Carl Switzer

AKA:

Alfalfa

Birth Name:

Carl Dean Switzer

Birth Date:

August 7, 1927

Birth Place:

111 N. Edgar Street, Paris, Illinois

Death Date:

January 21, 1959

Place of Death:

10400 Columbus Avenue, Mission Hills, California

Age:

Cause of Death:

Gunshot wounds

Cemetery Name:

Hollywood Forever Cemetery

Claim to Fame:

Show Business

Carl Switzer, the actor who as a child played Alfalfa in the Our Gang comedy film series, was the freckle-faced boy with a warbling singing voice and a cowlick protruding from the top of his head. It was Switzer’s best-known role in his short-lived Hollywood career. Our Gang revolved around a group of ragtag children and their adventures. In addition to Alfalfa, the ensemble of memorable characters included Spanky, Darla, Buckwheat, Froggy, Stymie and Pete the dog. Our Gang was considered groundbreaking in that it featured white and black child actors interacting equally. Switzer played Alfalfa from the mid-1930s to the early 1940s. In 1955, the Our Gang films were turned into a hugely popular TV series called The Little Rascals; however, Switzer never received any royalties from the show. After Our Gang, Switzer found small roles in movies and on television, but his most successful days in Hollywood were behind him. He made money working odd jobs, including stints as a hunting guide and bartender, and had several run-ins with the police. On January 21, 1959, Switzer and a friend went to the Mission Hills home of Moses “Bud” Stiltz, to collect a debt Switzer believed he was owed. A fight broke out, during which Stiltz shot and killed Switzer. A jury later ruled the incident justifiable homicide.

Fun Facts

As a child, Carl Switzer, who was born August 7, 1927, entertained people in his hometown of Paris, Illinois, with his singing. On a trip to California to visit relatives, Switzer’s mother took Carl and his brother Harold to the Hal Roach Studios, a film and television production company that launched the careers of comedy legends like Laurel and Hardy. The Switzer brothers were signed by Hal Roach and Carl was cast as Alfalfa in the Our Gang series, which Roach began producing as silent films in the early 1920s.

Carl “Alfalfa” was married to Diantha Collingwood, heiress of the grain elevator empire Collingwood Grain, Inc. who met and married the troubled child star on a blind date in Las Vegas, Nevada in 1954. She became the mother of his only known son, Justin Lance Collingwood-Switzer, but the marriage lasted less than two years, ending in divorce in 1956.

On the day he was killed, Carl, along with his friend photographer Jack Plott, went to confront Bud Stiltz in his home. There was a confrontation and according to Tom Corrigan, the stepson of Stiltz, his stepfather shot Switzer in cold blood as he was heading out the front door. Corrigan was not allowed to give his testimony and Stiltz’s claim of self-defense was accepted.

Eight years after that, a similar fate befell his brother, Harold Switzer, who by then was operating a company installing and servicing washers and dryers. In April 1967, Harold killed a customer over a dispute. He then got in his car, drove to a remote area near Glendale, California and committed suicide. He was only 42.

Cemetery Information:

Final Resting Place:

Hollywood Forever Cemetery

6000 Santa Monica Blvd.

Los Angeles, California, 90038

USA

North America

Map:

Map of Hollywood Forever Cemetery in Los Angeles, California

Grave Location:

Garden of Memory, Section 6), Grave 6, Lot 26

Grave Location Description

As you enter the cemetery drive straight ahead to the first intersection and turn left. Drive 120 feet and park. Walk into Section 6 on your left 2 rows from the road for the final resting places of the doomed Switzer family.