![\"Do](\"http:\/\/www.latimes.com\/media\/photo\/2010-04\/53070396.jpg\")
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The iron chain falls with a clang as the old man steps into the dark,
\ndeserted hallway of Linda Vista Community Hospital. Lights flicker and
\na stench of mold hangs in the air. Down the main corridor, a lone metal
\ngurney rests against a wall. <\/p>\n
More than a century ago, the
\nsix-story building in Boyle Heights opened to much fanfare as Santa Fe
\nCoast Lines Hospital. The Mission-style building — with verandas, a
\ndome tower and sweeping views of downtown Los Angeles — catered to
\nrailroad workers across the Southwest. Patients were cared for by a
\nsurgeon who once tended to Howard Hughes; they drank fresh milk from
\nthe hospital’s own Jersey cows.
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They were brought into the
\nlobby in wheelchairs, taken up an elevator operated by the simple
\npressing of a button and delivered to a heated room that could swiftly
\nbe evacuated by automatic fire escape.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
<\/br>"So complete and unique
\nare the automatic features of the new hospital that it will not be
\nstrange if all who enter therein for treatment are healed
\nautomatically,"announced a 1904 newspaper article.
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Now
\nthe wheelchairs are gone, the elevators broken. The heating-and-cooling
\nsystem hasn’t worked for 16 years. Jesus Mena walks the halls alone —
\nflashlight in hand, keys clinking on his leg — like an orderly making
\nhis final rounds. The 73-year-old watches over a building that in less
\nthan two decades went from community hub to haunted house.<\/p>\n