wcjfrisk’s comment reminded me of something I’d seen, so I hunted down the following piece from the July 14, 1919, issue of The Toledo Blade, as quoted in a 1919 book called “Motion Pictures as a Phase of Commercial Amusement in Toledo, Ohio,” by John Joseph Phelan:
:“SITE LEASED FOR $300,000 THEATRE HERE
“New York Interests Take Arcade Property for Motion Picture and Vaudeville Bills.
“The Sun & James Amusement Co., New York, has leased the property now occupied by the Arcade theatre, St. Clair and Jackson streets, and will construct a $300,000 theatre building.
“The deal was closed Monday, through Thomas Davies, of the Thomas Davies Realty Co. The building, it is expected, will seat 3,000. It probably will be used for both vaudeville and moving pictures.
“Ready January 1.
“The building will be 90 by 170 feet, brick and concrete.
“Work in tearing down the old Arcade theatre building already has been commenced and it is planned to have the new theatre ready for opening January 1.
“Mrs. Nettie Poe Ketcham, New York, owns the Arcade theatre building and property. The Sun & James Co. lease is for 99 years.
“Office Space Later.
“Gus Sun operates a theatre in Springfield, O., and W. M. James, a former Toledo man, owns the Broadway theatre in Columbus. Other theatrical men are said to be interested also.
“The new theatre auditorium will be built back from the street and it is planned later to build a large office building surrounding it and facing on St. Clair and Jackson streets.”
The same book includes the Arcade Theatre (listed as the Strand Arcade) at 438-40 St. Clair, and gives its seating capacity as 1,224. As the Rivoli has nearly twice the seating capacity, this had to have been a virtually new theater, even if part of the old Arcade was incorporated into the new construction.
The 1903 edition of the State of Ohio’s “Annual report of the Department of Inspection of Workshops, Factories and Public Buildings” has an entry for the Arcade Theatre. It a statement of changes the Department had ordered to be made to the building:
“No. 20—Empire Arcade—Mrs. Nettie Poe Ketcham (Toledo), November 19, 1902—Change exit doors on Jackson street so as to open outward; cut down third and seventh windows from stage on east side of auditorium and convert them into doorways, doors to be hung so as to open outward; provide six chemical fire extinguishers of four-gallon capacity each, two to be placed on stage, two in rear end of auditorium and two In gallery, of such style as approved by the National Board of Underwriters; repair fastening to gate in alleyway, between the Arcade and Empire Theaters, so that same can be opened easily. Complied; certificate Issued.”
An item about the Valentine Theatre in the July 25, 1908, issue of The Moving Picture World also mentions both the Arcade Theatre and the Empire Theatre, saying that the Empire was across the street from the Valentine, and the Arcade was in the same block of St. Clair Street. It appears that the Arcade’s doors on Jackson Street were probably always exits, not an entrance, at least from 1902 on.
I was unable to find either the Rivoli or Palace mentioned by name in the list of C.Howard Crane’s theaters in “The Theater Designs of C. Howard Crane,” a thesis by Lisa Maria DiChiera, but the list includes the Empire Theatre in Toledo as project #345. The date is not given, but the Allen Theatre (later the Capitol) in London, Ontario, which opened in February, 1920, was listed as Project #343, so it fits the time frame of the Rivoli’s construction.
As both the Empire and the Arcade were owned by Nettie Poe Ketcham, it seems possible that the project of rebuilding the Arcade might be listed under the name of the same owner’s adjacent theater that was still in operation. The finely detailed Beaux Arts facade of the Rivoli is certainly characteristic of Crane’s work of the period. In fact, many of the details of the Rivoli’s facade are almost identical to details on the facade of Detroit’s Orchestra Hall, built about the same time. I’d say it’s very safe to assume that the Rivoli was indeed the work of C. Howard Crane.
The building in the photo Warren linked to on April 15, 2009, has finally been identified. In a comment on the Bon Ton Theatre page, Bob Wilson says that it was the old Armory building, at Broadway and Johnston Street. It was not a theater.
