The
Ambassador Hotel on Wiltshire Boulevard
in Los Angeles was Hollywood
incarnate when it opened in 1921.
Rudolph Valentino, Joan Crawford, John
Barrymore, Marion Davies,
the F. Scott Fitzgeralds, Marilyn Monroe, Buster
Crabbe, Doris Day, and the list of celebrities who stayed and played at this
grand hotel goes on and on.
In June of 1968, Robert Kennedy was
assassinated
in the pantry of the kitchen by an Arab who also shot down
several others.
This horrific event marked the end of innocence for a
generation and was the death knell for the Ambassador Hotel.
The tragedy initiated a decline in
popularity for the hotel
as it became a constant reminder of the event. It
closed at the end of the 1980s. This elegant edifice remains closed and behind
chain link fences. Its 600 rooms and bungelows are rotting
away; a sad epitaph to Hollywood's most historical
landmark.
