Haunt Usual Habitats of Screen Favourites Volumes could be written about the tricks and dodges of the Hollywood autograph. hunter, writes Harold Heffernan, to the "Oregonian." While fans the world over are apt to display, a normal amount of curiosity and fascination when they come in contact with famous personalities, those residing on' the home grounds of the world's greatest movie factories become strangely afflicted with a fever that often reaches the maniacal stage.
The good Hollywood hunters never miss their prey because they hunt systematically. They know the habits of their quarry, almost as well as the stars themselves. Many have been making the daily and nightly rounds for years, They know that, on Monday night, if they lie carefully in wait outside the wrestling matches, they may find in the in-going or out-coming crowds Spencer Tracy, Eleanor Powell. Edward G. Robinson, Bing Crosby, Al Jolson and maybe Robert Taylor and Barbara Stanwyck, along with other film devotees of the writhe-and-grunt exhibitions, They know that the Tuesday night star-sponsored parties at the Cocoanut Grove will turn up at least a score of big names for their precious books, sometimes as many as 75.
Saturday night philharmonic concerts invariably draw Joan Crawford and Franchot Tone, together with a choice cluster of other music lovers from the studios. The polo matches on Sunday afternoon find hundreds of fans clustered about the turnstiles with open books. while on any Sunday evening outside the famous Trocadero cafe the hardy hunter may snag dozens of names big enough to make any book sparkle, Nobody understands better than the cruising fans that Thursday is the maid's day out and that whole families of movie people flock to three or four leading restaurants to escape the possibly disastrous results of a home-cooked dinner by the lady of the house. A long queue of children, aged men and women, young and middle-aged folks. cana always be found around the Brown Derby. Armstrong and Schroder's or Eaton's Chicken House any Thursday night. With so many stars eating at the same hour, the competition is frantic and some of the more earnest collectors motor from one spot to another.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.