It turns out that the building next door north of the Vitaphone Theatre (the one with the sign reading Solomon’s Porch) was also once a theater. A list of historic buildings in downtown Wenatchee lists the structure at 17 S. Mission as the Mission Theatre, built in 1920.
The source of the list, a document prepared for the National Register of Historic Places, also gives a 1930 construction date for the Vitaphone Theatre. I still don’t think it looks like a building from as late as 1930. Maybe it wouldn’t look so old fashioned if it hadn’t been painted entirely grey.
A document prepared for the National Register of Historic Places has information about the Liberty Theatre, including the fact that it was designed by architect Edwin W. Houghton.
The Moving Picture World was typically riddled with misspellings, so I’m not surprised they got the name of the hotel wrong. It was probably the publication that got the theater’s name wrong, too.
Does anyone know how long the Columbus Theatre remained open?
Well, duh. It finally dawned on me that the building at 11 N. Wenatchee could not have been the Wenatchee Theatre, which was built in 1905.
Also, a list of historic buildings in downtown Wenatchee that I came across includes a Public Farmers Market building at 9 North Wenatchee Avenue. This has to be the same building with the antique mall that uses the address 11 N. Wenatchee. A marquee would not have been unusual on a building built as a public market.
But the Rialto was apparently not the 1913 project for J.E. Ferguson, either. The list of historic buildings comes from a document prepared for the National Register of Historic Places, and there is information about the Rialto in it. Unless the document is mistaken (I’ve known this to happen at times,) the Rialto was built in 1921 and was designed by Seattle architect Edwin W. Houghton.
It could have the future Rialto Theatre that was mentioned in the Building News section of the January 15, 1913, issue of American Architect and Architecture: “Announcement has been made that Sheriff J. E. Ferguson will erect a 2-story theater building on Wenatchee and Palouse Sts….”
If the 1913 project was the Rialto, then this earlier item from The Pacific Coast Architect of October, 1912, would also be about the Rialto: “Theater- Wenatchee. Architect J. A. Creutzer prepared plans for a two-story brick and concrete theater building for J. W. Ferguson, to cost $50,000.” (This item got Ferguson’s middle initial wrong. It was definitely E.)
However, in Don’s 1940 photo, the building on the near side of Palouse Street, next door to the six-story building on the corner, has what looks like a theater marquee. The marquee is still there now, and the building is being used as an antique mall. Could this building also have been a theater? The address is 11 N. Wenatchee. As this building is about as close to Palouse Street as the Rialto is, it’s possible that, if it was a theater, this was the 1913 theater project for J. E. Ferguson.
Among the early theaters in Wenatchee that are not yet listed at Cinema Treasures are the Wenatchee Theatre, opened 1905 and operating at least as late as 1925 (and owned by J. E. Ferguson,) and the Majestic Theatre, mentioned in a 1951 Boxoffice Magazine article as an early movie house in Wenatchee, but not mentioned anywhere else that I’ve been able to find. One or the other of them (or neither of them) might have been in the building at 11 N. Wenatchee.
In any case, there’s still information about theaters in Wenatchee that is missing from Cinema Treasures, and I’ve pretty much exhausted the resources available to me. Maybe someone else can make use of these fragments to track down more details.
The facade on this theater doesn’t belong to a building built in 1930. Both the shape of the parapet wall and the decorative trim that probably marks sealed-up fenestration indicate an earlier time of construction. The Vitaphone Theatre might have been converted from an existing store building in 1930, of course, but there are two other possibilities.
This could be either the former Wenatchee Theatre, built in 1905, or the former Majestic Theatre, no known dates of operation. The Wenatchee Theatre vanished from the listings before 1930. The Majestic was mentioned in a 1951 Boxoffice Magazine article as an early movie house in Wenatchee, but I’ve been unable to find out anything else about it. Somebody with access to local sources might be able to discover more.
If this was the only movie house that ever existed on this corner, then it had to have been the house that was the subject of the following item in the December 20, 1913, issue of The Moving Picture World:
“HOTEL CONVERTED INTO PICTURE HOUSE.
