Edwin Carewe Marked at Hollywood Forever
HOLLYWOOD FOREVER CEMETERY
Director Edwin Carewe’s grave is marked after more than 69 years
Edwin Carewe (with megaphone) directing a scene as Mabel Normand looks on
By Allan R. Ellenberger
Recently at Hollywood Forever, I discovered that the grave of director Edwin Carewe had a grave stone installed after more than 69 years of being unmarked. I don’t know who marked him but it is always great news when someone that has been forgotten finally gets identified with a marker. The director, who discovered Dolores Del Rio and many other famous stars, died in Hollywood on January 22, 1940 from an apparent heart attack.
Edwin Carewe was born Jay Fox in Gainesville, Texas on March 5, 1883. He attended the University of Texas and the University of Missouri majoring in dramatics. Early in his career when his flair for acting was expressed, a fellow New York actor suggested that he change his name, thinking that Fox was not good professionally. So he took the name Edwin from his favorite actor, Edwin Booth, and for his last name chose to use that of a character that he was playing in stock.
Carewe’s first stage experience was with the Dearborn Stock Company and he made his debut on Broadway with Chauncey Olcott. He appeared in plays with such stage actors as Otis Skinner, Rose Coghlan and Laurette Taylor in New York, Philadelphia, Washington, Chicago and Los Angeles. Later, he entered motion pictures in 1912 with the Lubin Company.
As a director, he produced such films as Resurrection (1927), Ramona (1928), Revenge (1928), Evangeline (1929), and The Spoilers (1930), winning fame for its realistic fight scenes. Besides Del Rio, he encouraged the talents of Warner Baxter, Wallace Beery, Francis X. Bushman and Gary Cooper. His brother, Finis Fox (1884-1949), wrote many of his scenarios.
Over his career, Carewe directed films for Metro, Paramount, First National, Fox and others and at one time had his own lot, Tec-Art, on Melrose Avenue, opposite Paramount, where he made his biggest successes.
In 1925, he and actress Mary Aikin (whom he also discovered), eloped to Mexico. There he met Jaime Del Rio and his wife Dolores. He suggested that she return with him to Hollywood for a screen career. Carewe helped Dolores Del Rio become one of the biggest stars in silent films.
At one time Carewe was considered a millionaire. His percentage on Ramona and Resurrection, both with Del Rio, was close to $400,000. However he lost most of his fortune in a Texas garbage disposal deal.
Carewe’s health began to fail in July 1939 when he had a heart attack while driving his car and was taken to St. Vincent’s Hospital. Not wishing to remain in the hospital, his doctor’s would only allow him to leave if someone was constantly with him. He agreed to move to 5603 Lexington Avenue in Hollywood into an apartment across the hall from his nephew, Winston Platt.
Edwin Carewe died in his apartment here at 5603 Lexington Avenue, Hollywood.
On January 22, 1940, a doctor was summoned to Carewe’s apartment and administered a sedative to him around 4 a.m. Carewe fell asleep and Platt stretched out on a couch in the next room. At 8 a.m. Platt was awakened and found his uncle dead.
Funeral services were conducted at the Pierce Brothers Mortuary (across from Hollywood Cemetery) by Rev. Willsie Martin of the Wilshire Blvd. Methodist Episcopal Church. More than 200 of Carewe’s friends gathered to pay their final farewell.
Among those who attended were Dolores Del Rio, garbed in black, who sat in front with her husband, Cedric Gibbons, the art director at MGM. She sobbed throughout the rites.
On the whole, the chapel was filled with property men, electricians, cameramen, carpenters, grips, painters, other technicians and friends who made up the director’s crews when he was filming. Others who were present included Charles Murray, Guido Orlando, Rex Lease, Eddie Silton, William Farnum, Ivy Wilson, Wilford Lucas, James Gordon, Hank Mann, Roland Drew, George Renault, John Le Roy Johnston, John Boles and John Hintz.
In the ceremony and eulogy, Dr. Martin touched briefly on his pioneer endeavors in films and his making of Are We Civilized? (1934), his final film.
“He never failed a friend, he never carried bitterness in his heart and he was generous to a fault – a great attribute,” Martin said. “He was a man who never quit, a test of a thorough bred.”
Besides his widow, Mary Aiken, Carewe left five children, Sally Ann, William Edwin, Carol Lee, Rita and Mary Jane and two brothers, Finis and Wallace Fox.
After his interment at Hollywood Cemetery in 1940, Carewe’s grave went unmarked – until recently when an unknown benefactor placed a stone there.
Edwin Carewe’s new grave marker at Hollywood Forever
Edwin Carewe’s grave is located in Section One, Grave 471, in the northeast part of the cemetery, very near to the east wall, in the same area as Flora Finch.
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September 12th, 2009 at 6:55 pm
Simply wonderful news….LORD, this makes me happy! Heaven bless this kind and generous benefactor.
Your article is more than splendid, Mr. E!
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Thanks Melissa, I was happy to see it too. Now lets get the rest done.
September 12th, 2009 at 8:03 pm
Excellent article, as always, Allan. Thanks for the uplifting story – past and present. And I also appreciate the fact that I didn’t have to Google-map the location of the apartment where Mr. C. passed – you provided the picture for us, of course! Lynn
September 13th, 2009 at 3:01 am
Okay, I give up…why was Ramona lyricist L. Wolfe Gilbert moved from Hillside to FL-Cathedral City? The selling of his Hillside crypt for profit? Family relocated and FL was more convenient? A better and more entertaining view? Just a late night/early morning thot.
xx
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Anyone know the answer? – Allan
September 13th, 2009 at 6:13 am
Another great Hollywood tale, brought vividly to life. I will visit Mr Carewe next stop. Thank you, Allan, for another job well done.
