Costume Portraits From The Wrecking Crew

The Wrecking Crew was the last in the series of Matt Helm films starring Dean Martin.  It was released in 1969, a few months before Sharon Tate was murdered. The costume designer for Sharon's wardrobe in this film was Moss Mabry.

Looking For The Back Ranch House And The Outlaw Shacks

Any visitor to the site of Spahn's Movie Ranch today can easily see where the old western movie set was located on the flat area south of Old Santa Susana Pass Road across the street from the Church at Rocky Peak. Less apparent, however, is the location of the old Back Ranch House and the Outlaw Shacks, both of which also played significant roles in the saga of Charles Manson, his "Family," and the murders of the summer of 1969. These two places were situated in close proximity to each other west of the main ranch area and were accessible by a dirt road that was known as "Lovers Lane."

 Aerial photograph of Spahn's Ranch. Lovers Lane is indicated by the arrow. 

Topographic map of the Spahn's Ranch area (Oat Mountain map, 1952). The arrow on the right indicates the flat area where the movie set buildings were. The arrow on the left indicates Lovers Lane branching off to the west.

In his book My Life With Charles Manson Paul Watkins described the Back Ranch House thusly: "Like the rest of the buildings at Spahn's, the ranch house was in a general state of disrepair. But it was warm, rustic, and smelled of wood, generating the feelings of a mountain cabin. It had a huge living room with a fireplace and plenty of windows facing the road. Two good-sized bedrooms in the back fronted on the creek, and beyond it, a sloping forest of scrub oak, eucalyptus, and poison oak. The girls went to work at once, scouring floors, cleaning cabinets, and washing windows. We moved the mattresses, furniture, and food supplies in from the saloon, and afterward decorated the walls and the ceiling of the living room with Moroccan tapestries. It felt good to be out of the dusty confines of the saloon into a more bucolic, picturesque setting away from all the tourists."  (MLWCM, pages 76-77)

In Will You Die For Me? Charles "Tex" Watson recalled the Back Ranch House as the site of "the Family's" fear exercises:  "Sometimes Charlie would gather us all together in the ranch house and imagine a rich piggie [sic] sitting in the middle of a circle we'd form. "Imagine we just yanked this pig out of his big car and stuck him here," Charlie would instruct us. Then we would project all our own fear on that piggie while we fantasized his own fear as he was surrounded by our silent staring power." (WYDFM?, page 116)

Susan Atkins' son was born in the Back Ranch House. (Child of Satan, Child of God, pages 106-110)

The Back Ranch House was also the site of the infamous "freak-out" acid trip which occurred soon before the group initially went to the Death Valley area at the end of October, 1968 (See MLWCM, pages 105-112).

Judging from this interior shot of the Back Ranch House from the December 19, 1969 issue of Life magazine, the cement slab base for the structure must have been pretty big.

The Outlaw Shacks, located near the Back Ranch House, also figured importantly in the saga of Charles Manson and the murders which surrounded him, for they were the site of the infamous bust of Manson and Stephanie Schram on August 22, 1969. That bust, set up by Frank Retz and Donald "Shorty" Shea, was the final straw in the escalating conflict between "the Family" and the people that wanted them off the ranch property -- a straw that led to the stabbing death of Shea a few days later.

Charles Manson's mug shot from his arrest in the Outlaw Shacks on August 22, 1969

So, the Back Ranch House and the Outlaw Shacks were both important locales in the story of that crazy summer of 1969. But where exactly were they? In September of this year I went to the ranch site with the area's unofficial caretaker to see if we could find out.

It's been forty-five years since the ranch burned down, and that's a lot of time for changes to have occurred to the landscape. But if anything survived of the Back Ranch House it would be the cement slab that the house, like many other California structures, was built on. Also, there could be some remains of the stone work around the house's fireplace. So what we would be looking for would be the remains of a cement slab which, based on a 1969 photograph of the interior of the house, would be fairly large. As for the Outlaw Shacks, period photographs show them to be made out of wood, so likely all traces of them would be long gone. But one picture showed the horizons of the mountains behind the shacks, and we knew that if we could line up those horizons in the same way today we would be in the same spot as the photographer who took the period photograph.

It was a hot September day when we went out there. Starting on the west end of the movie set site we walked further west along the north side of the creek bed running in the gully behind the former western set. As guide material we had several old photographs of the Outlaw Shacks and Charles "Tex" Watson's map of the ranch area from his book Will You Die For Me?

Below, the Outlaw Shacks

Charles "Tex" Watson's map of the Spahn's Ranch area

This photo shows the lineup of the horizons. The arrow points to a noticeable feature of the far mountain range. If you found an identical lineup today you would be standing in the same spot as the photographer who took the picture. Note the distinct formation of rocks on top of the mountain in the center.