“The St. Brennen Hotel, located at 103rd Street and Columbus Avenue, New York City, has been converted into a picture house. The auditorium has a seating capacity of 400 persons; 300 of which seat on the parquette floor and the remaining 100 in the balcony. Boxes have been provided. The investment involved an expense of $4,000. The admission prices are 10 cents for the orchestra and balcony and 25 cents for the boxes. The name of the house is the Columbia and it was opened Saturday, November 29, by F. G. Cook, the manager. The theater was designed by architect Wm. H. Gompert, of New York City.”
If somebody can dig up a pre-1913 directory with an address for the St. Brennan Hotel, and that address matches the Arden Theatre’s address, then it will be confirmed that the house opened in 1913 as the Columbia Theatre. But the different seating capacities of the Columbia and the Arden, if both are accurate, suggest either an expansion at some point, or that they were two different theaters.
If the earlier Baldwin Theatre was on Grand, then the most likely explanation for the current address of this theater not being the 71 Merrick Road that Chuck found would be a renumbering sometime after 1933. The newspaper article quoted earlier said that the area around Merrick and Grand was the original center of the village’s business district. If growth later led to several small settlements expanding into one another, then a renumbering of the lots would be fairly likely to have happened.
The “Encyclopedia of New Jersey,” edited by Maxine N. Lurie and Marc Mappen, says that the Taylor Opera House was built in 1867, and had been designed by architect Henry E. Finch. Within twenty years of opening it was remodeled, the roof being raised to accommodate a second gallery.
An item datelined Trenton in the February, 1918, issue of construction trade journal The Bridgemen’s Magazine might be about a remodeling of the Taylor Opera House. It says: “Taylor Opera House, South Broad street, having plans prepared by W. A. Klemann, architect, First National Bank Bldg., for theater. About $100,000.”
Then the March 9, 1918, issue of trade journal Domestic Engineering said that construction bids were being requested for a “…$100,000 theater, Trenton, N. J., Taylor Opera House….”
It’s possible, though, that the project was not a rebuilding of the Taylor, but the construction of some other theater. An item in the August 14, 1915, issue of The Moving Picture World mentions the Trenton Theater Building Company, owners of the Taylor Opera House and Trent Theater in Trenton. As the company already owned two theaters, it’s not impossible that they were adding an entirely new third house to their holdings.
Back on September 26, 2007, lostmemory said: “Was there another Baldwin Theater? A Midmer-Losh theater organ was installed in a Baldwin Theater in Baldwin, N.Y. in 1925.”
Chuck: Is it possible that the address you provided for this theater in the first comment was actually the address for the earlier Baldwin Theatre? It’s clear from more recent comments that the 1933 Baldwin Theatre is now the Baldwin Medical Plaza, and the Internet brings up addresses of of 865-869 Merrick Road for that building.
I’m thinking that either your source for the address was a pre-1933 publication, and actually belonged to the earlier Baldwin Theatre, or Baldwin has renumbered the lots on Merrick Road sometime since 1933. In either case, the current correct address of the former Baldwin Theatre is that of the Medical Plaza.
An earlier comment by Scott Feldmann says that the Raymond Theatre in Pasadena opened one month before the Rialto. The Raymond opened in 1921, four years before the Rialto, and was originally operated by its builder, Henry C. Jenson.
C. L. Langley’s various business associations were complex, and I’ve never been able to sort them out completely. I know that he was associated with San Francisco theater men J. T. Turner and Fred Dahnken in several Southern California theaters by 1921, but his association with Sol Lesser and the Gore Brothers in the West Coast circuit seems to have begun later and might have overlapped with his Turner and Dahnken partnership.
Henry Jenson’s Palace Grand Theatre in Glendale had been taken over by Turner, Dahnken & Langley and renamed the TD&L Theatre by 1923, so the partnership might have taken over Jenson’s Raymond as well, though I’ve never found any sources that say so. However, the Raymond was operated by West Coast-Langley Theatres at some time in the early 1920s, so Turner and Dahnken might not have been Langley’s partners in that particular theater. All the Turner, Dahnken & Langley references in the L.A. Library’s California Index date from 1921, so I’m not sure how long the partnership lasted.
