Capitol Theatre

It should be noted that this building is in the city of West Allis, not Milwaukee, and still stands and while the theatre has been gutted from the building one can go into the 73rd St. side entrance and up stairs to where there is a men’s room in which one finds some of the original balcony steps. The blueprints are still at their city hall and also at the Wis. Architectural Archive downtown in the Central Library in Milwaukee. It was a single balcony design and is filed under: “Greenfield Ave. Theatre.” The 2nd West Allis Post Office was also designed into the building to the rear of the movie palace, and remained until the current WPA one with murals in the lobby was built four blocks westward in 1930. The CAPITOL had a Kilgen pipe organ of unknown specifications at one time. The only style discernable from the prints is a vague Beaux-Arts; it was a modest design; only one dim photo is known to exist of it, and it shows the main facade on the main street of this company town suburb of Milwaukee and the vertical sign rising above the then island box office, so long ago removed. No trace of the theatre remains aside from the odd balcony steps at some points. The dark brown brick was trimmed with limestone, but many years ago white aggragate marble chip panels covered the front windows of the office building.