Celebrity grave hunters generally haunt places like Forest Lawn cemeteries in the Hollywood Hills and Glendale, but there are a few famous and near-famous folks laid to rest closer to home.

Ivy Lawn Cemetery in Ventura is the final resting place for many who made their marks on the national stage in areas such as sports, politics and theater.

Ivy Lawn President and General Manager Terri Gonzalez says she doesn't get a lot of celebrity grave seekers, but she understands those who are curious.

"There's just something in us; it's a normal curiosity of people," Gonzalez said. "It's just your way of saying, Thanks, I'm coming to pay my respects.'"

On this Day of the Dead, we remember some people of national note who are buried at Ivy Lawn.

Charley Sea Lion' Hall, 1887-1943

The professional baseball player lauded in the press as the greatest relief pitcher on Earth began and ended his life in Ventura.

Hall launched his professional baseball career at 21, when he joined the Cincinnati Reds. He was traded to the Boston Red Sox in 1909, played for the St. Louis Cardinals in 1916, then moved on to the Detroit Lions. He pitched his last game on Aug. 7, 1918.

Ventura historian Richard Senate, who researched Ivy Lawn's denizens, said it wasn't clear why he was nicknamed "Sea Lion," but there are theories.

"Most people said it was this deep sound of his voice," Senate said. "One theory was that when he laughed, he sounded like a sea lion."

Marion Cannon, 1834-1920

Cannon was a local lima bean farmer elected to serve in the 53rd U.S. Congress from 1893-95. He helped to organize the People's Party of California in 1891, then ran on the Populist ticket.

"There was a movement in California where we just got sick of the Democrats and Republicans and there was a big movement to change everything," Senate said. "True to the calling of the Populist party, when his term of service was up, he went back to being a farmer."

Dr. Ethel Percy Andrus, 1884-1967

Ivy Lawn's Gonzalez said perhaps the most famous person buried there is the Ojai teacher who founded the American Association of Retired Persons.

"She's buried in a little urn in the garden area," Gonzalez said, "The Garden of Memories."

Andrus founded the National Retired Teachers Association in 1947 to help get health insurance for retired teachers.

According to AARP's Web site, private health insurance was virtually unavailable to older Americans at the time. Andrus approached some 30 health insurance companies before she found one willing to insure older Americans.

The NRTA expanded to include all retirees and become the nonprofit, nonpartisan AARP in 1958.

Today, AARP has more than 39 million members.

It adopted one of Andrus' quotes as its motto: "To serve, not to be served."

Frederick Carlisle Snodgrass, 1887-1974

Born in Ventura, Snodgrass played center field for the New York Giants and the Boston Braves from 1908 to 1916.

Unfortunately, Snodgrass was best known as a Giants outfielder for dropping a fly ball in the 10th inning of the 1912 World Series, which allowed the Boston Red Sox to win. It was called "Snodgrass' muff" for years.

"He redeemed himself the next (play) when he actually made a spectacular catch," Senate said.

In 1920, Snodgrass, his wife and their two daughters moved back to California, where they lived in Oxnard, then Ventura. He died in Ventura.

Despite his spectacular catch during the same inning, right after his mistake, the New York Times' obituary read: "Fred Snodgrass, 86, Dead; Ball Player Muffed 1912 Fly."

Alexander Sarantos Tremulis, 1914-1991

Better known than his name is the ill-fated car he was hired to design: the 1948 Tucker Torpedo.

The Chicago-born civil engineer had many other automotive, railroad, aircraft and spacecraft designs to his credit. According to numerous Web sites, he cooked up the design that would evolve into today's space shuttle.

Without any formal training in art or engineering, he landed a job in 1933, at 19, with the Auburn-Cord-Duesenberg Co. He helped design the now-classic Cord 810 and 812 series.

Preston Tucker hired Tremulis to design the Torpedo in 1948, after Tremulis had served in World War II.

In 1982, Tremulis was inducted into the Automobile Hall of Fame in Dearborn, Mich.

He died in Ventura after several strokes, one of which blinded him.

Eric Turner, 1968-2000

This professional football player, a defensive back, was just 31 when he died of intestinal cancer.

Born in Ventura, he attended Ventura High School before going on to play football for UCLA. He then went on to play professionally for the Cleveland Browns, the Baltimore Ravens and, finally, the Oakland Raiders.

He had 30 interceptions in 109 games. His nickname was "E-Rock," indicating he was a force to be reckoned with on the football field.

Chung-Kwang Yang, 1933-2007

Known as C.K. to his friends, Yang won Taiwan's first gold medal in the 1954 Olympics for the decathlon. He did it again at the 1958 Games.

The press dubbed him the "Asian Iron Man," a title he lived up to once again in 1960, when he won the silver medal at the Olympics in Rome.

Yang studied at UCLA. He died in Los Angeles after complications from a massive stroke and was laid to rest in Ventura, where he has relatives.

John Leal, 1905-1996

When he died at 91, the Bakersfield native was one of the oldest living Munchkins from "The Wizard of Oz" (1939).

Before becoming an actor, Leal worked at a number of other jobs.

"He was a singer and he had a whole sideshow career," Senate said.

His stint as a sideshow attraction was in Long Beach. He also worked at the 1933 World's Fair as a security guard and later assembled planes for Lockheed Corp.

Leal appeared in the Century of Progress exposition (1933) as a miniature Will Rogers, and in the 1945 film "An Angel Comes to Brooklyn."

He retired to and spent the rest of his life in Ventura.

Ethel Clayton, 1882-1966

Silent film actress Clayton had a career that lasted more than 30 years. Born in Illinois, she was educated at a convent, then auditioned for a touring stage company and finally got into silent pictures.

The actress appeared in 147 films between 1909 and 1947, including "Journey's End" (1918), "Sunny Side Up" (1926) and "Make Way for Tomorrow" (1937). Her last appearance was a bit role in "The Perils of Pauline" in 1947.

"She played rich matrons toward the end of her life," Senate said.

She died in Oxnard at 84.

Bessie Eyton, 1890-1965

Also a silent film actress, Eyton appeared in 85 movies between 1911 and 1925. Her most notable include the parts of Helen Chester in "The Spoilers" (1914), Moya Dalton in "The Man from Texas" (1915), and Virginia Carvel in the 1916 silent move "The Crisis."

She appeared opposite such silent movie heartthrobs as Tom Mix and Wheeler Oakman.

Born in Santa Barbara, Eyton lived in Hollywood during the silent film era. Her popularity began to erode during World War I, but she continued to work as an actress until 1925. She was married and divorced twice.

Several accounts say Eyton left her Hollywood home in the late 1930s after a terrible argument with her mother, and was never heard from again.

Little is known about her during the last three decades of her life. She died in Thousand Oaks in 1965 of congestive heart failure.

Unknown St. Francis Dam disaster victims, March 13, 1928

When the St. Francis Dam broke in 1928 and nosed its deadly path through the Santa Clara River Valley, it killed more than 500 people, many of them unidentified.

Apart from the mass grave site in Santa Paula, several unidentified victims who washed to the Ventura shore are buried at Ivy Lawn.

Gonzalez said the late James Reardon — who owned an Oxnard mortuary — used to tell her about the day after the flood, when he and his mortician father, Oliver Reardon, went out to gather the bodies.

"In his adult life, when families did not wish to have the flowers and wanted to donate them, he would bring them here," Gonzalez said. "He knew they had no one."

The graves are in Section D marked as either "unknown man" or "unknown woman."