I’m sure that West Coast-Langley Theatres was a different company than West Coast Theatres, Inc., which was formed by Sol Lesser, Adolph Ramish, and the Gore brothers, Abe and Mike, in 1920. West Coast-Langley appears to have been an affiliate of West Coast, and was later taken over completely by West Coast Theatres, or by its successor, Fox-West Coast Theatres, which was formed in 1928 (footnote: William Fox held an interest in West Coast Theatres as early as 1925, when he bought a big block of stock in the company from Adolph Ramish.) Langley also headed companies called Greater Pasadena Theatres, Inc., and Southwest Theatres, Inc., which were affiliated with West Coast Theatres.
Eventually (about 1930, I think,) Fox-West Coast also took over Turner and Dahnken’s large T&D circuit, which operated dozens of theaters from Central California to the Pacific Northwest. Some of T&D’s operations ended up in the T&D Jr. circuit, which operated mostly in the Central Valley of California, and was headed by Mike Naify. I’ve been unable to discover if Turner and Dahnken had any part in T&D Jr.
I’m not sure of what became of C.L. Langley after Fox took over West Coast Theatres, but I’ve found a single reference to a theater being built for him at Indio in 1930. Sol Lesser, who sold his West Coast shares in 1926, and Abe and Mike Gore later operated theaters on their own.
As far as I know, nobody has ever written a book about the early development of West Coast Theatres, and its evolution into Fox West Coast, so the information is scattered and details are hard to find. Such a book would be a good project for somebody with more patience than I have.
The February, 1919, issue of The Architect and Engineer of California featured a portfolio of the work of James W. Plachek, architect of the UC Theatre. There are two exterior photos of the theater and, following a page of text, two interior photos depicting the foyer and lobby (scroll down.) Pictures can be enlarged by clicking on the + sign in the toolbar at the bottom right of the web page.
The building that was converted into the Family Theatre was built in 1872-73 as an office and commercial building. Despite conversion of the upper floors into a hotel in 1880, then back into offices, then back into a hotel again in the 1890s, and finally the gutting of much of the interior for conversion into the Family Theatre in 1909, the facade remained essentially the same for decades. The original architect of the building was Mortimer L. Smith. The building’s history is told on this web page, where it is listed as the Second Williams Block.
An extensive description of the Bucklen Opera House can be found on this web page, as part of a biographical sketch of Herbert Bucklen (keep scrolling sown, you’ll get to it.) It says that the architect of the Bucklen Opera House was Mortimer L. Smith, of Detroit, who was also the architect of the Tibbets Opera House in Coldwater, Michigan.
I’ve found multiple sources saying that the Majestic Theatre itself was designed by Chicago architect J. M. Wood, and that John Galen Howard designed the building exterior. However, I’ve come across an item in the April 18, 1903, issue of American Architect and Architecture which says that while Wood had originally been associated with Howard in the project, he had withdrawn at an early stage.
The text is at this link. Scroll UP a few pages for an exterior photo, then a few more pages for two interior photos of the theater.
At this link is an article from the March 7, 1903, issue of the advertisers' trade supplement of American Architect and Building News. Along with a fairly detailed description, it features an additional two interior photos of the Majestic, and a small exterior photo.
A book published in 1892 called “The Bay of San Francisco” has a few paragraphs about Chicago theater architect J.M. Wood, who had designed the New California Theatre in San Francisco. It lists several of the theaters he designed, and the Grand Opera House in Los Angeles is among them.
As Keysor and Morgan had never designed a big theater, it seems likely that Ozro Childs would have wanted to have an established theater architect working with the local firm on such a major project. James M. Wood should be added to the list of architects for the Grand. It was not unusual for Wood to design theaters in buildings that were designed by other architects.
Wood later worked on the Burbank Theatre, a few blocks down Main Street in Los Angeles, and the Loring Opera House (Golden State Theatre) in Riverside, California. “The Bay of San Francisco” lists twenty theaters that had been designed by Wood as of 1892, and the list is not exhaustive.
The site’s “About Us” page says that the Academy of Music was designed by the noted Chicago theater architect J.M. Wood. The page also says that the house opened in December, 1885.
