Rjack: There are scans of a large collection of theater industry trade journals at The Internet Archive, and your grandfather is mentioned in several issues. He was an active contributor of capsule movie reviews to the “What the Picture Did for Me” feature of Exhibitors Herald in the early 1920s. I’ve found him mentioned as early as June, 1919, but he must have begun operating the Strand in 1917, as this item appeared in the April 20, 1959, issue of Motion Picture Daily:
“ATLANTA, April 19.-Lane Hebson, for 20 years with Martin Theatres, is the new owner of the Strand Theatre, Alexander City, Ala., having purchased it from Mack Jackson, who had operated the house for 41 years.”
You should be able to find quite a few mentions of your grandfather by Googling his name (in quotes) along with the names of the various trade journals (also in quotes- but just search one journal name at a time.) In addition to Exhibitors Herald he is mentioned several times in the successor publication Motion Picture Herald
and in Film Daily.
The vintage photo uploaded by elmorovivo shows that the Seville was in the same building (or at least on the same site) as the Queen Theatre. The ornate building to the left of the theater can also be seen in the vintage photo on the Queen’s photo page.
There is no street called Main Street in Owensboro, but I believe I have found the location of the Queen Theatre, as the front portion of the ornate building seen next door to it in the vintage photo uploaded by Granola is still standing in the 100 block of W. Third Street.
The site of the Queen is now occupied by part of a glassy, modern bank building to which the remaining portion of the old bank building serves as an entrance. The bank uses the address 100 w. Third, but a Verizon office directly across the street from what was the theater’s lot is at 115 W. Third. I would expect the theater most likely used the address 114 W. Third Street.
The first few seconds of this video, dated 1965, show the marquee of the Art Theatre with Spanish language movies featured on it.
The Art was catering to a Hispanophonic audience at least as early as 1944, when the “Theater Deals” Column of the April 14 issue of The Film Daily reported that T&J Theatres had taken a long term lease on the house and would follow a policy of films in Spanish.
The Art Theatre was mentioned in the January 18, 1921, issue of The Film Daily. At that time it had 1,402 seats.
The Art Deco style Bushnell Memorial Theatre opened on January 13, 1930, and was designed by the New York architectural firm of Corbett, Harrison, & MacMurray, one of the three associated firms that designed Rockefeller Center (Harvey Wiley Corbett and Wallace Kirkman Harrison. I’ve been unable to find MacMurray’s given names.)
The video wouldn’t run for me, but it might be just a video of a high school in Gary anyway. The makers of the video have a YouTube channel, but I’ve been unable to find any among their hundreds of videos that is about the Palace. It would probably be part of their LOSTtoTIME series, and their Playlists page says there are currently 83 videos in that series. I haven’t scrolled through them to see if the theater is there, though I did see their video for the Town Theatre in Highland, Indiana, which I’ve linked on that theater’s page.
YouTube does have a few videos of the Palace by other users, though. Just Google Palace Theatre Gary IN.
The Academy of Music suffered a serious fire sometime around the beginning of 1926. Repairs were underway, according to this item in the January 23 issue of The Moving Picture World:
“SOON TO REOPEN
“The work of repairing the damage done by fire to the Academy of Music in Newburgh is progressing rapidly and it looks as though the house would reopen within a few weeks. The theatre is one of several acquired by the Famous Players, which also has the Bardavon and the Stratford in Poughkeepsie, as well as the second-run Liberty. There is a stiff fight on in Poughkeepsie for patronage between the Famous Players group and another group of three houses run by George Cohen.”
This web page has a few photos of the Academy (click arrow next to visible thumbnails) including a couple showing the aftermath of the 1956 fire that led to the theater’s demolition.
The vintage photo shows the marquee over the bay on the right. The other two bays were probably always storefronts. Except for one suite with an entrance on Third Street, access to the offices in the former auditorium is from a parking lot north of the building.
If you use the address 19 Preakness Shopping Center at Google Maps, the pin icon fetches up exactly in front of the theater entrance, and you can get this street view.
This article from the Farquier Times, February 5, 2017, says that the Farquier Theatre opened on January 10, 1931. Pitts Theatres operated the house until 1969, when the chain was sold to R/C Theaters. The house was closed on May 12, 1974. The auditorium, which backed up to Third Street, was subsequently gutted and filled with three floors of offices.
Boxoffice of February 16, 1970, said that Mid-Atlantic Theatres, new owners of the Pitts-Madison Theatre in Orange, Virginia, which had been in operation since 1936, had closed the house on December 31, 1969, due to lack of business. Mid-Atlantic planned extensive improvements at the Pitts Drive-In, which continued in operation on weekends.
R/C Theatres, of Randallstown, Maryland, had bought the sixteen remaining theaters in the Pitts chain in November, 1969. As far as I’ve been able to discover, Mid-Atlantic was a subsidiary of R/C.
