Orpheum Theatre
122 N. 5th Street,
Springfield,
IL
62703
122 N. 5th Street,
Springfield,
IL
62703
4 people
favorited this theater
Additional Info
Previously operated by: Balaban & Katz Corp., Frisina Amusement Company, Keith-Albee, Orpheum Circuit, Paramount Pictures Inc., RKO
Architects: Edward P. Rupert
Firms: R. Levine & Co.
Previous Names: New Orpheum Theatre, RKO Orpheum Theatre
Nearby Theaters
The New Orpheum Theatre cost approximately $2,000,000 to build, an extraordinary sum of money at that time. The New Orpheum Theatre opened April 27, 1927. It contained 2,764 seats, and the walls were lavishly painted ivory with a background of turquoise, magenta, and gold. A 7 ½ foot-wide chandelier hung on the ceiling. It was equipped with a Barton 3 manual 11 ranks theatre organ which was opened by organist Joe Gibbs Spring. By 1941 the Orpheum Theatre was operated by Paramount Pictures Inc. through their subsidiary John Balaban. Frisina Amusements were the last operators who took over on September 19, 1958.
The last regular program was a 7 days screening of Tommy Kirk in “The Monkey’s Uncle”. Orpheum Theatre was closed on June 30, 1962 with a special premiere screening of James Stewart in “Shenandoah”. The Barton theatre organ was played in 3-slots for the final time by organist Tom Harmon. The instrument was donated to Springfield High School where it still resides in the 2020’s. The Orpheum Theatre was torn down in Fall of 1965 and was replaced by a bank.
Contributed by
P Shaw
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Recent comments (view all 27 comments)
My brother-in-law (David Eugene Punches) was a manager who hired entertainment/celebrities at the Orpheum in the 30’s. I have 30+ signed photos of the great and near great of this time period. Duke ellington, Cab calloway, Rita Rio, Dick Powell, Eddie “Rochester” Anderson, Stephin Fetchit, Harry Black Sr., Faith Bacon,Erskine Hawkins, Etc. Etc.If anyone has any interest of purchasing any of these-let me know-I’ll send a list of what’s available.
Ted Wanack
Peoria,IL
There are three more photos of the Orpheum in this Flickr set.
From YouTube, here is a 57 second clip of Mark Gifford playing the Orpheum’s Barton organ, now installed at Springfield High School.
Don’t want to sound arrogant, but I (Roger Beltz) uploaded the pictures you are seeing on this page (Not P Shaw). I don’t know what happened to the comments that I entered at the time I uploaded this picture. The comments seen below the picture might be that of P Shaw but, as I say, I uploaded the picture and I have this picture licensed under Creative Commons as © All Rights Reserved. It seems that the upload application being used my Cinema Treasures is not working properly.
Roger6: I’m not connected with Cinema Treasures except as an active long-time user familiar with its workings, and I’ve been able to puzzle out some of the features of the new site.
The attribution on this page only means that the theater was added to the database by P Shaw. Your photo attribution is on a different page. Click on the “Photos” link above the picture, or on the photo itself, then click on the thumbnail on the page the link fetches, and that will take you to the page where the photo and the comments you uploaded are displayed (the link to your Flickr page isn’t working, though. I don’t think they’ve worked out all the bugs yet.)
To the right of that photo on its own page it does say that it was uploaded by Roger6. There’s also a box below the photo where viewers can leave comments on the photo itself. Your user name to the right of the photo on that page is also a link, and it will take you to a page where thumbnails of all the photos you upload will be on display.
If you need more detailed information, you’ll have to contact the site’s moderators. The contact email addresses are on a page linked from the “About” page, which in turn is linked in the banner at the top of every page.
April 30th, 1927 grand opening ad in photo section.
1929 photo added courtesy of Patrick Gillespie.
Orpheum Lobby photo added, 1965 photo credit Springfield Rewind facebook page.
37 images of the Orpheum Theatre in this Memories Of Springfield Facebook link. Once on the link, click right to see all the photos.
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1557707147706420&set=g.5159854613&type=1&theater&ifg=1
I have never seen a photo of the large chandelier hanging over the main auditorium. I think it was wrought iron and I also heard that a theater in Chicago bought before the demolition.
The Orpheum Theater’s scale and ambition exceeded what many would have expected for a city the size of Springfield, Illinois. Its execution and transition from vaudeville to motion pictures allowed it to have a 30-year operational lifecycle in that industry. And its ultimate demolition would signal the forthcoming descent of Springfield’s Central Business District.
The Lincoln Square Theatre was announced in 1924 within the second era of lavish movie palaces. Springfield’s population had just topped 60,000 and, with its promising outlook, elevated the project to an upper tier theatre. Its $1.2 million initial budget was well above average for a second generation movie palace of that era in a town of that size. Lesser theaters were being built for not much more than its $50,000 Barton organ price tag. But between conception, opening and path to receivership auction six years after opening, a lot had changed for the Orpheum and Springfield, Illinois - and elsewhere.