A 1905 book titled “A Twentieth Century History and Biographical Record of Elkhart County, Indiana” (Google Books scan,) edited by Anthony Deahl, describes a new “Goshen Opera House” which was then under construction, but from the description it is clear that it was the Jefferson Theatre.
The Jefferson Theatre was designed by the noted Chicago theater architect J.M. Wood, who in the late 19th century nearly rivaled John McElfatrick in popularity as a theater designer.
The Grand Theatre was originally designed by Chicago architect J. M. Wood. James Wood was one of the most prolific American theater architects of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The restored mural on the proscenium arch is by Canadian artist Frederick Challener. The arch, side boxes, and the stage are virtually all that remains of Wood’s original design, the remainder of the building having been completely rebuilt in 1978.
Oh, and the name of the street is North Broadway. North is part of the street name in this case, not just a direction. Google got it right on the Street View image, but not on the map.
The Daly Theatre has been demolished. The L.A. County Assessor’s office says that the store on the corner was built in 1947, and the adjacent building was built in 1968.
wcjfrisk’s comment reminded me of something I’d seen, so I hunted down the following piece from the July 14, 1919, issue of The Toledo Blade, as quoted in a 1919 book called “Motion Pictures as a Phase of Commercial Amusement in Toledo, Ohio,” by John Joseph Phelan:
The same book includes the Arcade Theatre (listed as the Strand Arcade) at 438-40 St. Clair, and gives its seating capacity as 1,224. As the Rivoli has nearly twice the seating capacity, this had to have been a virtually new theater, even if part of the old Arcade was incorporated into the new construction.The 1903 edition of the State of Ohio’s “Annual report of the Department of Inspection of Workshops, Factories and Public Buildings” has an entry for the Arcade Theatre. It a statement of changes the Department had ordered to be made to the building:
An item about the Valentine Theatre in the July 25, 1908, issue of The Moving Picture World also mentions both the Arcade Theatre and the Empire Theatre, saying that the Empire was across the street from the Valentine, and the Arcade was in the same block of St. Clair Street. It appears that the Arcade’s doors on Jackson Street were probably always exits, not an entrance, at least from 1902 on.
I was unable to find either the Rivoli or Palace mentioned by name in the list of C.Howard Crane’s theaters in “The Theater Designs of C. Howard Crane,” a thesis by Lisa Maria DiChiera, but the list includes the Empire Theatre in Toledo as project #345. The date is not given, but the Allen Theatre (later the Capitol) in London, Ontario, which opened in February, 1920, was listed as Project #343, so it fits the time frame of the Rivoli’s construction.
As both the Empire and the Arcade were owned by Nettie Poe Ketcham, it seems possible that the project of rebuilding the Arcade might be listed under the name of the same owner’s adjacent theater that was still in operation. The finely detailed Beaux Arts facade of the Rivoli is certainly characteristic of Crane’s work of the period. In fact, many of the details of the Rivoli’s facade are almost identical to details on the facade of Detroit’s Orchestra Hall, built about the same time. I’d say it’s very safe to assume that the Rivoli was indeed the work of C. Howard Crane.
The building in the photo Warren linked to on April 15, 2009, has finally been identified. In a comment on the Bon Ton Theatre page, Bob Wilson says that it was the old Armory building, at Broadway and Johnston Street. It was not a theater.
It turns out that the building next door north of the Vitaphone Theatre (the one with the sign reading Solomon’s Porch) was also once a theater. A list of historic buildings in downtown Wenatchee lists the structure at 17 S. Mission as the Mission Theatre, built in 1920.
The source of the list, a document prepared for the National Register of Historic Places, also gives a 1930 construction date for the Vitaphone Theatre. I still don’t think it looks like a building from as late as 1930. Maybe it wouldn’t look so old fashioned if it hadn’t been painted entirely grey.
A document prepared for the National Register of Historic Places has information about the Liberty Theatre, including the fact that it was designed by architect Edwin W. Houghton.
The Moving Picture World was typically riddled with misspellings, so I’m not surprised they got the name of the hotel wrong. It was probably the publication that got the theater’s name wrong, too.
Does anyone know how long the Columbus Theatre remained open?
Well, duh. It finally dawned on me that the building at 11 N. Wenatchee could not have been the Wenatchee Theatre, which was built in 1905.
