Queen Theater
1096 North 2nd Street,
Abilene,
TX
79601
1096 North 2nd Street,
Abilene,
TX
79601
1 person
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The Queen Theater dates back to at least 1925. It was still operating in 1951.
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Lost Memory
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The Queen Theater actually dates back to at least 1916 when a Moller theater organ opus 2071 was installed. In 1925 a Reuter theater organ opus 172 size 2/6 was installed in the Queen Theater.
Lost Memory, I dug the Newspaperarchive.com and found that it was closed by Interstate in 1966 when the Westwood opened.
The Queen closed after a fire in 1938. A local paper announced the re-opening in September 1938:
http://tinyurl.com/ksyldx
That should have been 1935 for the fire, then the re-opening three years later.
I’m shocked that it wasn’t destroyed.
Here is the accompanying article, which notes that the architect was David S. Castle.
http://tinyurl.com/kshlm7
http://tinyurl.com/mb6r6b
http://tinyurl.com/mngsqw
http://tinyurl.com/lb3fcl
http://tinyurl.com/ma8r4c
http://tinyurl.com/lpwnc2
http://tinyurl.com/mlzhdo
http://tinyurl.com/mx8w2j
http://tinyurl.com/nytfrk
Too bad that article was saved.
The caption of this photo says that the truck is parked in front of the Queen Theatre. The photo looks to be from the 1920s. Although there appear to be movie posters on the front of the building with the arches, the Queen was actually in the building to the left, only half seen in this photo. This was probably the original 1916 facade of the building.
After the reopening of the house in 1938, it looked like this (though the undated photo appears to have been taken in a later year.) The windows on the second floor had been bricked up, but the brackets under the cornice are recognizable.
A still later photo is dated 1960, but the movie being advertised was released in 1956. The decorative details of the facade are barely visible, perhaps because this is a night shot, or perhaps because they have been covered by another coat of paint.
Still, the theater’s front appears to have looked about the same throughout its history, except for the addition of a modern marquee, probably in 1938. Any significant changes that resulted from the remodeling done that year, designed by architect David S. Castle, must have been on the interior.
Little detail is visible in this photo of the Queen’s auditorium, but it’s bright enough to reveal that the house had a stadium seating section. The photo is dated 1960.