Evergreen Theatre
926 Seneca Avenue,
Ridgewood,
NY
11385
926 Seneca Avenue,
Ridgewood,
NY
11385
1 person
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The Evergreen Theatre had a relatively short life. It was built in 1911 near the corner of Myrtle and Seneca Avenues in the Ridgewood section of Queens. It was originally opened as the Evergreen Airdrome, and was an open-air theater. Two years later, in 1913, the Evergreen Theatre was built right next to the Airdrome. Two years later, the Evergreen Theatre was enlarged.
The owners of the Evergreen Theatre also built and operated the Van Cortlandt Airdrome at corner of Van Cortlandt Avenue (now 71st Avenue) and Myrtle Avenue. The Van Cortlandt was never expanded beyone an open air theater.
It is not clear whether the Evergreen Airdrome and Evergreen Theatre operated at the same time. But there were two seperate screens, one in the theater and one in the open air theater. It is doubtful that anything beyond silent movies played there. My opinion is that when they built the Evergreen Theatre in 1913 at the corner of Myrtle and Seneca, they disconinued the use of the Evergreen Airdrome adjacent to it.
In late 1921 the Evergreen Theater was sold and soon after, the building was razed.
Contributed by
Chris
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Recent comments (view all 109 comments)
I can’t tell from that photo if the tree is located on top of the sign or on the corner of the roof. There appears to be an alley or walkway between the theater and the bank building. There is no space between the current building and the bank today. If the current building is the first floor from the former theater, the building must have been widened, at least in the front.
I don’t know how big that area between the bank and the theater was. It could have been along the whole property, or it may just have been a few feet in from the sidewalk to an emergency exit or something. But in any event, chances are slim that the first floor of the supermarket is the first floor of the Evergreen. If anything, it could be, as well as the basement, but there’s no way to tell for sure.
Was this the theater that had the roof cave in in a snowstorm? Wasn’t there also a fire?
Tha area between the bank and the theater could have been used as an emergency exit. I don’t know anything about a snowstorm Bway. If you read the comment above by mrbillyc, he explains that a fire destroyed the building in the 1950s and Bohack was built as a new building.
There’s a story and photo of the Evergreen in this weeks Timesnewsweekly in the “Neighborhood” section. The online version of the should be online in about a week.
I looked through the online edition of “Our Neighborhood” but didn’t see anything about the Evergreen.
That’s very strange, as I remember the article. The photo showed the Evergreen next to the Bank building.
Here are the 2009 archives Bway. Maybe I overlooked something.
I looked at he archives too. I remember the article in print….
Many newspapers don’t include everything from the print version in the online version. Looks like the Times Newsweekly has adopted that policy. Was it the same photo that was in the anniversary edition?
Yes, I think it was. Some of the weeks don’t have a “neighborhood” section on the online directory, so I think what you said may be the case.