The same mountain today, approached from the east

It was a longer walk than we thought, almost a half a mile.  As we proceeded west, the mountain in one of the photos of the Outlaw Shacks quickly came into view. It took a while to get oriented to the topography, and we did quite a bit of fruitless wandering up and down the hills before we got a sense of what we should be looking for. But finally we realized that the point we wanted was located close to the north side of a developed area about a half-mile west of the western set site and fairly close to Old Santa Susana Pass Road. We were just walking to that area to get the horizons of the mountains lined up when the guy drove up in the red pickup truck. My "Free Manson" T-shirt-clad fellow researcher disappeared into the brush, but he kept taking pictures.

Me pointing to the direction we would have to go to get the correct lineup of horizons. I'm already trespassing on private property.

"What are you doing here?" the man in the truck asked.

"Oh, hi. We're just trying to find the location of some old shacks," I told him.

"You know that this is private property?"

(Me, ignoring his question) "Oh, well we're just trying to line up these mountain horizons to find out where this location is. See, if you line up the mountains, then you're in the place. It should be just over there (gesturing north) someplace." (Presenting the 1969 photograph) "See, here's the same mountain with the same rocks on top."

When the guy saw the old pictures he suddenly became interested.

"Where did you get those pictures?"

"Off the Internet."

He saw my point about the mountain horizons and ventured that the reason they weren't lining up as in the 1969 photograph was because the far mountain's horizon had been altered during the construction of the Simi Valley Freeway in the late '60s and early '70s. I thought that such a geographical alteration was beyond even Caltrans' biggest earth-raping wet dream but I kept my disagreement to myself as the fellow was being fairly friendly and didn't seem inclined to call the cops. But neither did he seem inclined to let me venture further north to see if I could see the proper mountain alignment. 

I explain to the nice man that we're only trying to find the location of some old shacks.

After a few more minutes of conversation (including my heartfelt dissertation on my respect for private property rights) my research partner and I excused ourselves and retreated from the verboten territory.

As we walked back to our cars on Iverson Road, the mountains finally started to line up. The far range revealed itself from behind the near one, and it became apparent where the location of the Back Ranch House and Outlaw Shacks was, namely on the developed piece of private property owned by the Church at Rocky Peak.

Photo taken from Iverson Road shows the same rear mountain horizon that is noted in the 1969 photo above. The top arrow points to the same feature in the far mountain range. In order to line up the horizons precisely one would have to be standing about in the area indicated by the lower arrow. Fairly close to Old Santa Susana Pass Road, the location is now on private property.

Having found the location of the Back Ranch House and the Outlaw Shacks it was apparent that no trace of any of those structures would remain today. The shacks were wood and likely perished in the same wildfire that consumed the other buildings of Spahn's Ranch on September 26, 1970. A similar fate also probably befell the Back Ranch House, and any trace of a surviving slab it might have been built on has doubtlessly been obliterated by changes made on the property by the Church at Rocky Peak.

Thus, like so many locales related to this case -- the Spahn Movie Ranch proper, the Polanski residence, the house on Gresham Street, the Myers and Barker Ranches, to name a few -- the Back Ranch House and the Outlaw Shacks have passed on from the realm of reality and into the realm of legend and lore.

Google Maps satellite view of the ranch area today. The arrow on the right shows where the movie set was. The left arrow indicates the general location of the Back Ranch House and Outlaw Shacks -- now on developed private property. 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The below documents were sent along by Ben Gurecki. For details check the comments.

"Here are the arrest documents that go with the arrest photo of cm. these are originals and clearly signed by Red, using Bruce's alias."

The Manson Family CULT

When I look at these photos, it brings to mind something I read recently on a website about cults. It has listed key signs or warnings of what is typical of a cult. It sounds very familiar too, I might add, such as:

• The group displays excessively zealous and unquestioning commitment to its leader, and (whether he is alive or dead) regards his belief system, ideology, and practices as the Truth, as law.
• Questioning, doubt, and dissent are discouraged or even punished.
• Mind-altering practices (such as meditation, chanting, speaking in tongues, denunciation sessions, or debilitating work routines) are used in excess and serve to suppress doubts about the group and its leader(s).
• The leadership dictates, sometimes in great detail, how members should think, act, and feel (e.g., members must get permission to date, change jobs, or marry or leaders prescribe what to wear, where to live, whether to have children, how to discipline children, and so forth).
• The group is elitist, claiming a special, exalted status for itself, its leader(s), and its members (e.g., the leader is considered the Messiah, a special being, an avataror the group and/or the leader is on a special mission to save humanity).
• The group has a polarized, us-versus-them mentality, which may cause conflict with the wider society
• The leader is not accountable to any authorities (unlike, for example, teachers, military commanders, or ministers, priests, monks, and rabbis of mainstream religious denominations).
• The group teaches or implies that its supposedly exalted ends justify whatever means it deems necessary. This may result in members participating in behaviors or activities they would have considered reprehensible or unethical before joining the group (e.g., lying to family or friends, or collecting money for bogus charities).
• The leadership induces feelings of shame and/or guilt in order to influence and control members. Often this is done through peer pressure and subtle forms of persuasion.
• Subservience to the leader or group requires members to cut ties with family and friends, and radically alter the personal goals and activities they had before joining the group.
• The group is preoccupied with bringing in new members.
• The group is preoccupied with making money.
• Members are expected to devote inordinate amounts of time to the group and group-related activities.
• Members are encouraged or required to live and/or socialize only with other group members.