Also, a list of historic buildings in downtown Wenatchee that I came across includes a Public Farmers Market building at 9 North Wenatchee Avenue. This has to be the same building with the antique mall that uses the address 11 N. Wenatchee. A marquee would not have been unusual on a building built as a public market.
But the Rialto was apparently not the 1913 project for J.E. Ferguson, either. The list of historic buildings comes from a document prepared for the National Register of Historic Places, and there is information about the Rialto in it. Unless the document is mistaken (I’ve known this to happen at times,) the Rialto was built in 1921 and was designed by Seattle architect Edwin W. Houghton.
It could have the future Rialto Theatre that was mentioned in the Building News section of the January 15, 1913, issue of American Architect and Architecture: “Announcement has been made that Sheriff J. E. Ferguson will erect a 2-story theater building on Wenatchee and Palouse Sts….”
If the 1913 project was the Rialto, then this earlier item from The Pacific Coast Architect of October, 1912, would also be about the Rialto: “Theater- Wenatchee. Architect J. A. Creutzer prepared plans for a two-story brick and concrete theater building for J. W. Ferguson, to cost $50,000.” (This item got Ferguson’s middle initial wrong. It was definitely E.)
However, in Don’s 1940 photo, the building on the near side of Palouse Street, next door to the six-story building on the corner, has what looks like a theater marquee. The marquee is still there now, and the building is being used as an antique mall. Could this building also have been a theater? The address is 11 N. Wenatchee. As this building is about as close to Palouse Street as the Rialto is, it’s possible that, if it was a theater, this was the 1913 theater project for J. E. Ferguson.
Among the early theaters in Wenatchee that are not yet listed at Cinema Treasures are the Wenatchee Theatre, opened 1905 and operating at least as late as 1925 (and owned by J. E. Ferguson,) and the Majestic Theatre, mentioned in a 1951 Boxoffice Magazine article as an early movie house in Wenatchee, but not mentioned anywhere else that I’ve been able to find. One or the other of them (or neither of them) might have been in the building at 11 N. Wenatchee.
In any case, there’s still information about theaters in Wenatchee that is missing from Cinema Treasures, and I’ve pretty much exhausted the resources available to me. Maybe someone else can make use of these fragments to track down more details.
The facade on this theater doesn’t belong to a building built in 1930. Both the shape of the parapet wall and the decorative trim that probably marks sealed-up fenestration indicate an earlier time of construction. The Vitaphone Theatre might have been converted from an existing store building in 1930, of course, but there are two other possibilities.
This could be either the former Wenatchee Theatre, built in 1905, or the former Majestic Theatre, no known dates of operation. The Wenatchee Theatre vanished from the listings before 1930. The Majestic was mentioned in a 1951 Boxoffice Magazine article as an early movie house in Wenatchee, but I’ve been unable to find out anything else about it. Somebody with access to local sources might be able to discover more.
The Columbus (or Columbia) had to have have been across the street from the Arden’s site, then.
And one or the other of the publications must have gotten the name wrong, unless it was changed between 1913 and 1914.
If this was the only movie house that ever existed on this corner, then it had to have been the house that was the subject of the following item in the December 20, 1913, issue of The Moving Picture World:
If somebody can dig up a pre-1913 directory with an address for the St. Brennan Hotel, and that address matches the Arden Theatre’s address, then it will be confirmed that the house opened in 1913 as the Columbia Theatre. But the different seating capacities of the Columbia and the Arden, if both are accurate, suggest either an expansion at some point, or that they were two different theaters.If the earlier Baldwin Theatre was on Grand, then the most likely explanation for the current address of this theater not being the 71 Merrick Road that Chuck found would be a renumbering sometime after 1933. The newspaper article quoted earlier said that the area around Merrick and Grand was the original center of the village’s business district. If growth later led to several small settlements expanding into one another, then a renumbering of the lots would be fairly likely to have happened.
The “Encyclopedia of New Jersey,” edited by Maxine N. Lurie and Marc Mappen, says that the Taylor Opera House was built in 1867, and had been designed by architect Henry E. Finch. Within twenty years of opening it was remodeled, the roof being raised to accommodate a second gallery.
