Manos Theater
548 Philadelphia Street,
Indiana,
PA
15701
548 Philadelphia Street,
Indiana,
PA
15701
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Originally opened c.1928 as the Ritz Theater, it had been renamed Manos Theater by 1941.
Contributed by
David Stear
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Recent comments (view all 6 comments)
The Manos Theatre on Philadelphia Street in Indiana was destroyed in the early 1980s. I don’t know much about this theatre…I did attend movies there as a child, it was a beautiful theatre and it was a sad day when it was leveled. On the site now is the offices of Indiana County Head Start.
Barry: I was about to ask some folks I just met from Indiana PA about this theatre, but since it was leveled they will only have their personal memories. Too bad as Indiana PA is the homewtown of Jimmy Stewart and Stewart movies could have been shown at that theatre like It’s A Wonderful Life during the holiday season.
The Manos chain was pretty big in Western PA. The Palace in Greensburg has been beautifully restored and has frequent shows. We recently saw Patti Page there. I have a half decent xerox pix of the Manos in Monessen (rebuilt 1948// demolished a few years ago)
This theater was previously known as the Ritz Theater. A Robert-Morton theater organ size 3/8 was installed in the Ritz (Manos) Theater in Indiana, PA in 1928.
1979 photo of the Manos Theatre.
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The photo shows that the Manos Theatre was in a very old building. I would not expect a building of that style to have been built as late as 1928, when the theater organ was installed, and it could have been built as early as the 1900s or 1910s. The auditorium could have been built behind an existing commercial building, of course, but this could also be an earlier theater that has had multiple names.
Arcadia Publishing Company’s book Indiana, Pennsylvania mentions five theater names in the town, but is very short on both details and photos. It doesn’t mention the name Ritz Theatre.
There’s a photo of a theater called the Star, located on 7th Street, which was demolished to make way for a department store in 1915. There’s a photo of the entrance of the Manos Theatre in 1956. There’s a photo of the Indian Theatre from 1936.
Most interesting is a theater called the Globe. There’s a photo apparently depicting the original Globe, built in 1909, which suffered a fire in 1912. The Globe then moved to a different (unspecified) location. The caption says the new Globe was later called the Strand. What I’m wondering is if the Globe/Strand later became the Ritz and then the Manos?
Boxoffice of July 31, 1967, said that the Manos Theatre in Indiana, Pennsylvania, had celebrated its thirtieth anniversary on the 19th of that month, so it must have lost he name Ritz in 1937.