One Pasadena area filming location that I had long assumed was well-known in the stalking community was the home where the Hogan family lived in the 1986 television sitcom Valerie, aka Valerie’s Family, aka The Hogan Family. So, the other day when I happened to point out the location to Mike, from MovieShotsLA, while the two of us were in the area doing some stalking, I was absolutely shocked to discover that not only had he never been to the house, but prior to me mentioning it, he had no idea that it was even in Pasadena! I had originally found this location upon first moving to Southern California way back in 2000 thanks to an early edition of The Ultimate Hollywood Tour Book which featured a short blurb about the house. I’ve noticed, though, that, for whatever reason, more recent editions of the book do not mention the location. So, I decided to do a little more digging and was shocked to find out that not only was The Hogan Family house information not mentioned anywhere online, but that IMDB had even gone so far as to incongruously claim that the Hogan residence was the very same place where the Cunninghams lived on Happy Days. So, I figured it was high time I blogged about the true location of the residence to put the falsehoods to rest! 🙂

The Hogan Family house was actually one of the very first places I ever stalked and for that reason it will always hold a very special place in my heart. Shortly after relocating to Pasadena, my mom and I decided to spend an entire day driving around the City of Roses looking at its various movie and television sites. I remember being BEYOND excited that so many locations could be found in the city I was now calling home. Pasadena became my very own treasure trove that day and remains so even now. 🙂 Anyway, one of the locales my mom and I stalked was The Hogan Family house and I still remember how completely floored I was when I saw it as it looked very similar in person to how it appeared on the show. And I am very happy to report that even today – almost two and a half decades after the series premiered – the house still looks EXACTLY the same as it did when it was on TV! Even the same blue and white striped awnings are still flanking the home’s front windows.

The home’s address plaque also still looks much the same as it did in 1986, although it is now situated on a different side of the front porch. Love it! Love it! Love it! Oh, and please excuse the horrible quality of my screen caps. I don’t own The Hogan Family on DVD and had to settle for making them off of YouTube. According to Zillow, in real life the Valerie house has four bathrooms, five bedrooms, measures 3,846 square feet and was built in 1910. And it’s not very hard to see why producers chose to use it in the series, as it looks like the typical all-American home of the typical all-American family.

It is simply amazing to me that the series went through no less than THREE name changes during its five year run. During its first two years on the air, the show was known simply as Valerie, but when star Valerie Harper was fired in the summer following Season Two, the name was changed to Valerie’s Family: The Hogans. The following year, after the much publicized lawsuit that followed Harper’s dismissal, the name was changed once again to The Hogan Family. I was completely fascinated re-reading the many news articles written about the lawsuit while researching today’s post, as I had largely forgotten about the hugely bitter and widely publicized ordeal, which took place in 1987. As this article written about Harper’s firing and the subsequent lawsuit states, the controversy surrounding the show is far more memorable than the show itself. 😉 Even more juicy than the lawsuit, though, at least in my eyes, is the fact that the author of Valerie’s pilot episode would go on to pen Artistic Differencesa novel about a Hollywood writer who is hired to create a sitcom for an egocentric, narcissistic actress. Hmmm wonder what television show his book was based on? 😉 And a little bit of Hogan Family trivia for you – the sitcom starred none other than Josh Taylor (aka Dylan McKay’s father Jack from Beverly Hills, 90210) as Valerie’s pilot husband. 🙂

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: The house from The Hogan Family, aka Valerie’s Family, aka Valerie is located at 840 Bellefontaine Place in Pasadena.