He Was Buried Face Down On Top Of Marilyn Monroe And Vowed To Haunt His Wife If She Denied His Request
You can spend eternity rubbing elbows with Hollywood legends in the afterlife by being buried next to one.
A burial crypt above Marilyn Monroe’s final resting place at Pierce Brothers Westwood Village Memorial Park cemetery was put up for sale in 2009 by Elsie Poncher.
The crypt was once owned by Monroe’s former husband, Joe DiMaggio, the legendary Yankees baseball star.
Elsie Poncher’s husband, Richard, had laid in the crypt face down on top of Marilyn Monroe for 23 years at the time of the sale.
He died at the age of 81. She wanted to sell the crypt and use the money to help pay off the $1.6 million mortgage on her home in Beverly Hills.
When she placed the crypt for sale on eBay, she started the bidding at $500,000, as many people out there are willing to pay a pretty penny to be buried next to an A-list celebrity or two. At that price, it was one of the most expensive pieces of real estate per square foot on the market.
A Japanese man bid more than $4.6 million for the crypt above Marilyn. However, the deal ended up falling through, and Richard Poncher is still buried there to this day. Elsie died in 2014.
Richard Poncher was a hard-working entrepreneur who made a fortune with many electronics firms. He once sold surplus U.S. Army airplanes and parts.
Allegedly, he even built two bulletproof cars for Al Capone and owned 12 Rolls-Royces throughout his lifetime.
MSPhotographic – stock.adobe.com – illustrative purposes only – pictured above is Marilyn Monroe’s final resting place
The couple met in Chicago and then moved West. They dined at restaurants that catered to Hollywood stars and owned an apartment at the Peninsula Hotel in Hong Kong.
Richard bought the crypt from DiMaggio during his divorce from Marilyn in 1954. He did not know how iconic Marilyn would become in death or that she would be laid to rest in the Westwood cemetery.
Marilyn died of a barbiturate overdose in her home at the age of 36.
The Ponchers were chatting with DiMaggio at the Regency Hotel in New York when the retired baseball player asked if they wanted to buy two crypts. Later, Richard bought them for himself and his wife.
Before Richard died, he requested to be buried face down over Marilyn. If he wasn’t, he vowed to haunt his wife for the rest of her life.
Many celebrities have been interred in this cemetery, such as Natalie Wood, Dean Martin, Merv Griffin, Truman Capote, and Farrah Fawcett.
Marilyn’s spot gets the most visitors, though. People leave roses and lipstick marks in her honor. In 1992, Hugh Hefner bought the crypt next to the actress for $75,000, claiming it was too good of an opportunity to pass up.
He died at the age of 91 and was interred there in 2017. Marilyn launched Hugh Hefner into fame after she appeared on the cover of the first issue of his magazine despite never having met him before.
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