During the Thirties and the Forties, the area where you are standing was full of decaying Victorian mansions, grimy hotels and sordid nightclubs. The Great Depression had shattered the dreams of the men and women who had come from all over the country with vain hopes of starting anew.

Los Angeles reacted with rich literary noir creations. Writers and film makers projected a city of disillusionment and lost souls. This is the sinister Los Angeles seen in films such as The Big Sleep and Double Indemnity. Raymond Chandler wrote in his novella, The King in Yellow which was published in The Dime Detective in 1938, "...the top of Bunker Hill...you could find anything from down-at-heels ex-Greenwich-villagers to crooks on the lam, from ladies of anybody's evening to County Relief clients brawling with haggard landladies in grand old houses with scrolled porches.... It had been a nice place once..." Bunker Hill, formerly the site of lavish Victorian mansions, came to symbolize the rot in the heart of the metropolis.

A few steps south of the CALDER you'll find one of downtown's more engaging spots...