Booth Theatre
119 W. Myrtle Street,
Independence,
KS
67301
119 W. Myrtle Street,
Independence,
KS
67301
No one has favorited this theater yet
The Booth Theatre in Independence, Kansas opened 1927 as the only theatre in Independence to be designed specifically to show motion pictures. It was owned by Thomas Booth and designed by the Boller Brothers architecture firm. With seating of 1,100, the Booth opened to a standing room only crowd.
It offered a variety of arts, news, and entertainment as well as its main movie feature. The interior was worth the price of a ticket; and as Mr. Rothafel of Roxy theatre fame once stated, “We sell tickets to the theatre, not the movies”.
The Booth Theatre was in operation until April 20, 1980. A church congregation purchased the theatre and used it for services until 1987. The Booth Theatre Foundation was established in 1991 for the purpose of preserving, restoring and operating the theatre as a performing arts and motion picture playhouse.
As a contributing community member, the theatre will be host to community theatre, recitals, seminars and classic film series. The Booth Theatre was listed on the national register of Historic Places on October 13, 1988.
Reconstruction began in 2007 and is currently underway on the renovation of the first front quarter section of the theatre.
Contributed by
jackie haltom
Want to be emailed when a new comment is posted about this theater?
Just login to your account and subscribe to this theater
Recent comments (view all 5 comments)
An article and photos of the Booth Theater can be found here.
This is a nice 2008 photo.
Here’s the Booth in 1997:
View link
Here is a 1982 photo:
http://tinyurl.com/phpefo
From 2010 photo of the Indepencence Theatre in Independence. [Please click on thumbnails for larger view].