kinds of things, to where drugs started getting a bad name.  Then they started calling marijuana drugs.  Marijuana's never been a drug.  And then they come up with LSD, so they pushed LSD over on the drug market.  LSD isn't drugs.  And then peyote.  Peyote isn't drugs.  Your body is yours.  Your mind is yours.  And you should be able to do what you want to do with your body and your mind.

HS:  Would you tell today's kids to use or not use drugs?

CM:  I would say, change the laws and use the motivation of drugs for a positive purpose.  Sell it in the drugstore.  If you work and earn it then you can have it.  I think it is bad when people won't allow other people to be themselves.  If I tell you don't pick that up [he places a matchbook on the table], don't pick that up, don't even think of picking that up, I don't want you to, don't you dare --

HS:  I have the compulsion to pick it up.

CM:  Exactly, and that's exactly what we are doing to the kids.

HS:  So you think we should legalize --

CM:  Put it in the drugstore man.

HS:  The Beach Boys' Dennis Wilson  -- was he a friend?  What was your involvement with him?

CM:  Yes.  I loved him.

HS:  Did he live with the Family?

CM:  See, there you go again, drawing lines to the Family.  What's the Family?  The Family had five people in it.  It was a music group.  It was called Family Jams.

HS:  If you prefer, I'll use the word circle.  Was Dennis Wilson a member of your circle?

CM:  Member?  There were no membership cards.  You were just there if you were, and if you weren't, you weren't.  People came and went as they wanted to.

HS:  Was Dennis there?

CM:  Yeah.  When the Buffalo Springfield broke up, they left a motorcycle over at Dennis' pad.  I wanted the motorcycle.  I went over to get the motorcycle, mainly because I liked the Buffalo Springfield.  I was there with this Neil something or other, Diamond or Young, and we sat and bullshitted.  We played some music and he said, "You play pretty good, why don't you take it up professionally?"  I was going to do something with Dennis.  I was writing songs for Dennis, and Dennis was taking them and giving them to his brothers' recording company.  They were changing the words all around and moving the song to the point that it was not saying what I wanted to say.  I said, later!  If I can't say what I want to say, then I don't want the money.  Fuck the money, man.  It's the principle.

HS:  What were your thoughts when Dennis Wilson died?

CM:  I knew it. I'd seen it.  Too many negative trips.  Dennis was a lost child.  He was thrown up in the public's eye before he really knew what life's all about.  When I got him to hitchhike up and down the highway a couple of times, he was thrilled to death, because that was like getting back in touch with reality.  He had forgotten what the regular people lived like.

HS:  The Beatles --

CM:  They killed the music.  They killed the music by not standing up with the kids they were influencing.  "Why don't we do it in the road?"  Do what?  Who's going to do it in the road?  We'll do it in the road, and we'll do the suffering and the kids come to the nut ward and say, we'll go down to Strawberry Fields, where nothing is real, Penny Lane, cut your fuckin' wrists, write "I love you God" on the wall and all that stuff, and then hang yourself on the fuckin' ventilator.

HS:  What was your reaction to John Lennon's assassination?

CM:  He shot himself.  The guy that shot him said, "I'm John Lennon.  I shot myself."

HS:  Do you believe in God?

CM:  I believe in everybody in this room.

HS:  Are you saying that everybody in this room collectively is God?

CM:  Yes. And it is a word that we use.

HS:  In 1985, where do you think we are headed?

CM:  We are going to destruction.  I have some predictions for you. One is that crime for money will be on the down.  Crime for principle will be on the up.  People are waking up to the fact that ecology is important.  There'll be a revolution against pollution.  We have to clean up our atmosphere.  This is not a question as to whether we want to or not -- we have to!

HS:  Do you have any comments on our president, Ronald Reagan?

CM:  He was one of my heroes when I was a kid.  I like him.  I used to watch him on "Death Valley Days."  Reagan was always one of the cleaner actors, he was one of the more upstanding good guys.  He was never a bad guy, but always a straight shooter -- him and Roy Rogers, Gene Autry and all those guys like Gabby Hayes.

HS:  What about Reagan as a president?

CM:  As a president what he says is right.  I have listened to him, and I haven't heard anything he has said that isn't right on.  See, one thing that is wrong with this country is everybody uses the presidents to get off on.  That's why we elect them so we can dump the shit all on them.  Like Nixon, he was one of the best presidents this country ever had.