Sound familiar, ladies & gentlemen? 

Phil Kaufman Smells Money

From during the height of the Guns N' Roses brouhaha:

Charles Manson

February 19, 1994

Dear Charlie,

I know that you may have been preoccupied for the last 25 years but I'm sure you recall that I acted as producer for your recordings which became the "Lie" album (such "producing" consisting of setting up a brief, one-off recording session. I never had the album actually produced or promoted when you were still a free man and it might have done you some good.). The album was financed by various people, none of whom have been compensated for this endeavor (and who have thus suffered hardships that you can't imagine). Indeed, persons later described as your "followers" came to my house (from the house next door, which I arranged for them to stay in) and took most of the 20 or so copies of the album that were initially produced. (I called the cops on them.) There has never been any money made from this album (by me, that is, because it has been pointless for me to pursue the innumerable shadowy individuals who have been selling and presumably profiting from sales of bootlegged  albums and CDs of the music for at least the last 20 years).

But you -- I know who you are and where you are. And now I'm telling you that our agreement was that I received full rights to this music in exchange for producing 20 copies of the album (after you were imprisoned on charges of mass murder). Now that the music has received renewed interest (with a big money trail that can be traced), I ask that you acknowledge our agreement so that the original investors, who believed and trusted in you at the time of investing (but whose belief and trust  has been noticeably scarce since your arrest and conviction), can be duly paid back.

I hope that you will honor the aforementioned agreement so that I can in turn repay some of the people that invested in (and hoped to profit from) your notoriety years ago.

You can reach me through blah, blah, blah…. 

Yours,

Phil Kaufman 

(signed)  

(Letter annotated by "Unknown" --  G.S.)

Shorty's Guns!

Shorty's guns are for sale!  There is a listing for them at site that specializes in selling firearms.  The seller is asking $75,000.00 for them and associated memorabilia.

Skepticism abounds when items related to the Manson case are offered for sale.  With an enormous amount of help from CieloDrive I believe that between the two of us we have authenticated the revolvers and along the way discovered a thing or two that we didn't know.


Cielodrive.com has a section on Shorty with background information and the early days of the investigation into his murder.  The guns are discussed in the links to the reports. 

The revolvers enter into the picture because they were evidence that members and associates of the Manson Family had something to do with the disappearance of Donald Jerome "Shorty" Shea.  Danny De Carlo told investigators that he was given two pawn tickets that were taken from Shorty's body by Bruce Davis.  These two pawn tickets turned out to be for the revolvers.  De Carlo redeemed the tickets and took possession of the guns.  De Carlo allegedly gave one of the one of the revolvers to Charles Manson.  Two weeks later De Carlo learned that Shorty had been murdered where upon Charlie returned the revolver that De Carlo had given him and De Carlo using the alias of Richard A. Smith went to a different pawn shop and sold the revolvers. 

I was under the impression that Shorty's beloved guns were "pearl handled" revolvers as I have read this in various accounts.  When I interviewed Windy Bucklee she was adamant that the revolvers had pearl handles.   A March 9, 1987 LA Times article attributes Stephen Kay as saying the revolvers had pearl handles.  In a statement to authorities November 7, 1970 Jerry Binder describes the guns as having pearl handles.  Ed Sanders in The Family inexplicably describes the guns as having "brass handles", (2002, page 272).

The "pearl handles" description does not seem to be true, the guns have walnut handles and there is no evidence that Shorty owned any other pair of revolvers.

The serial numbers on the guns are the surest way of determining whether or not the revolvers are the ones that Shorty had had in his possession.  The official reports state that the serial number on the guns were 2421 and 2422, they also state that the revolvers were Colt 45's but we will get to that later.  One official report is the trial testimony of Magdalene Shea who was questioned about the guns.  She, BTW, described them as having "brown" handles and said she knew the serial numbers because Shorty had pointed out the consecutive numbers of the guns to her and was able to describe just where on the guns the serial numbers were located.

