Mike Todd's 'Liz' - A 1958 Tragedy
Posted: Friday, April 13, 2012 - Paul Milan, Historical Society - for the Cibola Beacon
On March 22, 1958, a plane crash killed actor Mike Todd, the husband of Liz Taylor, 22 miles southwest of Grants in Cibola County.
The Grants Beacon reported that city officials were swamped with calls after Todd was killed in a crash of his two-engine Lockheed Lodestar. The actor had become famous for his recent movie “Around the World in 80 days.” The location was two miles north of the Ice Caves, about one and one-quarter miles north of Highway 53. Telephone calls to the Beacon, the radio station, and the Grants’ police station came from New York, Hollywood, Calif., and London, England. Liz Taylor called the Grants Police Station to verify the report and broke into hysterical sobs when told the news, according to media accounts.
I was going to college in Mexico City and was spending the weekend with a family friend when I was told that Grants made the headlines in all the Mexican papers. I have a copy of a paper, the headline reads “Near Grants, New Mexico, MIKE TODD DIES IN PLANE CRASH.” The article reported that, “Mike Todd, multi-millionaire showman and husband of actress Elizabeth Taylor, was killed today when his private plane ‘iced up’ and crashed during a thunderstorm in mountains southwest of Grants, N.M. Screen-writer Art Cohn and two pilots died with the flamboyant 50-year-old producer in the flaming crash in New Mexico’s uranium-rich ‘badlands’ wilderness of volcanic rock.”
The article mentioned that the trim little plane was named “The Liz”. Its $13,500 interior was extremely lavish, including an oak conference table, a deep foam rubber couch, buffet bar, deep pile carpet, drapes, gold-bronze ashtrays and door knobs, a gold-tooled guest book and monogrammed towels. The toilet articles were engraved with “Liz” and “His”, as were the couple’s Rolls Royces.
Jim Barber’s column, “Light of the Beacon” wrote that, “Mike Todd, a man with a good sense of humor, would have gotten some good laughs out of the goings-on hereabouts Saturday, if he hadn’t been dead from an airplane crash a few hours earlier. Take the Albuquerque mortuary that sent a hearse tearing out to Grants to pick up the remains, completely by-passing Tony Frkovich, the Grants mortician. That pleased Tony as much as the Grants State Bank would be if one of the huge Albuquerque banks parked a truck on one of Grants’ streets and started taking savings deposits and cashing checks. But the Albuquerque outfit had wasted its time. Woody Thigpen, to whom fell the awful task of picking up the bits of bodies from the burned plane, hauled the remains of the four victims all the way to Albuquerque, thanks to some quick footwork by local officers. The discomfiture of the Albuquerque mortuary suited this column fine. Those birds-and include Gallup in this too-are as helpful to the Beacon in getting news of deaths of Grants area citizens as if they were doing business in Berlin. The flash of local pride, when an out-of-town mortuary was pushed ahead of local business, was pleasing. What this town needs is more local pride-more pride in its people and hometown services.
A similar situation arose when DA Paul Robinson of Albuquerque found out – belatedly –that the crash victims were world-famous movie figures. He got on the phone and started throwing orders around about inquests and cops guarding the property, and then tore out to the scene in person. The laws had been complied with long before Robinson had even heard of the crash, in a normal, routine manner. Officers had been among the first on the scene, and J.P. Angelo Sakelares had already conducted an inquest. To hear KOB-TV (Albuquerque) talk about it, the Todd crash was their property. KOB neglected to tell its listeners that its information came from the wire services who in turn were depending on newsmen in Grants, and other points. It would have been interesting sometime to see KOB news department try to cover a big news story like the Todd crash by itself - sitting on their collective fat behinds 102 miles away.”
Lee Marmon told me that he and the Gottliebs from Cubero were one of the first to reach the scene and he still had pictures that no one has seen.
Editor’s Note: Paul Milan, a longtime Cibola County resident, is a member of the Cibola County Historical Society.
On March 22, 1958, a plane crash killed actor Mike Todd, the husband of Liz Taylor, 22 miles southwest of Grants in Cibola County.
The Grants Beacon reported that city officials were swamped with calls after Todd was killed in a crash of his two-engine Lockheed Lodestar. The actor had become famous for his recent movie “Around the World in 80 days.” The location was two miles north of the Ice Caves, about one and one-quarter miles north of Highway 53. Telephone calls to the Beacon, the radio station, and the Grants’ police station came from New York, Hollywood, Calif., and London, England. Liz Taylor called the Grants Police Station to verify the report and broke into hysterical sobs when told the news, according to media accounts.
I was going to college in Mexico City and was spending the weekend with a family friend when I was told that Grants made the headlines in all the Mexican papers. I have a copy of a paper, the headline reads “Near Grants, New Mexico, MIKE TODD DIES IN PLANE CRASH.” The article reported that, “Mike Todd, multi-millionaire showman and husband of actress Elizabeth Taylor, was killed today when his private plane ‘iced up’ and crashed during a thunderstorm in mountains southwest of Grants, N.M. Screen-writer Art Cohn and two pilots died with the flamboyant 50-year-old producer in the flaming crash in New Mexico’s uranium-rich ‘badlands’ wilderness of volcanic rock.”
The article mentioned that the trim little plane was named “The Liz”. Its $13,500 interior was extremely lavish, including an oak conference table, a deep foam rubber couch, buffet bar, deep pile carpet, drapes, gold-bronze ashtrays and door knobs, a gold-tooled guest book and monogrammed towels. The toilet articles were engraved with “Liz” and “His”, as were the couple’s Rolls Royces.
Jim Barber’s column, “Light of the Beacon” wrote that, “Mike Todd, a man with a good sense of humor, would have gotten some good laughs out of the goings-on hereabouts Saturday, if he hadn’t been dead from an airplane crash a few hours earlier. Take the Albuquerque mortuary that sent a hearse tearing out to Grants to pick up the remains, completely by-passing Tony Frkovich, the Grants mortician. That pleased Tony as much as the Grants State Bank would be if one of the huge Albuquerque banks parked a truck on one of Grants’ streets and started taking savings deposits and cashing checks. But the Albuquerque outfit had wasted its time. Woody Thigpen, to whom fell the awful task of picking up the bits of bodies from the burned plane, hauled the remains of the four victims all the way to Albuquerque, thanks to some quick footwork by local officers. The discomfiture of the Albuquerque mortuary suited this column fine. Those birds-and include Gallup in this too-are as helpful to the Beacon in getting news of deaths of Grants area citizens as if they were doing business in Berlin. The flash of local pride, when an out-of-town mortuary was pushed ahead of local business, was pleasing. What this town needs is more local pride-more pride in its people and hometown services.
A similar situation arose when DA Paul Robinson of Albuquerque found out – belatedly –that the crash victims were world-famous movie figures. He got on the phone and started throwing orders around about inquests and cops guarding the property, and then tore out to the scene in person. The laws had been complied with long before Robinson had even heard of the crash, in a normal, routine manner. Officers had been among the first on the scene, and J.P. Angelo Sakelares had already conducted an inquest. To hear KOB-TV (Albuquerque) talk about it, the Todd crash was their property. KOB neglected to tell its listeners that its information came from the wire services who in turn were depending on newsmen in Grants, and other points. It would have been interesting sometime to see KOB news department try to cover a big news story like the Todd crash by itself - sitting on their collective fat behinds 102 miles away.”
Lee Marmon told me that he and the Gottliebs from Cubero were one of the first to reach the scene and he still had pictures that no one has seen.
Editor’s Note: Paul Milan, a longtime Cibola County resident, is a member of the Cibola County Historical Society.
