Dale Theatre
189 W. 231st Street,
Bronx,
NY
10463
189 W. 231st Street,
Bronx,
NY
10463
1 person
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I was there when the bomb went off during Cactus Flower. I was about 10: it never stopped me from going back for many years. They used to have Disney double features there during the summers.
I was also there when they started showing Midnight Movies, they showed The Rolling Stones – I think it was “Sympathy for the Devil ( bad choice ) there was a riot and the screen was damaged and the little box office out front vandalized.
The Dale Theatre was under construction when it was mentioned in Boxoffice, July 3, 1937. Later issues indicate an opening sometime between August and October that year. It was built for Harry Brandt.
Looking at the photos linked in the previous two comemnts, I fancy the Dale has a strong similarity to the Kent Theatre that was opened in Brooklyn during the same era. Harry Brandt was a partner in the Kent Theatre, which was designed by Charles Sandblom. Could the Dale be another Sandblom design? Boxoffice isn’t telling.
Five years later and the taxi cabs are still there in this 1978 photo.
A great old photo
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This site has the ability to list multiple uses for a former theater building so we might as well take advantage of it. Some people might be interested in knowing what the building is currently being used for without making a trip there to find out. The more information, the better.
Wouldn’t it be easier to just say “Non-theatrical” for the function?
It seems that the furniture warehouse, the diner and bingo all share the same address. The function above should include all three.
Louie’s Dale Diner
189 W 231st St, Bronx, NY 10463
231 Street Bingo Incorporated
189 W 231ST St, Bronx, NY 10463
S & S Furniture Discount
189 W 231 St, Bronx NY 10463
Nice catch, Ken! Thanks for sharing, and keep ‘em coming!
Here is a photo taken off of Google maps:
http://tinyurl.com/5pngb2
The circa 1941 photo is here.
A circa 1941 photo can be seen here.
“The Moon is Blue” was famous because it was one of the first major films to go out without the MPAA Seal.
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It closed around late 1993. I was a high school student from the nearby JFK High School and the last movie I saw there was “Needful Things” around the time. I remember watching “Batman”, “Passenger 57”, “Terminator 2: Judgement Day”, “Ghostbusters II”, and “Rapid Fire”
NYC records show a motion picture theater at this address in 1993. Theater one seating is 238 and theater two seating is 262. In 1995 it is no longer listed as a motion picture theater so it probably closed around 1994.
There was a bomb explosion in the Dale Theater as well as in the Loew’s Paradise on the Grand Concourse [188th St]. The bombs went off within minutes of one another at about 9:30 PM. The Dale was showing Cactus Flower – the Loew’s showed the Liberation of L. B. Jones. 10 people were injured at the Dale – where the more serious of the explosions occurred – one at the Loew’s. There was an article in the NY Times on 3 May 1970 entitled: Bronx Bombing Scored by Mayor. The NY Daily News had a picture of a local Catholic grammar school teacher being carried out by two firemen. He taught at St. John’s on Godwin Terrace.
I’ve been out of the area since 1991 – I am surprise to here from the above account that the place was bombed again in the 1990s.
I was eleven at the time and back then there were rumors of it being a targeted attack. I’ve done some digging lately out of curiosity and had been unaware of the second bomb at the Loew’s Paradise. Was that the theater right on the Concourse with the grat clock and steam driven figures [St George and the dragon] and the great ceiling similiar to Grand Central Station?
I remember the Dale Theatre quite well as a child in the 50’s and early sixties. You see, my father was it’s daytime projectionist. I must have seen hundreds of double features there. I was always fascinated by the carbon arc lighting and how my dad was able to switch from one projector to the other when a reel of film ran out (there were 2 holes popped out seconds apart in the top right hand corner of the film frame.)
Recently I was given a projectionists view of the largest multi screen theatre (15) and was blown away. Each film is now one huge reel instead of four and it is now placed horizontally like a pancake instead of vertically. Instead of 2 side by side for one film there are fifteen of them side by side. My dad would have loved to see how this medium evolved.
A dear friend of mine, whose name I will mention, patronized the Dale one evening in the 90’s. A small bomb exploded in a seat in the row in front of him causing him to be seriously injured in the foot and leg. He was fortunate that he wasn’t injured worse or killed. The event was in the papers. I believe it caused by some Latin American politcal terrorists. Soon after my friend’s unfortunate incident the Dale closed.
Images from September 2002 can be found here:
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You’re right, YankeeMike; I remember as well the Dale being twinned, not tripled.
I believe it was twinned. I saw some movies there in the late 80’s. The afternoon shows cost 4 dollars.
I may be wrong about this, but wasn’t the Dale twinned or triplexed at some point?
The Dale! I’d been trying to remember that name, but had confused it with the Beverly and the Valentine, which it certainly was not. Located near the RKO Marble Hill, it showed subsequent-run product that had made its way through the Loew’s and RKO chains. I remember it from the late ‘50s and early ‘60s, when it also showed a fair amount of classic revivals and some foreign films. It never really competed for the latter with the wonderful Heights on W. 181 Street, but still it offered enough off-beat fare to attract the Riverdale crowd. (Um, I guess it got its name from the “Dale†in “Riverdale�) It had an attractively blue-draped, softly lit design, with a properly proportioned widescreen that was rare in small theaters whose proscenium was usually too narrow for post-’53 technology. You could see the marquee from the elevated B’way IRT train, often the best way to find out what was playing since the theater did not advertise in the NY Times. I went there with friends from school chiefly for the revivals, which were otherwise unavailable in the pre-VCR, pre-DVD era.
The Dale had 590 seats, according to the 1942 Film Daily Year Book.