The Pitts Drive-In was still in operation in 1970, when the February 16 issue of Boxoffice reported that extensive improvements were planned by the new owners, the Mid-Atlantic Theatre Corporation. Pitts Theatres had been taken over by R/C Theatres of Randallstown, Maryland, in November, 1969. This page at Drive-Ins.org says that the theater was renamed the Orange Drive-In after being taken over by R/C Theatres, and says that it was closed in 1979. Mid-Atlantic appears to have been a subsidiary of R/C.
Boxoffice of February 16, 1970, reported that Fabian Management Corporation would not be renewing its lease on the Embassy Theatre in Reading, and that the house would be shuttered on March 31.
The east wing of Plymouth Meeting Mall— about a third of the entire center, including this theater— was destroyed by a fire on January 10, 1970. Rebuilding took close to a year, and when the theater reopened on December 25 it was as a twin.
Victor Gruen Associates designed the mall itself, but the firm responsible for designing virtually all of General Cinema’s theaters during this period was William Riseman Associates.
This article from the Baxter Bulletin of May 30, 2014, says that the Evans Theatre opened in 1939, and was located where the Old Tyme Restaurant is today, which is 609 S. Baker Street.
The former theater is now one of two buildings on the block occupied by First Security Bank. I’m not sure what the bank uses this building for, as their retail operation for Mountain Home appears to be in the building across Baker Street, but it might contain offices as the south wall has been fenestrated. The distinctive masonry detailing on the facade is still there, though it is now painted gray.
In early 1909, E. H. Martin’s son bought the Unique Theatre. A few months later the July 3 issue of The Improvement Bulletin reported that E.H.Martin had begun construction on a new building for the Unique Theatre. As there is no evidence that the Unique ever moved from its original location, I suspect that this project became the first Orpheum instead.
The project was designed by J. R. White, Webster City’s best known architect of the period, who had designed the Martin Telephone Company building in 1904. As Martin had hired White to design at least two projects prior to building the second Orpheum, it seems likely that he would have hired White for that job as well, though I haven’t found documentation that he did. Although the second Orpheum is more ornate than the first, the two buildings have certain elements in common, most notably the oblong, horizontal clerestory windows near the top of each facade.
This article from the January 19, 2016, issue of Webster City’s paper, The Daily Freeman-Journal has a fairly detailed history of the Isis Theatre. A. C. Schuneman bought a half interest in the Isis in 1912, and eventually became sole owner. He sold the house to Finklestein Theatres in early 1931.
Although the theater was dismantled in 1954, the building is still standing, the front portion housing a hearing aid center and the rear occupied by seating for the restaurant next door, the Second Street Emporium. The 1990 restaurant expansion included a small banquet facility called The Isis Room, which displays photos of the theater.
The reopening of the rebuilt Isis following the January, 1927, fire was on June 11, 1927.
A new organ was installed in the Isis Theatre in 1917, as noted in this item from the March 3 issue of The Moving Picture World:
“Webster City, Ia. — A. C. Schuneman, of the Isis theater in Webster City, is installing a new organ in his theater at a cost of $10,000. This theater will open about the 1st of March with Clara Kimball Young in ‘The Common Law.’”
Schuneman was manager of the Isis at least as early as 1914, when he and the theater were mentioned in the February 10 issue of the Webster City Freeman:
“Pictures of Real War.
“Manager A. C. Schunaman [sic] of the Isis theater states that he expects soon to have moving pictures of actual warfare taken in northern Mexico. These films have been widely written of and are taken by the Mutual Film company, whose president made an agreement with General Villa, head of the rebel army in northern Mexico, whereby they are to be taken of the campaign waged against Huerta’s forces and even on the march to Mexico City, if Villa gets that far south. The first batch of films have been received in this country and it is expected that in a week or so will be released to jobbers, who will book them and Mr. Schunaman hopes to be able to get the first group of films for Webster City.”
Schuneman’s career as manager of the Isis lasted at least into 1929, when he was named in an item in the April 13 issue of Motion Picture News listing movie houses that had recently installed sound equipment. The installation at the Isis was a sound-on-disc system.
This web page has a history of the State Theatre. Construction began in late 1926 and was completed in 1927. The theater and the adjoining Abbott Building were designed by Edwyn Alfred Bowd and Orlie J. Munson of the Lansing architectural firm the Bowd-Munson Company. The Abbott Building survived the theater by more than three decades, finally being demolished in October, 2017, after having been vacant for about ten years.