An item datelined Trenton in the February, 1918, issue of construction trade journal The Bridgemen’s Magazine might be about a remodeling of the Taylor Opera House. It says: “Taylor Opera House, South Broad street, having plans prepared by W. A. Klemann, architect, First National Bank Bldg., for theater. About $100,000.”
Then the March 9, 1918, issue of trade journal Domestic Engineering said that construction bids were being requested for a “…$100,000 theater, Trenton, N. J., Taylor Opera House….”
It’s possible, though, that the project was not a rebuilding of the Taylor, but the construction of some other theater. An item in the August 14, 1915, issue of The Moving Picture World mentions the Trenton Theater Building Company, owners of the Taylor Opera House and Trent Theater in Trenton. As the company already owned two theaters, it’s not impossible that they were adding an entirely new third house to their holdings.
Back on September 26, 2007, lostmemory said: “Was there another Baldwin Theater? A Midmer-Losh theater organ was installed in a Baldwin Theater in Baldwin, N.Y. in 1925.”
Chuck: Is it possible that the address you provided for this theater in the first comment was actually the address for the earlier Baldwin Theatre? It’s clear from more recent comments that the 1933 Baldwin Theatre is now the Baldwin Medical Plaza, and the Internet brings up addresses of of 865-869 Merrick Road for that building.
I’m thinking that either your source for the address was a pre-1933 publication, and actually belonged to the earlier Baldwin Theatre, or Baldwin has renumbered the lots on Merrick Road sometime since 1933. In either case, the current correct address of the former Baldwin Theatre is that of the Medical Plaza.
An earlier comment by Scott Feldmann says that the Raymond Theatre in Pasadena opened one month before the Rialto. The Raymond opened in 1921, four years before the Rialto, and was originally operated by its builder, Henry C. Jenson.
C. L. Langley’s various business associations were complex, and I’ve never been able to sort them out completely. I know that he was associated with San Francisco theater men J. T. Turner and Fred Dahnken in several Southern California theaters by 1921, but his association with Sol Lesser and the Gore Brothers in the West Coast circuit seems to have begun later and might have overlapped with his Turner and Dahnken partnership.
Henry Jenson’s Palace Grand Theatre in Glendale had been taken over by Turner, Dahnken & Langley and renamed the TD&L Theatre by 1923, so the partnership might have taken over Jenson’s Raymond as well, though I’ve never found any sources that say so. However, the Raymond was operated by West Coast-Langley Theatres at some time in the early 1920s, so Turner and Dahnken might not have been Langley’s partners in that particular theater. All the Turner, Dahnken & Langley references in the L.A. Library’s California Index date from 1921, so I’m not sure how long the partnership lasted.
I’m sure that West Coast-Langley Theatres was a different company than West Coast Theatres, Inc., which was formed by Sol Lesser, Adolph Ramish, and the Gore brothers, Abe and Mike, in 1920. West Coast-Langley appears to have been an affiliate of West Coast, and was later taken over completely by West Coast Theatres, or by its successor, Fox-West Coast Theatres, which was formed in 1928 (footnote: William Fox held an interest in West Coast Theatres as early as 1925, when he bought a big block of stock in the company from Adolph Ramish.) Langley also headed companies called Greater Pasadena Theatres, Inc., and Southwest Theatres, Inc., which were affiliated with West Coast Theatres.
Eventually (about 1930, I think,) Fox-West Coast also took over Turner and Dahnken’s large T&D circuit, which operated dozens of theaters from Central California to the Pacific Northwest. Some of T&D’s operations ended up in the T&D Jr. circuit, which operated mostly in the Central Valley of California, and was headed by Mike Naify. I’ve been unable to discover if Turner and Dahnken had any part in T&D Jr.
I’m not sure of what became of C.L. Langley after Fox took over West Coast Theatres, but I’ve found a single reference to a theater being built for him at Indio in 1930. Sol Lesser, who sold his West Coast shares in 1926, and Abe and Mike Gore later operated theaters on their own.
