American Theatre

Mr. Harmon any idea who built The American? Did it also play it vaudeville in the 20's? Were Ed Hart or Harry Hart early owners? Did it have a fancy cast iron frotage? Was the Gus Sun Vaudeville troops frequent performers?

The year given for this photo is 1983.

Could the image listed above (by Lost Memory from May 16, 2009) be the Palace Theatre at 224 N. Market Street (see Historic Movie Theatres in Illinois, 1883-1960 by Konrad Schiecke, p. 291) and not the American Theatre at 903 Market Street? It looks this building (the one pictured) still exists and is a Masonic Lodge.

Being there is no plain Market St. in Mt. Carmel and when you map it at 903 N. Market it comes up a CVS pharmacy, if that is the correct address then it is demolished. As far as the photo that LM submitted and the address you give for the photo the Masonic lodge is still there. From a photo on the internet and the address given for the Palace theatre on the internet I would agree with you that the photo posted is of the Masonic Lodge/Palace Theatre. I couldn't find the Palace listed on CT though. Someone with info on the Palace needs to add it. Then the photo can be moved to the proper theatre.

The March 11, 1939, issue of Boxoffice reported that the American Theatre in Mount Carmel had been badly damaged by fire. The item said that a print of the Republic film "Forged Passport" had been destroyed. Owner Theodore Coleman had been vacationing in Florida when the fire took place.

It looks like the theater was only two years old when the fire struck. Boxoffice's survey of construction in the ST. Louis area published on October 16, 1937, lists the New American Theatre, 700 seats, Mt. Carmel, Ill., for Theodore Coleman. Boxoffice gives no details, so I don't know if this was entirely new construction or an alteration of an existing theater.

It apparently took some time for repairs. Boxoffice of July 22, 1939 said that Brenkart projection equipment and an RCA sound system had been purchased for the American Theatre. Boxoffice of September 30, 1939 said that the New American Theatre had recently been outfitted by Ramsey Theatre Supply of St. Louis.

The rebuilt American had an impressive Art Deco facade. A photo of it was featured in a May 25, 1940, Boxoffice article on theater fronts. The photo is here (lower right corner.) The text pertaining to the American is on the following page. It says that the design for the rebuilding was done by St. Louis architect Oliver W. Stiegemeyer.

A March 8, 1947, Boxoffice article about St. Louis's film row said that Theodore Coleman had opened his first theater, the Joy in Mount Carmel, in 1916, when he was 14 years old.

On this site if you go to Mt. Carmel it clearly states that the Masonic Lodge was also the Palace Theatre. So the Photo link that LM posted of for the Masonic Lodge/Palace Tehatre. It says there is no chap[ter there at present.
http://www.ram-il.org/Temples.htm
There is still a diffence in the years of existance from what is listed in the header and what Joe has found.

Multiple references in Boxoffice to the 1937 project as the New American Theatre suggest that there was a previous American Theatre in Mount Carmel, but I've not found any specific references to the earlier theater of that name, nor anything revealing whether the 1937 project was a rebuild of the earlier American or was entirely new construction either on the same site or at a different location. After 1939, the new house is always referred to simply as the American Theatre.

I haven't found any references to the Palace Theatre in Boxoffice at all. The American and the Uptown are the only Mount Carmel theaters it mentions until the Carmel Drive-In shows up in 1950. The Palace might not have operated past the silent era.