The October 28, 1930, issue of The State Journal said that the Colonial Theatre had originally operated for several weeks under the name People’s Theatre. The promoters of the project, strapped for funds, had decamped shortly before the house was to open, and Charles Clark, the contractor who had built it for them, rather than let it sit idle, opened and operated it himself as the People’s Theatre while he sought a permanent operator. Two local men, Charles H. Davis and John M. Wilson, leased the house and renamed it the Colonial Theatre.
The same issue of the newspaper carries a courtesy ad from the local Bowd-Munson Company, architects with offices in the Wilson Building, so that must have been the firm that drew the plans for remodeling the Colonial into the Lansing Theatre. Edwyn Alfred Bowd and Orlie J. Munson also designed the State Theatre in East Lansing.
Rjack: There are scans of a large collection of theater industry trade journals at The Internet Archive, and your grandfather is mentioned in several issues. He was an active contributor of capsule movie reviews to the “What the Picture Did for Me” feature of Exhibitors Herald in the early 1920s. I’ve found him mentioned as early as June, 1919, but he must have begun operating the Strand in 1917, as this item appeared in the April 20, 1959, issue of Motion Picture Daily:
You should be able to find quite a few mentions of your grandfather by Googling his name (in quotes) along with the names of the various trade journals (also in quotes- but just search one journal name at a time.) In addition to Exhibitors Herald he is mentioned several times in the successor publication Motion Picture Herald and in Film Daily.The vintage photo uploaded by elmorovivo shows that the Seville was in the same building (or at least on the same site) as the Queen Theatre. The ornate building to the left of the theater can also be seen in the vintage photo on the Queen’s photo page.
There is no street called Main Street in Owensboro, but I believe I have found the location of the Queen Theatre, as the front portion of the ornate building seen next door to it in the vintage photo uploaded by Granola is still standing in the 100 block of W. Third Street.
The site of the Queen is now occupied by part of a glassy, modern bank building to which the remaining portion of the old bank building serves as an entrance. The bank uses the address 100 w. Third, but a Verizon office directly across the street from what was the theater’s lot is at 115 W. Third. I would expect the theater most likely used the address 114 W. Third Street.
The first few seconds of this video, dated 1965, show the marquee of the Art Theatre with Spanish language movies featured on it.
The Art was catering to a Hispanophonic audience at least as early as 1944, when the “Theater Deals” Column of the April 14 issue of The Film Daily reported that T&J Theatres had taken a long term lease on the house and would follow a policy of films in Spanish.
The Art Theatre was mentioned in the January 18, 1921, issue of The Film Daily. At that time it had 1,402 seats.
The Art Deco style Bushnell Memorial Theatre opened on January 13, 1930, and was designed by the New York architectural firm of Corbett, Harrison, & MacMurray, one of the three associated firms that designed Rockefeller Center (Harvey Wiley Corbett and Wallace Kirkman Harrison. I’ve been unable to find MacMurray’s given names.)
The restored NorShor Theatre reopened as a live performance venue on February 1, 2018.
Here is the official web site.
Here is video of the Town Theatre shortly before its demolition.
The video wouldn’t run for me, but it might be just a video of a high school in Gary anyway. The makers of the video have a YouTube channel, but I’ve been unable to find any among their hundreds of videos that is about the Palace. It would probably be part of their LOSTtoTIME series, and their Playlists page says there are currently 83 videos in that series. I haven’t scrolled through them to see if the theater is there, though I did see their video for the Town Theatre in Highland, Indiana, which I’ve linked on that theater’s page.
YouTube does have a few videos of the Palace by other users, though. Just Google Palace Theatre Gary IN.
The Academy of Music suffered a serious fire sometime around the beginning of 1926. Repairs were underway, according to this item in the January 23 issue of The Moving Picture World:
This web page has a few photos of the Academy (click arrow next to visible thumbnails) including a couple showing the aftermath of the 1956 fire that led to the theater’s demolition.The vintage photo shows the marquee over the bay on the right. The other two bays were probably always storefronts. Except for one suite with an entrance on Third Street, access to the offices in the former auditorium is from a parking lot north of the building.
If you use the address 19 Preakness Shopping Center at Google Maps, the pin icon fetches up exactly in front of the theater entrance, and you can get this street view.
This article from the Farquier Times, February 5, 2017, says that the Farquier Theatre opened on January 10, 1931. Pitts Theatres operated the house until 1969, when the chain was sold to R/C Theaters. The house was closed on May 12, 1974. The auditorium, which backed up to Third Street, was subsequently gutted and filled with three floors of offices.
Boxoffice of February 16, 1970, said that Mid-Atlantic Theatres, new owners of the Pitts-Madison Theatre in Orange, Virginia, which had been in operation since 1936, had closed the house on December 31, 1969, due to lack of business. Mid-Atlantic planned extensive improvements at the Pitts Drive-In, which continued in operation on weekends.