Another official report is the trial testimony of Arch Hall Sr. who sold the guns to Shorty.  And thirdly, there are the pawn tickets from Shorty pawning the guns.  Shorty had pawned the guns a few times when he was low on money.  These tickets are from when they were pawned in February 1969 and the serial numbers are noted.

A little about how Shorty came to have the revolvers.  The revolvers were purchased new by a man named Arch Hall Sr..  Arch Hall was involved in the movie business, first as a stuntman with occasional small roles in films starting in the 1930s.  He eventually started his own film company, Fairway International Films, in the late 50s which was solely to promote his son Archie Hall Jr. as an actor and singer.  He had visions of his son becoming the next Elvis Presley.  He completed about 11 films which were later pronounced as being the worst films ever made.

Hall made Shorty's acquaintance when he shot portions of a movie titled What's Up Front early in 1963 at Spahn Ranch.  Shorty and his second wife, Sandra, were living at Spahn with their three children at the time.  Shorty kept in touch with Hall after the filming and hit him up for any possible film roles quite regularly. 

In 1964 Hall was filming a western movie, Deadwood 76, in South Dakota and due to some very bad weather the shoot in South Dakota had to be cancelled.  Hall resumed filming at Corriganville, another movie ranch located next to Spahn's, but Corriganville did not have horses that approximated the look of the horses that were used in South Dakota so horses were rented from Spahn Ranch.  Shorty was the person that took the horses over to Corriganville for the daily shoots and returned them to Spahn at night.  Shorty also was given a small part to play in the film. 

The revolvers were acquired by Hall for use in the filming of Deadwood 76.  Hall stated that Shorty fell in love with the guns during the shooting of the movie and pestered Hall to sell him the guns which he eventually did in 1968.

A little about the revolvers from direct quotes of the trial testimony-  

They are-- Italian made copies of Frontier model Colt's with long barrels, and they are made in Milano.

I had them made special for quick-draw.  ...you file the triggers-- I'm not technically qualified to say, but it is so that you can fan the gun, shoot much faster with it.

Q  By Mr. Denny-  Were the guns safe to fire real bullets?

A I'd hesitate to shoot them.  They are made in Italy to match a Colt and we never shot a real bullet in it.  We shot reloads-- you know, blanks-- and I think they said they were alright, but because it was sort of a Mickey Mouse Colt, in a sense, we never used it for real bullets.

So, the revolvers were not manufactured by Colt, they were less expensive Italian knock-offs that had been modified and Hall wouldn't have used live bullets in the guns.  Most of the official report do refer to the guns as Colt's as does the current seller.

The Seller provided both Cielodrive and myself with pictures of the serial numbers and a close up of the papers that are being sold with the guns.

Arch Hall Sr. died in 1978, it was his son who applied to the Superior Court of Los Angeles County to have the revolvers returned.  Cielodrive told me that these are the only guns associated with the Family that are known to have been returned to their owner.

While Shorty did give Arch Hall something down for the purchase of the revolvers, about $25, two used cameras and some second party postal money orders, which bounced, as collateral.  He did not finish paying off the guns nor make good on the money orders.  As a matter of fact once Shorty had the guns in his possession he did not give Hall any more payments, only called with excuses from time to time.  Hall had the receipts for the original purchase of the guns so that made the guns his.

While reading the information at Cielodrive it occurred to be that Shorty wasn't as tall as I once thought.  I have always thought that Shorty was 6'5" and the reason he was called Shorty was because he was so tall.  Not so apparently, Kitty Lutesinger puts shorty at 5'10", Shorty's wife Magdalene says he is 5'10", information in one of the reports that looks like it's from Shorty's drivers license says he is 5'11".  Shorty's autopsy report says the remains were 5'10''.  Another myth shattered!

Here is the movie Deadwood 76, see if you can find Shorty!  Cielodrive and I could not.  Shorty is suppose to be riding a horse in several scenes of the film and he was one of Sam Bass's "boys" involved in a gun fight towards the end and he gets shot, to the best of Arch Hall's recollection in the trial testimony.

"The Picture Is A Warning"

Contemporary local media coverage of the TV-movie Helter Skelter

The Bugliosi Letter

During my days as Charles Manson's "Minister of Information" in the 1990s I very often received mail and other communications from all kinds of people who had an interest in Manson and the Tate-LaBianca murder cases. Many of these contacts were made through "backdoor" channels by people who were involved in their own intrigues related to the case and who wanted us to be aware of their activities or the activities of others. One such backdoor communique was The Bugliosi Letter. 

The Bugliosi Letter was sent to me by a person who had received it from a literary agent after he had asked the agent for examples of pitch letters for a book. Amazingly, among the pitch letter examples sent by the agent was the one that Vincent Bugliosi wrote when he was trying to sell the concept of what would later become the bestselling true-crime book of all time -- Helter Skelter.