As far as I know, nobody has ever written a book about the early development of West Coast Theatres, and its evolution into Fox West Coast, so the information is scattered and details are hard to find. Such a book would be a good project for somebody with more patience than I have.
The February, 1919, issue of The Architect and Engineer of California featured a portfolio of the work of James W. Plachek, architect of the UC Theatre. There are two exterior photos of the theater and, following a page of text, two interior photos depicting the foyer and lobby (scroll down.) Pictures can be enlarged by clicking on the + sign in the toolbar at the bottom right of the web page.
The correct address for the Rex is 1305 19th Street. A huge parking garage now covers that whole block along 19th Street.
The building that was converted into the Family Theatre was built in 1872-73 as an office and commercial building. Despite conversion of the upper floors into a hotel in 1880, then back into offices, then back into a hotel again in the 1890s, and finally the gutting of much of the interior for conversion into the Family Theatre in 1909, the facade remained essentially the same for decades. The original architect of the building was Mortimer L. Smith. The building’s history is told on this web page, where it is listed as the Second Williams Block.
An extensive description of the Bucklen Opera House can be found on this web page, as part of a biographical sketch of Herbert Bucklen (keep scrolling sown, you’ll get to it.) It says that the architect of the Bucklen Opera House was Mortimer L. Smith, of Detroit, who was also the architect of the Tibbets Opera House in Coldwater, Michigan.
I’ve found multiple sources saying that the Majestic Theatre itself was designed by Chicago architect J. M. Wood, and that John Galen Howard designed the building exterior. However, I’ve come across an item in the April 18, 1903, issue of American Architect and Architecture which says that while Wood had originally been associated with Howard in the project, he had withdrawn at an early stage.
The text is at this link. Scroll UP a few pages for an exterior photo, then a few more pages for two interior photos of the theater.
At this link is an article from the March 7, 1903, issue of the advertisers' trade supplement of American Architect and Building News. Along with a fairly detailed description, it features an additional two interior photos of the Majestic, and a small exterior photo.
A book published in 1892 called “The Bay of San Francisco” has a few paragraphs about Chicago theater architect J.M. Wood, who had designed the New California Theatre in San Francisco. It lists several of the theaters he designed, and the Grand Opera House in Los Angeles is among them.
As Keysor and Morgan had never designed a big theater, it seems likely that Ozro Childs would have wanted to have an established theater architect working with the local firm on such a major project. James M. Wood should be added to the list of architects for the Grand. It was not unusual for Wood to design theaters in buildings that were designed by other architects.
Wood later worked on the Burbank Theatre, a few blocks down Main Street in Los Angeles, and the Loring Opera House (Golden State Theatre) in Riverside, California. “The Bay of San Francisco” lists twenty theaters that had been designed by Wood as of 1892, and the list is not exhaustive.
The official web site that Lost Memory linked to is gone, but here is a link to the new official Academy Theatre web site.
The site’s “About Us” page says that the Academy of Music was designed by the noted Chicago theater architect J.M. Wood. The page also says that the house opened in December, 1885.
A 1905 book titled “A Twentieth Century History and Biographical Record of Elkhart County, Indiana” (Google Books scan,) edited by Anthony Deahl, describes a new “Goshen Opera House” which was then under construction, but from the description it is clear that it was the Jefferson Theatre.
The Jefferson Theatre was designed by the noted Chicago theater architect J.M. Wood, who in the late 19th century nearly rivaled John McElfatrick in popularity as a theater designer.
The Grand Theatre has had an entire book written about it, “Let’s go to the Grand!,” by Sheila M. F. Johnston.
The Grand Theatre was originally designed by Chicago architect J. M. Wood. James Wood was one of the most prolific American theater architects of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The restored mural on the proscenium arch is by Canadian artist Frederick Challener. The arch, side boxes, and the stage are virtually all that remains of Wood’s original design, the remainder of the building having been completely rebuilt in 1978.
Oh, and the name of the street is North Broadway. North is part of the street name in this case, not just a direction. Google got it right on the Street View image, but not on the map.
The Daly Theatre has been demolished. The L.A. County Assessor’s office says that the store on the corner was built in 1947, and the adjacent building was built in 1968.