The Google map and street view I’m currently seeing on this page are miles and miles from the actual location of the Wakefield Opera House. I tired to link to a corrected view at Google Maps but it wouldn’t cooperate, so here is the correct location from Bing Maps. Unfortunately this is one of the places Bing Maps doesn’t have a good 360-degree bird’s-eye view available.
The Cinema Data Project has a page for the Empire Theatre. It has numerous snippets about the theater’s history, and one long excerpt from a 1991 article from the Manchester Historical Association, which includes this information:
“The Empire Theatre, Massabesic St., Manchester NH was operated by Delbert E. Smith and Earl C. Thompson who formed a partnership October 1913, renting a building from Andrew Bruno. Smith, who worked for the telephone company, supervised the theatre operation and Thompson kept the books…The first show was 15 Dec 1913, admission 5 cents for all at all shows.”
The grand opening of the Regal Natomas Marketplace 16 was to take place on August 20, 1999, according to the August 17 issue of Sacramento Business Journal. The Natomas Marketplace complex, including the theater building, was designed by the local firm LPAS Architecture + Design, though Regal undoubtedly brought in a firm specializing in cinemas to design the theater interior.
I’m not sure how long the Astor operated on a regular basis, but at least as late as early 1931 it was still capable of mounting shows and showing movies. The January 2, 1931, issue of The Troy Times had an ad for the Astor’s run of an Earl Carroll production called Unguarded Girls, touted as “A Gripping—Thought-Compelling Stage and Film Attraction Every Adult Should See.”
The shows were continuous from 1 to 5 and 7 to 11. In between they probably gave the “Special Performances for Male Adults Only” that the ad noted. All seats were 50c.
Chris is correct. The Palace Theatre was not in the building at 606 Main Street now occupied by the Magenta Theatre. This web page shows a very early photo of the Palace, and gives the address as 605 Main Street. The building is still standing, and the theater entrance is now occupied by the zoomNet Postal + store. The Palace opened on February 10, 1909, according to this page at HistoryLink.
The 1909 photo is earlier than the photo we currently have on this page, which probably dates from around 1913, but although the front of the theater was redesigned during that time it is the same building, as can be seen by the stairs at right leading down to the basement then occupied by the New Palace Billiard Hall.
This web page about the Odd Fellows Hall says that the Romanesque Revival style building was designed by architects Pugh & Gray (Walter D. Pugh and John Gray.) During its early years the theater was listed in the Cahn guides as the Grand Opera House.
The IOOF maintained its quarters in the building until 1995, long after the theater had closed. The building was placed on the NRHP in 1988. This PDF contains the NRHP nomination form, with a detailed description of the building and its history. The house showed movies as early as 1911, though live events were presented throughout the theater’s history. In the 1970s, the original stage (which had lost the upper part of its fly loft to an expansion of the third-floor IOOF lodge in 1936) was removed and replaced with a wrestling ring. The stage was reinstalled in the 1980s as part of a failed effort to convert the Grand into a venue for the Salem Theater of Performing Arts.
The original interior of the house by Walter D. Pugh was largely destroyed in an extensive 1935 remodeling by architect James W. DeYoung, which included an extension of the balcony and the addition of some Art Deco design elements to the interior. In 1928, DeYoung and his then-partner Knud Roald had served as supervising architects for the construction of the Rapp & Rapp-designed Paramount Theatre in Portland, and that commission led to several other theater commissions for DeYoung, including the Grand remodeling.
The Palace Theatre had not been demolished when Google’s street view camera last passed by, nor when the satellite view currently displayed was made. As far as I know it is still standing today. The building runs along the east side of Coal Street, stretching the entire block from Bertsch Street to Patterson Street. Google Maps shows only the view from Patterson Street, where the large stage house sits. Half a dozen photos from the John Lewis collection, including views of the entrance, can be found on this page at CinemaTour.
The location, as well as the size and shape of the building and its architectural details, which include a tapestry brick front, very popular in the late 1910s and early 1920s, indicate that the Palace Theatre was this project noted in the “Contracts Awarded” column of the July 1, 1922, issue of The American Contractor:
“Theater & Hall Bldg.: $100,000. 3 sty. 50x150. Coal & Patterson sts., Lansford, Pa. Archt. John T. Simpson, Essex bldg., Newark. Owner Panther Valley Amusement Co., Vincent Quinn, pres., Lansford. Brk., limestone trim. Gen. contr.. mas. & carp. wk. let to King Lumber Co., Charlottesville, Va.”