Bugliosi early on recognized the financial possibilities of the case he had been assigned to prosecute, and already during the trial he made arrangements with the literary establishment to position himself as the authority who could write the definitive book about the Charles Manson case. 

This in confirmed in the book The D.A.: A True Story, by Lawrence Taylor. Writing about an aspect of the political intrigues of the L.A. district attorney's office that he dubbed "Bugliosi syndrome," Taylor said,

"When the Tate-LaBianca slaughters had horrified the world, then-District Attorney Evelle Younger named the most experienced deputy in the office, Aaron Stovitz, to prosecute Manson and his "family" for the murders. A younger deputy by the name of Vincent Bugliosi as assigned to assist him.

"The carnival-like atmosphere of the Manson trial quickly turned Stovitz into a media celebrity. The press seemed hypnotized by the charismatic Manson; stories of biblical prophecies, race wars, and sacrificial murders captured headlines for months. Younger, who was later to be elected attorney general for California and later still to lose in a bid for the governor's mansion, began to perceive his ace prosecutor as a political threat: Stovitz was seen as using his new fame to position himself for a run at Younger's job. In a pattern that was to become familiar in the office for many years to come, the D.A. removed Stovitz from the case, replacing him with Bugliosi.

"Bugliosi, it turned out, was considerably more ambitious than Stovitz ever was. A younger deputy was assigned as "second chair" for the trial, but he was not to conduct any important cross-examination or present evidence to the jury. The younger deputy sat silently at the counsel table, content to research legal issues and organize witnesses, while Bugliosi performed daily before the world's press. Unknown to anyone at the time, Bugliosi had already arranged to write a book about the trial -- with himself as the hero; his ghostwriter, Curt Gentry, was given a valued press pass and sat in the courtroom audience. The book, Helter Skelter, eventually became a bestseller. And, ironically, Bugliosi used his newfound fame to do do exactly what Younger had feared of Stovitz -- announce his candidacy for the office of district attorney."  (The D.A.: A True Story, pages 33-34)

Lawrence Taylor

The Bugliosi Letter substantiates all of this.

Clearly the letter was written while the trial was still in progress. Note the references "After the trial, many more books will be written…." (page 2, emphasis added) and "I'm the one who is engaging in a veritable life and death struggle with Manson and who will ultimately ask the jury to return a verdict of death against Manson and his 3 female co-defendants." (page 3, emphasis added). The defendants were not even convicted and yet Bugliosi was very eager to go.

"It's a big case," Bugliosi wrote to the literary agent. "The book we're contemplating will likewise have to be 'big' in every sense of the word…. 

"I feel there should be one definitive, authoritative book on this case. I believe that I'm the one to write this book…. Other than Charles Manson himself, I don't think that there's any other person who knows as much about these murders and the madness that led to them as I."

Among the most base selling points, Bugliosi recognized, would be the inclusion of the death photos from the murder scenes on Cielo and Waverly Drives. "The book will have official photos of the murder scene that no other book on the market could possibly have since only the Los Angeles Police Department and the District Attorney's office have said photos," he explained to the agent.

Compare this photo pitch to the reason Bugliosi gave in Helter Skelter for not providing the defense with evidentiary copies of the death scene photos before the trial: "I also strongly opposed providing the defense with copies of the death photos. We had heard that a German magazine had a standing offer of $100,000 for them. I did not want the families of the victims to open a magazine and see the terrible butchery inflicted on their loved ones." (Helter Skelter, page 286)

Perhaps sensing the unseemliness of people finding out that he was shopping around a book about a trial while he was in the process of prosecuting it (is there any kind of ethics issue involved here?) Bugliosi later presented a different version of why he decided to write Helter Skelter. In a 1997 interview with Playboy magazine, when asked about the circumstances that led him to write the book, he replied (and lied), "When the trial was over I kept expecting someone of Truman Capote's stature to write a book about the case. But there was no one, and that's when I decided to do it."  (emphasis added)

One could collect together all of the fallacies presented by Vincent Bugliosi over the years and end up with something reminiscent of the closing sequence of Citizen Kane. We will never know if the Bug had a "Rosebud" moment before his recent death ("The…. 'g'…. is…. silent…"?), but one thing we do know: He will always be as big, as consequential, and as controversial, as Orson Welles' character in that film. 

Below, The Bugliosi Letter: 

Bugliosi letter to me for signature comparison:

Postscript Note -- One thing that was always of concern back in the busier days of the 1990s was the fact that people were frequently trying to set us up. Most commonly such efforts consisted of offering us some kind of financial gain through dubious means. Other times people would offer to "do anything" for us. And then there were efforts made in order to make us look bad or to put us into an awkward legal position. Thus, we were (and are) always on guard against anything that might appear to be too good to be true. The Bugliosi Letter fit into this latter category and thus was initially regarded with suspicion in that it might be a forgery. However, I think anyone reading it would agree that it is genuine. The tone is pure Bugliosi throughout. Note the mis-use of the word "societies" on page 6, an unintentional indicator of Bugliosi's incompetence as a writer. And there are details in it that can be checked (the name of the literary agent, for example). I have no doubt that it is the real thing, and I freely present it here without any concern that it will ever be shown to be a fake.

