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Los Gatos Weekly-Times file photograph
British actor Charles Laughton was among many celebrities who came through Los Gatos for business or pleasure.
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Picture from the Past
Service station owners tipped press to celebrities' presence
By John S. Baggerly
In the late 1940s, British-born actor Charles Laughton was spotted at a local Shell service station by its owner, Lou Sporleder, who was also a volunteer firefighter. He tipped off the local press that the actor had asked for directions to El Campo Bello, a restaurant run by Leonora Ghetti on Roberts Road.
Los Gatos Mail-News reporter Beth Grover Rondone was granted an interview with Laughton, during which time the actor said he was going about the country and repeating for various groups the speech he made in the movie Ruggles of Red Gap. Portraying a British butler, he extolled democracy in America--a democracy not known to him in England. Laughton told Rondone that in England, actors invited to lofty homes were treated like the "help" and entered by a servants' door.
Last of the old breed of service station owners to tip off the press when celebrities were among us is 93-year-old Ed Malatesta, who retired from his Associated Station in 1978. Malatesta's station was on N. Santa Cruz Avenue, across from the cinema. He'd also run other stations in town.
Malatesta's first connection with celebrity came when a local cop told him there was a car dangerously stalled with a flat tire near Lexington Reservoir. Malatesta promptly shut down his station and drove up to Lexington, where he found actor Gregory Peck as the distressed driver. Malatesta changed the actor's tire and returned to work. Peck later invited the Malatesta family to visit his home in Boulder Creek.
Shortly before retiring, Malatesta got a visit from his cousin, the comedian Lou Costello. The Costello and Malatesta families hailed from Paterson, N.J.
As Malatesta tells it, cousin Lou was a struggling comic in New York City vaudeville houses until he spotted Bud Abbott, an usher and ticket seller at the time. Abbott and Costello went on to become highly successful on stage and screen.
When actor Vincent Price arrived in the West Valley in the early 1960s, it was Dave Replogle, a Los Gatos High School student working in a Saratoga service station, who alerted this reporter by phone. Price had rolled into the station in his state-of-the art camper and asked the location of Mary Montgomery's antique shop in downtown Los Gatos.
It was easy to spot Price's camper in front of Montgomery's. A New Englander, she made regular buying trips to her home territory and was known for her items from that area. Price apparently told Montgomery that he was buying antiques throughout the western states for a large outlet in Chicago.
The son of an affluent candy maker in St. Louis, Price was given a trip to the art galleries of Europe as a high school graduation present. After attempts to act on the professional stage in New York City, Price caught on in Hollywood in numerous parts. He is best known for the sinister ones.
While Price was looking around, the antique shop began filling with unlikely customers--girls of high school age. Price politely answered their "thought up" questions. Had Price been a jokester and answered in one of his sinister voices, these pseudo art buffs might have fled in terror instead.
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Los Gatos, California Since 1881
