Strand Theatre
State Street,
Schenectady,
NY
12305
State Street,
Schenectady,
NY
12305
2 people
favorited this theater
The Strand Theatre, located on State Street, with a secondary entrance at 162 Barrett Street, is notable for being the first Schenectady movie house to screen a “talking picture”, Al Jolson’s “The Jazz Singer” in December of 1927. The Strand Theatre is listed as open with seating for 1,300 in the 1945 Film Daily Yearbook.
Any further information on the Strand Theatre would be appreciated.
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Bryan
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Recent comments (view all 5 comments)
The Strand Theatre was originally called the Barcil, built in 1921, because it was located between Barrett and Clinton streets. It was extensively remodelled and reopend as the Strand on September 4, 1931.
When I was in high school in the 1950’s, the Strand was owned by a gentleman named Rapp, whose son Harvey went to school with me.
Sometime in the early 1950’s my parents drove us from Lowell,Mass. to Schenectady to visit with a couple they knew. To fill our evening ,so the adults could have grownup conversations ,they dropped us off at The Strand Th. It was a double bill and the picture we saw on entered was ,“It Came From Beneath The Sea”….I was 10 years old my kid brother was only 7. During the screening the projectionist must have forgotten to adjust the audio level on one projector, for as the screen creature emerged from San Fransisco Bay there was a tremendous ear splitting sound effect(much louder then the film was intended to produce). I screamed like a four old girl,it scared me so. Now ,(I was a boy )so I had two reactions, first embarrasment for being a wimp and secondly I feared if my brother told my parents the film scared me, they might never let us venture out to cinema again. We flash ahead to the present(55 years later), last week I took home from our Library a DVD of ,“It Came From Beneath The Sea”, a Ray Harryhousen epic and laughed myself silly. How in hell could I ever have been terrorised by this film????? Well the foolishness of youth, I guess. Sorry I didn’t really share my observations about your theater interior, but the film is mostly what I remember all these years later.
I worked with a gentleman named Lou Rapp at the Towne Theater in Latham NY. He had a lot of proud stories about the different theaters he managed in Schenectady. He even named his dogs Roxi. I believe Harvey was his brother
This was actually on State Street (Main is a very short street in a residential area). But all indications from google photos are that the Proctor’s is the only theater remaining on State St. Looks demolished.