Nuel Emmons

Have you ever noticed that with this case many things that you thought were the absolute truth turn out to be a corrupted version of the truth.  It really doesn't matter which side you look at, the prosecution, the defense, the good guys or the bad guys every one regardless of bias cannot seem to tell the truth.  This case is still being talked about 45+ years down the road.  The perpetrators have been arrested, tried and sentenced.  The usual course would be that interest in the case would taper off and eventually fade from public scrutiny.  Not so with the so called "Manson Murders".

 The book Manson In His Own Words as told to Nuel Emmons has, on the back fly leaf, a short statement saying that Emmons knew Manson because he spent time in federal prison with him on two occasions.  The first time was in 1956 when Emmons had been convicted of car theft and the second in 1960 "under similar circumstances."   Any articles about these arrests of Emmons were completely elusive, there were none to be found.

George Stimson gave me a clue that ultimately opened up a new line of research for me.  George said that Charlie called Emmons "Mel" and he thought that Emmons first name might be Melton.  With that knowledge I was able to find one article about Melton Emmons where he and a friend were shooting rats at the dumps in Humboldt County California.  The friend, Theodore C. Annibel, was shot by a third person who was trying to scare the two men away. (The Times Standard Eureka CA Jan. 31, 1955 page 1)

Although interesting, it still didn't solve the mystery of the arrests that landed Emmons in federal prison.  At that point I hit upon the idea of going back and taking another look at Emmons obituary, sure enough the answer was there.  One of Emmons survivors was a son with the last name of Melton.  From there information on Emmons flowed.

Nuel was born Nuel Arnold Emmons September 17, 1927 in Ada Oklahoma.  His parents were Sidney and Christena (nee Folsom) Emmons.  His mother's father, Elias Folsom, died the same year she was born, her mother remarried and Christena used her step-father's last name of Russell until she married Sidney Emmons.  Christena's birthfather, Elias Folsom, is on the American Indian Rolls as being 1/4 Choctaw.

I was able to find Sidney and Christena Emmons in a Muskogee OK city directory in 1932.  They divorced shortly after 1932.  Sidney remarried and eventually moved to Texas.  His occupation was in the production end of the newspaper business. 

Christena moved out to California with her two children, Nuel Arnold and Theda Bara Emmons.  In 1935 Christena married Billy Marvin Melton in Oakland California.

The 1940 census shows Christena and Billy Melton living in Richmond, Contra Costa County along with Nuel and his sister Thedie B.  Both children were using the last name of Melton.  Nuel went to school in Richmond CA.  It was there that he met his first wife, Virginia Fessenden.  Nuel and Virginia had three children born in 1947, 1949 and 1953.  Nuel was still using his step-father's last name of Melton.

(picture of first wife)

While I was not able to find an article detailing Nuel's first arrest I was able to find a few articles where Nuel Melton was playing basketball for a California Youth Authority (CYA) team.   These articles were all in the Santa Cruz Sentinel and dated in the first three months of 1948 when Nuel would have been 20 years old so I am reasonably certain that it's the same person.  An article in the Nevada State Journal dated January 20, 1956 said that Nuel had served a sentence in the past in California's Preston Reformatory which was CYA facility.

The next time that Nuel popped up in the news was in 1952 when he was playing baseball for a semi-pro team called the Vallejo Builders.  The article says that Nuel had played ball for both the New Mexico and Texas leagues prior to joining the Vallejo Builders.  He was a 3rd baseman and is second from the left in the bottom row of this 1952 picture.

 In 1953 the articles on Nuel's criminal activities started in earnest.  In May of 1953 a warrant for Nuel Melton's arrest was issued.  He was involved in a statewide car theft ring that when all was said and done consisted of a couple of dozen people from Ukiah to Sacramento, the San Francisco Bay Area and Los Angeles.  Melton came under scrutiny when a California Highway patrolman came under investigation because he had sold a vehicle with a stolen engine in it.  It seems that the Highway Patrolman bought a wrecked a car which he took to Melton's garage to be fixed for resale.  Unbeknownst to the Highway Patrolman, Melton put a "hot" engine in the car.  The officer had agreed to split the profits of the sale with Melton in exchange for the repair work.

