My Story Salon friend, Dan Tirman, told a couple of stories about an actress named Anita O'Day. I realized I had a similar link to old Hollywood.

After the Northridge Earthquake, Donna and I had to move to a new apartment. It wasn't because of quake damage; it was because after the quake, several of our neighbors left California for good. Since the building was not getting any new tenants, except some bikers with phony section 8 vouchers, the building's management decided not to repair things like lights or the security gate.

The building manager also had her life threatened by the phony section 8 bikers, causing her to never leave her apartment. This forced a lot of us to leave what used to be a very nice apartment complex. We moved about a mile east to a building built in the early 1960s. Several of the residents were older character actors; some were the buildings original tenants.

In the lobby I heard a familiar voice. This was the voice of Emily's father on The Bob Newhart Show, Roseanne's father on Roseanne, Brad's father on Angie, Col. Potter's friend on M*A*S*H, and the Mayor of Los Angeles in Earthquake. It all comes back to Earthquakes. This new building's manager introduced us. He greeted us with, "Hi I'm John Randolph, I'm an actor."

The week we moved in, we saw John as an evil white supremacist on Matlock, then as a man who lost his wife on E.R. The next time we saw him we went to compliment his work on the shows. He greeted us with "Hi I'm John Randolph, I'm an actor". Obviously he'd forgotten we had already met, but that's okay. We complimented his work on the shows and Donna mentioned that she hated him one day and he broke her heart the next. He really appreciated the kind words.

Our building used to hold a Christmas party. This was a great event because, for so many of the elderly residents, this was their Christmas. When John entered the party it was like Norm entering the Cheers bar. JOHN! John greeted everyone with "Hi I'm John Randolph, I'm an actor".

There were times we crossed paths at the elevator and then forty-five minutes later were sitting on this black couch and he's telling me about the time when he and Will Geer were blacklisted. I had been fascinated by that period in American history for a long time, so to hear what it was like from a man who saw it first hand was priceless.