Broadway Theatre

Another fire on Broadway damaged the Broadway Theater back in 1943, I think it was. The fire started in an adjacent bowling alley, I believe. The theater was closed for about a year, and the Park Theater, on Upper Broadway, near Robinson Avenue, which had been inactive for several years, was cleaned up and reopened. I remember going to see “Yankee Doodle Dandy” there, for the first time. Since then, I’ve seen it probably close to 100 times. Corny as it is, I love that movie!!!!!

Warren is correct. The building in the photo he linked to might or might not be in Newburgh, but it certainly isn’t the Broadway Theatre. Not only was the Broadway, as restored after the 1943 fire, an Art Moderne building, but it was demolished following the second fire in 1965, so couldn’t have been there to be photographed in 1986.

It’s possible that the building in the photo was not a theater at all. The entrance was awfully narrow for a theater, plus it looks like the side walls had large, factory-style windows in them. It might have originally been a printing plant or some such thing. Whatever its original use, it certainly looks to have been built in the 19th century. The small, moderne marquee and the poster cases at the entrance suggest that it might have been used later as a dance hall, as those frequently had such features.

As for the Broadway Theatre, according to the book “Newburgh: The Heart of the City,” by Patricia A. Favata, the Broadway originally opened on February 28, 1914. The 1965 fire which ended its career took place on September 1.

Patricia Favata’s book says that the damage to the theater from the 1943 fire that destroyed the building next door was primarily water damage. Apparently, the fire burned so hot that the fire department had to keep pouring water on the theater’s roof to prevent it from combusting. The 1943 fire took place on January 22.

The long delay in the restoration and reopening of the theater was probably due to the wartime shortages of materials, and the difficulty in getting permits. As Newburgh was then plentifully supplied with theaters, restoring the Broadway would not have been given a high priority by the Federal officials in charge of such matters.

The building in the photo Warren linked to on April 15, 2009, has finally been identified. In a comment on the Bon Ton Theatre page, Bob Wilson says that it was the old Armory building, at Broadway and Johnston Street. It was not a theater.

Ad from Newburgh News, April 29, 1929, in connection with the opening of Lady of the Pavements with Lupe Vélez, directed by D. W. Griffith.