Melton, naturally, disappeared when the warrant was issued but he did send a letter to the Richmond CA police, mailed from Rodeo CA, "absolving the officer of any guilt in the transaction" as related in the Oakland Tribune, May 14, 1953.  This same article describes Melton as being an "ex-San Quentin convict."  I was never able to discover why or exactly when Melton had previously been in San Quentin.

The aforementioned January 20, 1956 Nevada State Journal article states that Melton, of Klamath Falls OR, was returned to Reno NV to face federal prosecution for driving a stolen car across state lines.  This would be a violation of the Dyer Act, the same charges that Manson was in prison for at the time.  A February 4, 1956 article in the same newspaper says that Melton was given a continuance and a trial date was set for February 17.  Out of all the articles I found on Melton this was the only one that even mentioned a trial and I'm not sure that this trial ever took place because there are no articles saying as such.  It's quite possible that a plea deal was made before it came to trial.

Whatever the outcome of the 1956 arrest Melton did not serve much time because  in July of 1959 Melton was arrested at the San Ysidro CA/Mexico border for smuggling nearly three pounds of heroin that he had secreted in a false compartment in his car.  This arrest landed him back in federal prison in 1960 where he again met up with Charlie Manson but the arrest most certainly was not "under similar circumstances" of his 1956 incarceration. 

This arrest was kind of interesting in that his co-conspirator, Longino Castro, received a 30 year sentence, later appealed and reduced to 10 years, but Melton was out of prison by April of 1966 when he married his second wife in Alameda County.  The particulars of the crime are spelled out in a 1963 appeal filed by Castro.

20 page pdf

Some of the highlights in the appeal are-

Melton and his wife, Virginia, were the occupants of the car when the arrest was made.  Longino Castro was not in the car but was at the Melton home in Costa Mesa babysitting the three Melton children while Melton and his wife made the heroin purchase in Mexico.  The car however was tied to Castro but it was determined that Melton had signed a false name to the "pink slip" for the car.  This trip to Mexico was not the trio's first time.

 Virginia Melton was not charged, she was allowed to go home to care for the children.  Melton was able to make the $20,000 bail, then promptly skipped bail and fled out of state.  Castro's trial was severed from Melton's due to Melton's absence and he went to trial  in September 1959, was found guilty and received a 30 year sentence as this was a second narcotics conviction for him.

Meanwhile, Melton described as a body and fender man, had taken the assumed identity of William O'Donnel and was working in Salt Lake City UT as a sheet metal worker.  The FBI located him and he was arrested January 1, 1960.  I was unable to find any further articles relating to this arrested leading me to believe that some sort of plea deal was made in lieu of a trial.

The next time that Melton was in the newspaper was when he and his first wife, Virginia, filed for divorce in Contra Costa County CA in 1964.

In April 1966 Nuel married Elizabeth (Bette) Quiett in Alameda County CA.  He married her using the name of Nuel Melton Emmons, combining his step-father's last name with his birth name.  Bette had two sons.

In 1968 Nuel was again arrested for possessing heroin for sale.  He was arrested in the name of Nuel Melton in Berkeley CA even though he was using the last name of Emmons at that time.  According to newspaper accounts he had arranged to sell a little more than two pounds of heroin to a client that turned out to be an agent with the California State Bureau of Narcotics.  The heroin was said to be 80% pure, when cut and sold on the street heroin is about 5% pure, so this was an enormous amount of heroin in Melton's possession.

Melton's arrest was not reported by the press until other arrests of people associated with Melton were taken into custody.  One of those people was Michael Barrigan who was named by a US Senate crime-committee as "one of the biggest international traffickers in narcotics."  Barrigan, a Baja California rancher, had been sought by authorities for more than 20 years.  In all 6 1/2 pounds of "exceptionally pure" heroin was seized, it had an estimated street value of $2.5 million back in 1968.  In today's economy that $2.5 million translates to $17, 093,750.00! 

I located a San Francisco Chronicle article dated April 18, 1968 which says, in part, "Matthew O'Connor, Chief State Narcotics agent in Northern California said two of his agents, Henry Lopez and Julius Beretta, got on Barrigan's trail through the arrest in Berkeley last Friday of one of his customers, Nuel A. Melton, of Pinole.  Presumably Melton "talked,"  because the next day, Saturday, state agents struck in San Diego, arresting another man and seizing another 10 ounces of heroin."

When Barrigan and his confederate, Mike Ramirez, were arrested in Mexico the next Monday after a short gunfight where no one was injured, they were in possession of 70 ounces of heroin.   Barragan and Ramirez were held and charged for their crimes in Mexico.  Sources for these arrests etc. are The Times San Mateo, Oxnard Press Courier and The Oakland Tribune all dated April 17, 1968.   The image is of the San Francisco Chronicle  dated April 18, 1968.

 I have no doubt that Melton/Emmons turned out to be a snitch with this arrest.  He did not serve a single day in prison for the heroin trafficking charges.