John T. Simpson was licensed as both an architect and engineer. He established an architectural practice in Newark in 1913, but had been an engineer prior to that. Judging from the notices in various trade journals of the period he specialized primarily in school buildings. The Palace might have been his only theater project.
An article in the August 8, 2001, issue of Allentown daily The Morning Call said that it would be at least a month before the remains of the former Victoria Theatre in Lansford would be removed. The theater building, long used for the storage of automobile tires, had partly collapsed on July 13 that year.
The article said that the theater building had been a “century old” at the time of the collapse. That means it must have been the old Lansford Opera House, the only large theater in the town during the early years of the 20th century. The opera house was in operation by 1908, as it was listed in the 1908-1909 Cahn guide, and was also mentioned in issues of The Billboard that year. The Opera House was still listed in the 1922 Cahn guide. The earliest reference to the name Victoria Theatre I’ve found is from 1932, and I’ve not yet found the house mentioned under either name between those years.
CinemaTour has about eighty photos of the Victoria from the John Lewis collection, showing the house both before and after the collapse. Thumbnails are at this link.
Another article in the paper says that the architect, R. L. Benz, who had but recently moved his business to Anniston, also acted as the contractor on the project.
If this twin didn’t open until February 19th, 1972, there must have been some sort of construction delay. The August 23, 1971, issue of Boxoffice reported that the Eric Brookhaven Theatres I and II were expected to open around Thanksgiving (early November.) The auditoriums were each to seat about 700.
The August 23, 1971, issue of Boxoffice said that the Stanley Theatre building in Selinsgrove had been sold and the theater dismantled. The house had closed earlier that year. The item gave the address as 6 N. Market Street. If that’s correct, then the theater has been demolished. The site is now occupied by a commercial building that resembles a Victorian house, but is clearly of fairly recent construction.
The Boxoffice article named Charles Ulrich as the original owner of the Stanley Theatre. A 1919 publication of the State of Pennsylvania listed building plans approved during the month of October by the Bureau of Inspection, and a motion picture theater for Charles P. Ulrich at Selinsgrove was among them. The architect was listed as William Douden. This might have been among Douden’s last projects in Pennsylvania, as in 1920 he closed his office in Millersburg and reestablished himself in Union, South Carolina.
Internet reveals that James S. Maurer was operator of the Park Theatre from at least as early as 1964. Ads for the theater from that year indicate that at least part of the time it was a live burlesque house. Other sources called it an art theater, but I think they were using the term euphemistically (meaning that it presented “adult” fare during that time period.)
This rather large PDF contains a scrapbook of clippings related to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, and among them are a couple of items pertaining to the appearance at Maurer’s Park Theatre of an exotic dancer using the stage name Jada. Jada had purportedly been Dallas night club owner (and assassin of JKF assassin Lee Harvey Oswald) Jack Ruby’s girlfriend.
Also in the photo Rob uploaded, at the right, is a partial view of the Orpheum Theatre after it had been converted for use by the Monongahela Power Company.
The second to last photo on this web page shows the entrance to the Moore Opera House sometime after the introduction of talking pictures. The marquee advertises “Vitaphone Presentations.”
Thanks for the correction, link0612. I wasn’t aware that the two companies used different coloring styles.
Gerald DeLuca’s link to the 1948 Boxoffice article about the opening of the Rex is dead. The article is now at this location. It has no photos, unfortunately.
The text above a picture of the Orpheum about halfway down this web page says that the house opened on May 1, 1913.
In its early years, the Orpheum was operated by Jack Marks, who also operated Clarksburg’s first movie house, the Star Theatre, and later opened Moore’s Opera House. From 1922 until closing, the Orpheum was operated by Claude Robinson, of Robinson’s Grand Theatre.
After giving up the Orpheum, Marks took over an early house on West Main Street, originally called the Odeon and later the Bijou, and renamed it Marks' Orpheum, which he operated until his death in 1952, so Clarksburg had two houses with the Orpheum name from 1922 until 1929. Marks also built the Ritz Theatre in 1927.
