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The
four-story building, which has been vacant more than a decade,
burned for nearly two hours before more than 100 firefighters
brought the flames under control, according to the Los Angeles
Fire Department.
The Morrison Hotel was featured on the cover of The Doors' fifth
album. Celebrated music photographer Henry Diltz made the image
in 1969 and said years later that it took a little trickery to
pull it off.
A hotel clerk told the band they weren't allowed to take photos
inside, but when the clerk stepped away, the group ran into the
lobby and Diltz quickly got the photo looking through the
window, with legendary frontman Jim Morrison in the middle.
“It was a great old wooden building with many small rooms
upstairs where transients and drinkers could sleep it off on a
cot for $2.50 a night!" Diltz told The Associated Press on
Friday. "I think the beautiful front window with “Morrison
Hotel” in red letters was the best part of it! So did The
Doors!”
The album was viewed as a comeback to their roots for The Doors,
coming on the heels of Morrison's on-stage arrest at a Miami
concert that saw him convicted of indecent exposure and
profanity.
Morrison and The Doors would release one final album, “L.A.
Woman,” before he was found dead in a Paris bathtub on July 3,
1971.
Los Angeles firefighters who first arrived at the blaze on
Thursday found heavy flames on the building's top floor.
Several people who were in the building escaped without
injuries, including three people rescued by firefighters from
the third floor, according to the department. The building’s
roof collapsed, leaving its structural integrity in doubt, the
department said.
The building in recent years had been used as a training site
for firefighters.
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