In 1968 Emmons, his wife Bette and her two young sons moved to Lake County CA and settled there for the duration of their lives.  Emmons was using that last name exclusively now.  Bette got a job with the county and Nuel opened a body and fender shop in Nice CA.  Emmons mother and step-father, Christena and Billy Melton were already in residence in Lake County as was Emmons sister, Theda, her husband and their children.  Things seemed to be moving along fine, all happy families, until 1975 when Emmons was arrested again!

April 24, 1975 he was arrested in Lake County under the name Nuel Emmons and the charges were for possession of a stolen car and two stolen motorcycles according to a Ukiah Daily Journal article dated April 25, 1975.  The court proceedings, which George Stimson obtained and kindly shared with me, state that Emmons was charged with four counts of receiving stolen property.  The first count was that between July 5, 1973 and October 8, 1974 Emmons did knowingly receive stolen property.  Second count, that between December 8, 1973 and October 8, 1974 he did knowingly receive stolen property.  Third count, that on April 24, 1975 did knowingly receive stolen property and the fourth count, that between June 29, 1972 and October 8, 1974 did feloniously take property of another and the value of such property exceeded the sum of $200.00.

It seems that authorities had been watching Emmons for a while........

November 19, 1975 he plead not guilty and a jury trial was scheduled for December 9th.  On December 10th he withdrew his not guilty plea and plead guilty to a charge of receiving stolen property, sentencing was scheduled for December 22nd.  On January 21, 1976 Emmons was committed to the California State Department of Corrections in Vacaville CA for "diagnostic evaluation and recommendation" for a period of time not to exceed 90 days.  The outcome of this evaluation was that Emmons was to serve 6 months in the Lake County jail with credit given for the time spent in Vacaville.  He was also ordered to pay $1700. restitution to a specific person as well as abide by the usual conditions of probation once released from jail.  He was released from probation July 7, 1978.

There was no mention of any of Emmons prior crimes, under the last name of Melton, in any of the court proceedings that George was able to obtain so I have no idea if they were taken into consideration when sentencing was pronounced.

On Monday March 3, 1980 an article by Nuel Emmons ran in The Ukiah Daily Journal which was an exclusive interview with Charles Manson.  This article planted the seed for the book on Manson he wrote.

The article also seemed to be the start of Emmons newspaper writing career.  April 1980 Emmons began reporting as a special correspondent on various local and national sports stories.  August 7, 1980 he wrote another story on Manson this time reporting that Manson had been released from solitary confinement and was given a job assignment at Vacaville Prison.  April 1981 found Emmons giving a talk to the Mendo-Lake Prayer and Share Christian Writers Fellowship at a mobile home park in Lakeport CA.  He was billed as a "well known sportswriter".

It was announced that on June 12, 1981 Emmons would be a guest on NBC's Tomorrow show speaking about the autobiography of Manson that he had been preparing for the last 15 months.  This show also presented Manson's first televised interview which Emmons had arranged.  The book would not be published until 1986.  He would continue to write sports stories for the UDJ during this time.  September 11, 1983 Emmons got his own column in the UDJ, "Lake County Picquancy" a folksy column about the happenings and people in that county.  I found this column to be a bit cheezy and he featured his own family in many of the columns.

Here's a Mother's Day 1984 column that pretty much names every female he was related to.  The column ran on Sundays for about a year.

In 1986 "Manson in his Own Words" as told to Nuel Emmons, Grove Press, was finally published.  It was published by Grafton Books in 1987 in the UK under the title "Without Conscience".   The book duly received reviews from critics across the US and it was generally well received netting Emmons many interviews.  However the book's most vocal critic was Charles Manson, himself, who declared the book to not be a accurate representation of the truth. 

Ben Gurecki shared with me a letter from "Mel" to Manson that he has in his archives.  Ben has a story about Manson's false teeth involving Emmons that he hopefully will share with us in the comments.  Coincidentally, Ben and Charlie have recently been talking about Emmons and Charlie said Emmons was a "cheat and only lying to himself."  I have to wonder if Manson ever had an inkling that Emmons was quite possibly a snitch.  I don't think so because I doubt that he would have ever agreed to do the book.  Manson has spoken out about his feelings on snitches and they aren't warm and fuzzy feelings.

It is amazing to me that Emmons was ever allowed to interview Manson, let alone the many years it took to gather the information for his book.  Emmons was a convicted felon.  He had federal convictions as well as state convictions.  He was a drug trafficker.  His last felony conviction was in the 70s and he did not get off parole until a scant year before he started his interviews with Manson.  I thought that felons were not allowed, by law, to interact with each other particularly if one of those felons was still in prison.

Nuel Emmons died in Lake County CA on November 19, 2002.   Photo by George Stimson.

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