The Lincoln Square Building Corp. was chartered and the path looked to be fairly standard for the movie palace in December of 1924. It had purchased 10 downtown properties at just over $325,000 for the Lincoln Square multi-use project with the theatre, 18 commercial sites, offices and more. Edward P. Rupert then delivered the Lincoln Square architectural plans. The project began construction in July of 1925 and the theatre’s direction became cloudy.
The Orpheum Circuit - the leaders in live vaudeville featuring vocal performers - thought that this majestic palace should highlight vaudeville with silent movies a fine second tier accoutrement. So they got involved on the conceptual stage as the demolition needed for the project was underway in 1925. They looked to replace their aged Majestic Theatre nearby.
It’s in this period that the purported budget for the Lincoln Square Theatre elevated to $1.5 million and, at opening, $2 million dollars as the stage and back of house was beefed up for top tier vaudeville. At the same time, Balaban & Katz was being subsumed into Paramount / Lasky, a move that fundamentally shifted the film industry to vertical integration of production, distribution, and exhibition under a few dominant corporate umbrellas. So by the time construction started in 1926, everything was clearer that this would be a top tier vaudeville first / silent films second venue. In fact, the Lincoln Square moniker was ousted in favor of The Orpheum. (Sorry President Lincoln!) The Majestic would be readied as a second tier silent movie grindhouse.
When it opened on April 27, 1927, the Orpheum vaudevillians were prominently featured in the heart of the evening’s lineup after the Star Spangled Banner and opening remarks with film scooted off to the top and bottom of the bill (program in photos). The two existential challenges for the Orpheum Circuit were dead ahead with the birth of sound films highlighted by “The Jazz Singer’s” release less than six months away and the impact of the Great Depression two years later.
Diversification was helpful to the Orpheum project. The Orpheum Amusement Center opened on August 18, 1928 bringing billiards, bowling and other entertainment to what would be considered in the 21st Century as a Family Entertainment Center (FEC). The Orpheum Ballroom opened on November 16, 1929. And all of the retailers including the Orpheum Lunch & Chili Parlor, the Orpheum Shoe Shine and Shoe Repair store, the Orpheum Beauty Shop, the Orpheum Cleaners, and the Orpheum Barber, had opened, as well.
Meanwhile, the Orpheum Circuit was in financial turmoil and merged with the Keith-Albee Circuit to became Keith-Albee-Orpheum (commonly KAO) which led to programmatic changes at theaters all over the United States including the Hippodrome in New York to Springfield, IL. The theatre here was rebranded as The New Orpheum Theatre on February 26, 1928 with a continuous show 11a to 11p grind policy with sound films taking center stage and vaudevillians the undercard. Quite a fall from grace prior to its first anniversary.
The next reorganization took place that October with the creation of the Radio-Keith-Orpheum Circuit and the “new” Orpheum became the RKO Orpheum with an impressive addition to its signage (see photos). But RKO, itself, would head into bankruptcy in January 1933. The result was that the company bolted from long-term lease arrangements contributing to receiverships, foreclosures, and reorganizations nationwide.
On February 27, 1933, Balaban & Katz assumed operational control of the Orpheum as part of Great States Theatres Circuit. The three day reboot featured the Mills Brothers each day. On July 22, 1933, the theatre was in receivership and sold at auction. About fifty bidders showed up and the Orpheum went at the hammer for $147,000 including personal property.
During the Paramount decree of the 1950s, the theatre remained virtually unchanged although under United Paramount Theatre’s subsidiaries B&K Management along with Great States. The theatre got an upgrade allowing for 3D films beginning with “Bwana Devil” in 1953 as movie theaters desperately looked for advantages over its rival of television. United Paramount operated the Orpheum through its end of leasing agreement in mid-September of 1958. Frisina Amusements took over on September 19, 1958.
On February 27, 1962, Marine Bank bought the Orpheum for under $500,000 to build an auto bank. Frisina went out classy with the film “Shenandoah” supported by three performances on the Barton organ by Tom Harmon on June 30, 1962 before it was donated to the local high school which still was operational in the 2020s. Movie palace expert, Cleveland Wrecking, performed a salvage sale before demolition in the Fall of 1965.
In the short term, even had the Orpheum survived beyond 1965, it would have faced growing competition from suburban luxury shopping-center theaters such as the Frisina Springfield Cinema (1967) and the Fox Town and Country (1967) along with newer twin-screen drive-in theaters to say nothing of the White Oaks Mall of the later 1970s. So if remembered at all, the opulent Orpheum should be remembered for surviving the collapse of vaudeville, the advent of sound films, the Great Depression, the beginning of television, and the entire reorganization of the American cinema exhibition industry—only to be halted by an architecturally insignificant auto bank.