LOS ANGELES -- As word of the death of legendary broadcaster Chick Hearn spread, it was as though there had been a death in the family, and that family was the entire city of Los Angeles.

	Fans of all sorts pay tribute at Chick Hearn's star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Since Hearn, 85, was hospitalized Friday night after falling at his home, local radio stations had constantly been broadcasting updates of his condition, and when his death was announced Monday night at a news conference outside Northridge Hospital Medical Center, television stations interrupted regularly scheduled programming to cover it.

One hundred or more people had gathered outside the hospital to drop off flowers or cards or just offer good wishes, and when they heard the news, many burst into tears.

Several miles away, at Hearn's star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, many people rushed to place flowers. Still others gathered late Monday night at Staples Center, the downtown arena where the Lakers play.

At the various impromptu shrines, people left not only flowers and cards, but also such things as hot dogs and Jell-O, playing off such Hearn expressions as "the mustard's off the hot dog'' and "the Jell-O is jiggling.''

''It's like losing an immediate family member,'' said James Worthy, a star of the 1980s Lakers teams and now a broadcaster for KCAL-TV.

''He gave me 'Big Game James,' he was the one responsible for my nickname, and I'm known by that nickname everywhere I go,'' said Worthy, who played on four NBA championship teams with Magic Johnson and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

''Chick is like a fatherly figure. When the going was tough during the season, he gave everybody encouragement,'' said Bob Vyas who, like Hearn did, lives in Los Angeles' suburban San Fernando Valley. When he called his daughter in India to tell her Hearn was ailing, Vyas said, she told him: ''Dad, go to the hospital and pray for him.''

Also at the hospital was Carol Weissberg, who arrived to drop off flowers and burst into tears when she learned Hearn had died.

''I've been following the Lakers for 39 years,'' said Weissberg, 46. ''The only voice I ever heard was Chick's.''

Hearn became the Lakers' broadcaster when the team arrived in Los Angeles from Minneapolis in 1960 and has been the only play-by-play man the team has ever had.

''Quite frankly, I don't know where the organization goes from this point, although we will figure it out,'' a grim-faced Lakers General Manager Mitch Kupchak, his voice breaking, told reporters outside the hospital.

For decades Hearn had seemed invincible, missing only two games in 42 years and broadcasting a record 3,338 games from 1965 to 2001.

During that time such Lakers stars and Hall of Fame players as Jerry West, Elgin Baylor, Wilt Chamberlain, Abdul-Jabbar and Johnson came and went. But Hearn was always there, and those who knew him said his work ethic was legendary.

''At game's end, he's already the first one on the bus,'' his broadcast partner Stu Lantz said shortly before Hearn's death. ''And everybody's on the plane and he wants to know why the pilot isn't taking off. He's even gotten the players to join in and chant now, 'Let's go.' It's a tribute to Chick because everybody always knows he's always there first.''