R/C Theatres, of Randallstown, Maryland, had bought the sixteen remaining theaters in the Pitts chain in November, 1969. As far as I’ve been able to discover, Mid-Atlantic was a subsidiary of R/C.
The Pitts Drive-In was still in operation in 1970, when the February 16 issue of Boxoffice reported that extensive improvements were planned by the new owners, the Mid-Atlantic Theatre Corporation. Pitts Theatres had been taken over by R/C Theatres of Randallstown, Maryland, in November, 1969. This page at Drive-Ins.org says that the theater was renamed the Orange Drive-In after being taken over by R/C Theatres, and says that it was closed in 1979. Mid-Atlantic appears to have been a subsidiary of R/C.
Boxoffice of February 16, 1970, reported that Fabian Management Corporation would not be renewing its lease on the Embassy Theatre in Reading, and that the house would be shuttered on March 31.
The east wing of Plymouth Meeting Mall— about a third of the entire center, including this theater— was destroyed by a fire on January 10, 1970. Rebuilding took close to a year, and when the theater reopened on December 25 it was as a twin.
Victor Gruen Associates designed the mall itself, but the firm responsible for designing virtually all of General Cinema’s theaters during this period was William Riseman Associates.
The Morgan Theatre was on the northwest corner of S. Main and W. 7th Street. The site is now part of a public plaza.
This article from the Baxter Bulletin of May 30, 2014, says that the Baxter Theatre opened on January 3, 1948, and closed on December 21, 1978.
This article from the Baxter Bulletin of May 30, 2014, says that the Evans Theatre opened in 1939, and was located where the Old Tyme Restaurant is today, which is 609 S. Baker Street.
The former theater is now one of two buildings on the block occupied by First Security Bank. I’m not sure what the bank uses this building for, as their retail operation for Mountain Home appears to be in the building across Baker Street, but it might contain offices as the south wall has been fenestrated. The distinctive masonry detailing on the facade is still there, though it is now painted gray.
In early 1909, E. H. Martin’s son bought the Unique Theatre. A few months later the July 3 issue of The Improvement Bulletin reported that E.H.Martin had begun construction on a new building for the Unique Theatre. As there is no evidence that the Unique ever moved from its original location, I suspect that this project became the first Orpheum instead.
The project was designed by J. R. White, Webster City’s best known architect of the period, who had designed the Martin Telephone Company building in 1904. As Martin had hired White to design at least two projects prior to building the second Orpheum, it seems likely that he would have hired White for that job as well, though I haven’t found documentation that he did. Although the second Orpheum is more ornate than the first, the two buildings have certain elements in common, most notably the oblong, horizontal clerestory windows near the top of each facade.
This article from the January 19, 2016, issue of Webster City’s paper, The Daily Freeman-Journal has a fairly detailed history of the Isis Theatre. A. C. Schuneman bought a half interest in the Isis in 1912, and eventually became sole owner. He sold the house to Finklestein Theatres in early 1931.
Although the theater was dismantled in 1954, the building is still standing, the front portion housing a hearing aid center and the rear occupied by seating for the restaurant next door, the Second Street Emporium. The 1990 restaurant expansion included a small banquet facility called The Isis Room, which displays photos of the theater.
The reopening of the rebuilt Isis following the January, 1927, fire was on June 11, 1927.
A new organ was installed in the Isis Theatre in 1917, as noted in this item from the March 3 issue of The Moving Picture World:
Schuneman was manager of the Isis at least as early as 1914, when he and the theater were mentioned in the February 10 issue of the Webster City Freeman:Schuneman’s career as manager of the Isis lasted at least into 1929, when he was named in an item in the April 13 issue of Motion Picture News listing movie houses that had recently installed sound equipment. The installation at the Isis was a sound-on-disc system.This web page has a history of the State Theatre. Construction began in late 1926 and was completed in 1927. The theater and the adjoining Abbott Building were designed by Edwyn Alfred Bowd and Orlie J. Munson of the Lansing architectural firm the Bowd-Munson Company. The Abbott Building survived the theater by more than three decades, finally being demolished in October, 2017, after having been vacant for about ten years.
The October 28, 1930, issue of The State Journal said that the Colonial Theatre had originally operated for several weeks under the name People’s Theatre. The promoters of the project, strapped for funds, had decamped shortly before the house was to open, and Charles Clark, the contractor who had built it for them, rather than let it sit idle, opened and operated it himself as the People’s Theatre while he sought a permanent operator. Two local men, Charles H. Davis and John M. Wilson, leased the house and renamed it the Colonial Theatre.
The same issue of the newspaper carries a courtesy ad from the local Bowd-Munson Company, architects with offices in the Wilson Building, so that must have been the firm that drew the plans for remodeling the Colonial into the Lansing Theatre. Edwyn Alfred Bowd and Orlie J. Munson also designed the State Theatre in East Lansing.