Lyric Theater
604 W. Walnut Street,
Louisville,
KY
40203
604 W. Walnut Street,
Louisville,
KY
40203
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Street name has been changed to Muhammad Ali Blvd.
This is from Wikipedia:
Lyric Theater 604 W. Walnut Street.
Closed. One of four theatres open to blacks before desegregation. In 2003, proposed to have it’s name live on as a youth center to be called the Grand Lyric Theatre. Closed by the late 1980s, part of the Walnut Street corridor, a center of a black-owned businesses and entertainment venues.
The Lyric was open and showing sub-run double features on 4/17/60, according to the Louisville Courier-Journal of that date.
Walnut St. in Louisville is now Muhammad Ali Blvd. This was a part of the Walnut St. Corridor, in its heyday the center of black-owned businesses and entertainment, “heart of Louisville’s African-American culture”.
The Lyric theater in Lexington, KY had a relatively short life. The Art Deco styled Lyric Theater in Lexington opened on December 10, 1948 at a cost of a quarter of a million dollars. The Lyric Theater in Lexington closed in 1963.
Ken….If you have any other info on this Lyric theater, you can add this one too. The Lyric Theater located in the Welch Building at 116-118 East Main Street Scottsville, KY. No specific opening date given, but it did operate in the 40’s and part of the 50’s. On November 19, 1957 the Lyric burned down after the furnace exploded. It showed three different movies a week plus cartoons. Seating is listed as 600.
How about another Lyric Theater on East Main Street in Scottsville, Ky.
Thats fine with me Ken. I did find some info on this Lyric Theater. It is very similar to the Lyric in Lexington. In the 1950’s this Lyric was located in an African-American neighborhood. This Lyric also showed movies and live performances. The singing group “The Dominoes” set a box office record at this theater in 1952. Nat “King” Cole also appeared at this theater in the 50’s. Walnut Street is now known as Muhammed Ali Boulevard. I will post more info as I find it.
My Film Daily Yearbooks, 1941 and 1950 list the Lyric Theatre, Louisville as being a Negro theatre.
lostmemory;
I will add the Lyric Theater, Lexington, KY as a new theatre on this database and include your details given above. OK.
I was trying to find some info on this Lyric Theater and instead I found another Lyric Theater in Kentucky. Maybe I need a new search engine. :) Anyway, I found a Lyric theater in Lexington Kentucky.
“The Art Deco style of the Lyric Theater and its marquee lit up the corner of Third and DeWeese streets for part of the 20th century. A leading entertainment center in the African-American community, the Lyric hosted first-run films, black films, and entertainers like the Temptations, Cab Calloway, Duke Ellington, Sarah Vaughn, Ella Fitzgerald, the Ink Spots, and Redd Foxx. The Lyric’s decline began with the integration of Lexington’s other theaters, and it closed in the late 1960s. The property is now part of a dispute between a private owner and Lexington-Fayette Urban County Government, which seeks to condemn it in order to bring the property into the public domain and restore it to usefulness in the community”.