--- title: This Photo Shows James Dean Shortly Before His Death description: The actor died 60 years ago, after a Sept. 30, 1955, car crash canonical: https://time.com/4038581/james-dean-photos-anniversary/ author: Lily Rothman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-09-30T11:30:09.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-22T11:02:05.288Z article:section: History og:title: This Photo Shows James Dean Shortly Before His Death og:description: The iconic actor died in a car crash 60 years ago og:url: https://time.com/4038581/james-dean-photos-anniversary/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8c552b31ab2344cc/6988640e196cf41148038130/150917-james-dean-history.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: James Dean with Silver Porsche og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: This Photo Shows James Dean Shortly Before His Death twitter:description: The iconic actor died in a car crash 60 years ago twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8c552b31ab2344cc/6988640e196cf41148038130/150917-james-dean-history.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # This Photo Shows James Dean Shortly Before His Death  by [Lily Rothman](https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/)  ## Lily Rothman Rothman is managing editor at TIME. Sep 30, 2015 11:30 AM UTC  James Dean at a gas station with his silver Porsche 550 Spyder he named Little Bastard, just hours before his fatal crash. Sept. 30, 1955. James Dean at a gas station with his silver Porsche 550 Spyder he named Little Bastard, just hours before his fatal crash. Sept. 30, 1955.Corbis  by [Lily Rothman](https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/)  ## Lily Rothman Rothman is managing editor at TIME. Sep 30, 2015 11:30 AM UTC He was, according to the brief [obituary](http://time.com/vault/issue/1955-10-10/page/116/) he earned in TIME, the “most promising young cinemactor of 1955.” But that career was famously cut short on Sept. 30 of that year, when James Dean died “in a collision as he sped along a darkening highway in his silver Porsche Spyder sports car to enter a road race one week after he completed work in a new film, _Giant_; near Paso Robles, Calif.” The untimely death—he was 24—made Dean [even more of a celebrity](http://time.com/3425592/james-dean/) than he had been, and lent a portentous air to [every mile he drove](https://vimeo.com/63415705) that day in his [supposedly cursed](http://jalopnik.com/5113390/the-curse-of-james-deans-little-bastard) Porsche. Among the haunting images of that day is the photograph above. One of the last known pictures of the star alive, it was taken at a gas station in the Sherman Oaks area of Los Angeles, as Dean fueled up en route to the race he never made. **_Read more about James Dean’s posthumous celebrity, here in the TIME Vault:_** [Dean of the One-Shotters](http://time.com/vault/issue/1956-09-03/page/56/) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4038581/james-dean-photos-anniversary/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4038581/james-dean-photos-anniversary/"},"headline":"This Photo Shows James Dean Shortly Before His Death","datePublished":"2015-09-30T11:30:09.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-22T11:02:05.288Z","description":"The actor died in a car crash 60 years ago","url":"https://time.com/4038581/james-dean-photos-anniversary/","keywords":["photography","People"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8c552b31ab2344cc/6988640e196cf41148038130/150917-james-dean-history.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Lily Rothman","jobTitle":"Rothman is managing editor at TIME.","url":"https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/"}],"articleSection":"History","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt8c552b31ab2344cc/6988640e196cf41148038130/150917-james-dean-history.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"James Dean with Silver Porsche","caption":"James Dean at a gas station with his silver Porsche 550 Spyder he named Little Bastard, just hours before his fatal crash. 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