HS:  Maybe you are crazy, Charlie.

CM:  No, no.  Because he was so sneaky [laughter].  If somebody is going to look out for your interest, would you rather have some rockydoo up there, playing with flowers, or would you rather have some terrible son-of-a-bitch that's just awful?  You know what kind of ol' lady I want if I ever get out?  I want her to be the meanest one, the most wicked bitch in the whole fuckin' country, because then I can hide behind her ass, see.

HS:  Charlie, if you could get out of prison right now, what would you do?

CM:  I'd get a girl and get her in the bushes.

HS:  After sex, then what?

CM:  There's no after. that's what I'd do all the time, and I'd try my damnedest to get rich, then I wouldn't have this happen anymore -- jail and all.

December 19, 1969 LIFE Magazine: The Green Caddie

Another cool tidbit from the December 9, 1969 LIFE magazine:

"The strange story of Charlie Manson and his brood of nubile flower children charged with murder begins on p. 20 of this week's issue. Written in New York by Paul O'Neil, it is based on legwork by our entire California staff plus a few others. In search of facts and pictures, they travelled from the surfers' canyons of Los Angeles to the heart of Death Valley and San Francisco's decaying Haight-Ashbury, and on the way they had some adventures of their own. Los Angeles Bureau Chief John Frook reports:  

"After all the pounding on doors, false steps and blind leads, there always seems to be that one shiny moment you remember. Reporter John Fried and Photographer Vernon Merritt, for example, got the job of covering the Manson Family's existence at the Barker ranch. Its a terrible place to get to and their journey involved four-wheel-drive vehicles and a helicopter, but they made it to the ranch, got their words and their pictures, and made it back again. The day ended in a restaurant in Death Valley with two Japanese journalists approaching and asking, please, for directions to the Barker ranch. Fried and Merritt couldn't say a thing."

"Reporter Judy Fayard tried to tack down people who might have known Manson or his followers. Late one night - "Make that one very dark night,' she says - in Las Flores Canyon, she scrabbled (sic) up a hillside to reach a deserted-looking house where some promising sources were supposed to live. 'Their apartment was in the very back. I went in and quite literally groped my was across the living rom and for the first time in my career the thought crossed my mind that yes, sex DOES make a difference in this business. But when I found them, they turned out to be nice and they gave me some good material."

"Luck - good and bad - figures mightily in a story of this kind. Merritt and I had been to Death Valley on a different story about 10 days before the Manson thing broke, and when it did I called a friend I had made there and asked if he'd heard of this desert commune. 'Sure,' he said, 'Why didn't you ask?' Now that is bad luck. But there was one moment when luck did seem to be with us. Trailing through Devil's Canyon, which was to have been Manson's escape route to the desert, we came upon a new, green Cadillac convertible, complete with a bullet hole in its trunk, wedged into an arroyo. We were sure we had a giant clue. Short of a parachute there is simply no way it could have got in there. Unfortunately I couldn't find any connection between the car and the Manson tribe. But I checked the registration, and Mr. J.E.Lopez, if you're interested, I know where your Caddy is."

Tex's thoughts on the subject....

I just read an interview Tex Watson did, (Manson's Right-Hand Man Speaks Out) in which the interviewer asked him if the crimes would of happened without Manson. This is what Tex had say in regards to that particular question. He also added something else, which I find interesting. Of course, Tex was full of caca most of the time, but who knows, perhaps he was right on the mark with what he said in his answer. Read on:

Q: Would the crimes have happened without Manson's order?

Definitely not! Bugliosi, the prosecuting attorney, agrees that Manson was the catalyst. We would never have gone out on our own and killed people. It was not our idea of an exciting night. We murdered after taking on Manson's beliefs and hatred toward society, but it was nothing we wanted to do. We could've said no, but our foolish hearts were darkened. True, I had anger in my heart and released it during the crimes. I had misplaced anger, but enough to kill? -- not without many other factors, none of which excuses my actions.

Manson had the motive. It was more than just his crazy philosophy and a copycat murder. Manson was angry at Doris Day's son, Terry Melcher, for not giving him a recording contract. Terry was an acquaintance who used to live at the house where the murders took place. It's believed that Manson was at the house looking for Terry the night before the murders and was offended by the new occupants. As a result, he sent us there to kill them and to start Helter Skelter. I also believe that Manson and another family member went to the house afterward and disturbed the crime scene.