Columbia Music Hall

Photos and additional information are found here:
http://tinyurl.com/2d2mr9

This is an article about the fire. Photos included.

1979 photo of the Columbia Theatre.
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1979 night photo of the Columbia Theatre.
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This article was in the Portsmouth Times in February 1937:

Considerable damage was caused by floodwaters at the three Warner Bros.' theaters here and the Garden theater. The Columbia theater lost all equipment such as seats and carpeting. Damage to the Lyric Theater was confined to the decorations. Decorations at the Garden theater were damaged end a new sound machine is replacing the one damaged by floodwaters. Some seats at the LaRoy theater were lost and the carpeting on the mezzanine floor was damaged.

Work of cleaning out and renovating the theaters was started with the recession of the high water. The Garden theater has scheduled its opening for Sunday. Work at the Lyric theater is progressing rapidly, but it will be several days before the theater will be opened to the public. J. Knox Strachan, manager of the LaRoy theater, said none of the Warner Bros:' theaters will be opened for several days in order that they can be renovated and completely dried out. New equipment will be bought for the Columbia theater and the damaged equipment at the LaRoy theater will be replaced.

Scaffolding was built at the Columbia theater for the seating equipment, but the water went beyond a 70-foot stage, which the scaffolding had been built to protect, and all the equipment was damaged. The scaffolding fell in the front part of the theater, water stood within a few inches of the ceiling. Equipment of the LaRoy theater was stored on the mezzanine floor and in the balcony, but water reached the mezzanine, flooding it about a foot and a half deep.

The three Warner theaters, the Garden theater and the New Westland theater recently spent considerable sums to renovate and redecorate their interiors. The Westland already has reopened.