Mode Theatre

1937- ten years before I was born, that vertical sign with the accent on the “e” looks exactly the same as I recall it from 1957 to about 1968, when the neon was removed and the theatre became the PUERTO RICO. The letters were hand painted, and the black background was turned white or light yellow. Saw “GOLDFINGER” in English- with Spanish subtitles- to a near empty auditorium. Thanks for posting, Compass.

No, I went to Stockton School at Montrose & Beacon, but I had friends that went to St. Mary’s. I went on to Senn High School & graduated in 1964.

Hi Ken!
I just now discovered your Oct. 6 2010 comment (shouldn’t I have been automatically notified!?) How EXCITING! The prospect of getting a MODE flyer from 1959 / 1960!
Glad to hear that there is advertising for local neighbourhood merchants too! I used to get my flyers at Danny Schwab’s HOT DOG HAVEN on the corner of Sheridan and Damen(?). I’m such a collector – why I didn’t save a MODE flyer is beyond me!?
Please send me the flyer I will reimburse you for your expenidture! Thanks so much!

To KenC,

I am interested in a copy of your Mode flyer. I grew up a few block from the theater in the 1950’s and early 60’s. Great memories. Mom world give me and my brother 27 cents and send us to the Mode. 17 cents for admission and 10 cents for popcorn. That was in the early to mid 50’s. I grew up in Buena Park on Buena where it meets Kenmore, right next door to Rowland Funeral home and across the street from St. Mary’s of the Lake and what we referred to as “The Little Park.” “The Big Park” was down by Wilson & Lake Shore Drive.
If you’re interested I have a picture of the Mode from 1937 that I can have a print made. It was actually from an ad in the Architectural Record from 1937. Thanks.

No. The Riviera is off of Lawrence & Broadway.
If you check the address the Mode was on Sheridan Rd., just South of the Sheridan Red Line elevated stop & Irving Park Rd.
It later was the Festival Theater, which ran XXX films & some live performances.

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I too was stunned when I saw that the Rowland Funeral Home had been torn down. Would have made a great museum dedicated to the history of the neighborhood, if nothing else. There used to be some in-ground, city run swimming pools just West of there. In a quadrant/mini public parks kind of street set-up. Then a new foundation for a building that seemed to never get finished was poured after that. I think there are trees where the pool was now.

There was also a spectacular, massive sized church at the very point where Broadway & Sheridan meet, North almost to Montrose. It too was torn down maybe 1992 or so. I think it was closed long before that though. Alledgedly, Un-Godly type activity had apparently been taking place in some of the church’s many exterior alcoves.

I lived next to L tracks at one time too (Webster near Sheffield over a Chinese laundry and German restaurant), and know what you mean about the noise and the rumbling of the walls. Visited Chicago’s north side last week, and now realize how Sheridan Rd. comes west above Grace St., then turns north; I was thinking it was Irving Park Rd there and that confused me. The gentrification of the Sheridan Rd. and Irving Park Rd. area was impressive – in fact, most of the north side along Broadway and Clark (except for Uptown) I thought really revitalized and beautiful; some buildings I remembered, including my old girlfriend’s apt. house, others more vague but I remembered various ones. I understand now why I couldn’t dream the streets correctly in the area between Fremont St. and the Mode. I liked the parking lot area of the hospital because it opened the skyline behind it on the north side, made it more interesting. What was sad to me was that all along the north side area I visited, I only noticed three theaters, Uptown, Riviera and I went out of my way to see the Century. Just read that the Adelphi was to be torn down (maybe has been done). All those apt. buildings preserved, and most of the movie houses gone. It just boggles the mind as to what the powers that be were thinking – unless it had something to do with taxes (or was a secret pact to destroy old memories of beautiful things?), I do not get it. Chicago is more “toddlin'” now than I ever remember it; vital, aggressive – I don’t comprehend how the theaters were lost…one by one…evidently. (Mumble…mumble)

Hi Scott! Thanks for checking on the Hardward Store and the Grocery under the Sheridan L. From 1959 until 1963, I lived on the 3rd floor of 3934 Sheridan Road – which is the building directly adjacent to the tracks. An L passenger, reaching out of the window of a train, could have shook my hand! Needless to say, it was a very loud apartment! To the immediate south of our building’s entry was a butcher, a barber and Hot Dog Haven on the corner of Dakin. I have some Super 8 footage taken of that area and will put it on YouTube when I have it digitalized. The camera pans from the L station to the corner and then, unfortunately runs out of film before getting to the MODÈ! I’ll be doing some traveling and won’t be back until the end of March – thanks for all the information and memories that you and Sharon have provided me with in the past few days!

I often rode the bus up and down Broadway in this area, to go to church, Uptown, downtown. I don’t know how Broadway appears today, of course, but from Montrose south to Irving Park, my recollection was from about 1956-66 that where the buildings were not “special purpose structures” such as a church, a gas station, an auto dealership, there were many brown buildings with innumerable office or shop spaces at the ground level – for businesses that today would be managed from home, or within box stores and/or malls, or are redundant, i.e. distributors of manufacturing/industrial parts, insurance agencies. Even then, these spaces on these streets seemed to be for a function that had peaked and passed. I think the streets and buildings were already in their second season (or more). Over some of the shops were apartments, I think.

I never really had been able to visualize what that area east of Broadway might have been before the apartments were constructed, so thank you, Scott, for describing the U.S. Marine Hospital, and the Husser house, and giving a broader earlier picture of north Chicago.

Although I don’t work in the field, I have been trained as a real estate appraiser, and I have an interest in buildings and streets being rehabbed or constructed for continuity of style. So many of those buildings could have been encompassed under a continuous style (even though intermixed with other styles), and perhaps through that had a chance to be preserved and rehabbed under a larger umbrella. That way, neighbors might not have to defend each building as to its historical architectural significance. Even back before the time, when the neighborhood switched styles from, say, Belle Arts or Queen Anne/Chicago Craftsman style houses and buildings to Art Moderne in a neighborhood, I don’t think I have ever once heard that residents even thought of resisting developers against tearing down one style and introducing another. They may have liked Art Moderne and were all for it – then. In my day, Mayor Daly controlled every aspect of the city, and there were no residents' rights to speak of that I recall.

I hadn’t heard reference to St. Mary of the Lake in a long time; a friend attended that church.

I “enjoyed” seeing the ROWLAND FUNERAL HOME across the street from St. Mary Of the Lake Church thanks to Scott’s link to compassrose… I didn’t realize, that it was once the Parish Clubhouse! I remember, it had an impressive driveway. I was disapointed that it no longer existed, when I visited my old elementary school last July. Does anyone know what became of St. Mary of the Lake convent? it seems to be a food storage today?! Where are the nuns!? Unfortunately, the day that I was there, the church was closed…

Thank you, Scott. I have glanced at a couple of sites, including the wrecking of the Buena Pres. Church. I would add, that I do indeed remember there were a good many Native Americans in the area in the early ‘60s. At the time I was sensitive to the juxtapositions of style especially on commercial streets and intersections, which could sometimes be disheartening as they began to go into blight, but other streets had continuity of style and the beauty they were designed to evoke was visible. I was aware of “compassrose” but had not studied the links. A friend of mine worked the concession at the Uptown. I would usually go to the early show and talk to the conessionaires as they prepped. It is coming back to me that there were still some large houses and “mansions” just east of Broadway; that there were streets over there with old houses."

Thanks for the links to those sites Scott! They’re great and will keep me busy for quite a while!