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Thanks Steve. – Allan
September 13th, 2009 at 8:27 pm
This is only 69 years too late. Why would it take that long to place a marker? Allan, you take the sharpest pictures. All the photo’s you take are excellent. I will have a lot to see the next time I visit LA . Once again Sir, your blog is the best!!!!!!
September 14th, 2009 at 4:58 pm
It is nice to see that someone cared enough to update the grave site of my grandfather. Now, I will have a place to go and visit him in memory. There is also a film, currently in production, that profiles the life and times of Edwin Carewe and his legacy. It is slated for release later this year or early next year.
September 14th, 2009 at 5:20 pm
I am a grandson of Edwin Carewe, my father was William Edwin. I had been informed 2 years ago, by my oldest son Adam, of his Hollywood Forever unmarked grave site. On a trip to Los Angeles with my youngest son, Tyler, last year we went to Hollywood Forever and had them show us the unmarked site. While we were there I couldn’t get over the fact that there wasn’t a grave stone! I am the one who designed the marker and had it installed in its rightful place.
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Hello Mr. Carewe, thank you for letting everyone know about this and thank you for marking your grandfather. Many people into film history are thrilled. — Allan
September 14th, 2009 at 6:44 pm
The reason why it took 69 years was that our family had no idea where he was buried. I am the great grandson of Edwin Carewe and found the cemetery location last year while doing a search of our relative. My grandpa was William Edwin Carewe and my father who also left a post above visited the grave site while on business and purchased the stone to mark the place of his grandfather. Thanks for the great story of our ancestor!
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You’re welcome and thank you for marking your great-grandfather. We don’t see this happening very often. — Allan
September 15th, 2009 at 1:04 am
Allan, a fantastic and fascinating story, as always. And it’s so nice to read the comments of Mr. Carewe’s descendants, and so nice that they want to honor and remember him. Thank you to all.
September 15th, 2009 at 3:32 am
What a wonderful story all the way around!
September 15th, 2009 at 7:21 am
This is such good news. I remember, when I was working at Hollywood Forever, being so saddened that Edwin Carewe had no marker … now, from across the miles, I am thrilled that his grandson has shown such generosity and love for his famed granddad. See? Angels are in our midst everyday. This is a very heartwarming development.
September 15th, 2009 at 9:54 am
this is indeed an awesome story and that the family saw it too, and commented.
WOW!!!!
Great Job Allan!!!!!!
September 15th, 2009 at 2:58 pm
This is really great news! Allan – who do you have on your list of the “unmarked?” Are the 3 Moore brothers (Tom, Owen & Matt) all unmarked? Owen & Matt are at Calvary, right? Where is Tom?
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I don’t know where Tom is off hand. I will post a list of unmarked celebrities sometime. Thanks.
September 28th, 2009 at 11:04 am
Dear Carewe family members. It is great to learn more about your ancestor. I have done a lot of research and writing about screenwriter June Mathis, whom Ed Carewe started on her career. They did many films together at Metro in the teens, and Finis Fox is credited as co-screenwriter on several of the films. I have a copy of a letter Mathis sent to her family while in Rome to work on Ben-Hur dated March 3, 1924. In one line, she writes, “A strange circumstance – Rex and Ed Carewe were both in Paris when I was there. I saw ED., but did not see Rex; of course.” She and director Rex Ingram were not getting along at the time. Naturally, I would love to learn more about Mathis’s and Carewe’s work together. If you can provide any help, I would be very grateful.
October 15th, 2009 at 7:53 am
I too am a grandchild of Edwin Carewe! I am so touched that my cousin Art marked our Grandfather’s grave. It is beautiful Art, thank you. Diane Allen
July 28th, 2010 at 12:35 pm
Thank you, Mr. Ellenberger, for such the excellent, sensitive and informative article and photographs.
I am working with a group of concerned historians on an effort to get a preservation copy of Edwin Carewe’s “Ramona” (1928) back to an archive in the United States. Currently the only confirmed copy, which I have viewed, exists in the National Film Archive in Prague, Czech Republic. It is a very good film, and richly deserves to be revived at silent film festivals.
I am hoping you can forward this request and my email address to members of the Carewe family so that if they choose to do so, they can add their voice in support of this cause. Thank you.
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Thank you I will forward your information to the family.
September 6th, 2010 at 2:47 pm
Does anyone have more information on Finis Fox, his brother? I am working on that side of the family “tree”.
January 19th, 2011 at 10:26 am
I am researching the life of Dolores Del Rio and want to know if you have any documentation about Edwin Carewe’s college education. When I wrote to the registrars’ offices at the University of Texas and University of Missouri, both replied that they have no record of Carewe ever having attended. I also gave the name Jay Fox.
By the way I enjoyed your bio of Ramon Novarro.
January 30th, 2012 at 10:12 pm
I have been going through family geneology and found a note my mother, Cecelia M Jones Nitchy wrote: Edwin Carewe was a patient of my grandfather, Dr. Cecil M. Jones. He was an Osteopath in Bevery Hills. He died in 1940 from a heart attack himself on June 21. Another note I found stated how pushed he was all the time as a doctor…Not much different than life in 2012…