The last photo on the page I linked to shows the Ritz, directly across Pike Street from the Monongahela Power Company Building which has a parapet identical to the Orpheum’s in the earlier photo. As the photo dates from the late 1940s or early 1950s, I believe the power company building must have been the Orpheum building remodeled, in which case the theater was not demolished in 1929, but merely dismantled and the power company offices built in its shell.
The page for the Concord Theatre at the Cinema Data Project has excerpts from a 1974 newspaper article about the theater, including several quotes from long-time operator Theresa Cantin.
Also, click this hyperlink to reach Paul Brogan’s 2014 article about the Concord. There’s also a slide show with five photos.
This page of the Ogunquit Playhouse website says that the first performances were presented in 1934 in the building on Shore Road,which had previously been a garage. The Ogunquit Playhouse moved into its present home on Route 1 in 1937. As the MGM report that Ron cited says that the Ogunquit Square Theatre opened in 1939, the old playhouse must have been dark for a couple of years before being converted for movies. (This page also has the photo robboehm referred to in the previous comment.)
The news that the Ogunquit Square started life as a legitimate theater, coupled with the satellite view of the building at Google Maps and the Bird’s Eye view at Bing Maps (much clearer than Google’s satellite) convinces me that the entire theater building is still standing. There is a tall structure at the back of the building which I thought looked like a former fly tower, but as I had thought the theater had opened as a movie house only I concluded that it might be a later addition, or even part of an entirely new building built on the theater’s site. Now that the theater’s origin as a legitimate house is known, it’s clear that it’s all still there, but converted to other uses.
The Ogunquit Square Theatre page from the Cinema Data Project gives the location as “Water St., Shore Rd.” I’m guessing that means the street name was changed (the only other thing it could mean is that the theater was at the corner of Water St. and Shore Rd., and there is no Water Street in Ogunquit today.)
There’s no address of 5 Shore Road today, either, The description cited by Cinema Data says the theater was in a one-story brick building. I think it might be the building that is now occupied by a retail shop called the Barrel Stave (15 Shore Rd.) and two other shops with higher addresses, though that building currently has no resemblance to a theater. The theater building might or might not be gone.
The Magnet Theatre building suffered a fire in March, 1977, according to this page from the Claremont Firefighters Association. There are no details, and the two photos were taken from down the block, but it looks to have been a significant fire and it probably led to the demolition of the building.
The March 12, 1921, issue of The American Contractor said that architect G. O. Garnsey of Chicago had drawn the plans for a theater that was being built at Lapeer by George F. Smith.
The Google map and street view I’m currently seeing on this page are miles and miles from the actual location of the Wakefield Opera House. I tired to link to a corrected view at Google Maps but it wouldn’t cooperate, so here is the correct location from Bing Maps. Unfortunately this is one of the places Bing Maps doesn’t have a good 360-degree bird’s-eye view available.
Official web site.
The Cinema Data Project has a page for the Empire Theatre. It has numerous snippets about the theater’s history, and one long excerpt from a 1991 article from the Manchester Historical Association, which includes this information:
The grand opening of the Regal Natomas Marketplace 16 was to take place on August 20, 1999, according to the August 17 issue of Sacramento Business Journal. The Natomas Marketplace complex, including the theater building, was designed by the local firm LPAS Architecture + Design, though Regal undoubtedly brought in a firm specializing in cinemas to design the theater interior.
I’m not sure how long the Astor operated on a regular basis, but at least as late as early 1931 it was still capable of mounting shows and showing movies. The January 2, 1931, issue of The Troy Times had an ad for the Astor’s run of an Earl Carroll production called Unguarded Girls, touted as “A Gripping—Thought-Compelling Stage and Film Attraction Every Adult Should See.”
The shows were continuous from 1 to 5 and 7 to 11. In between they probably gave the “Special Performances for Male Adults Only” that the ad noted. All seats were 50c.
Chris is correct. The Palace Theatre was not in the building at 606 Main Street now occupied by the Magenta Theatre. This web page shows a very early photo of the Palace, and gives the address as 605 Main Street. The building is still standing, and the theater entrance is now occupied by the zoomNet Postal + store. The Palace opened on February 10, 1909, according to this page at HistoryLink.
The 1909 photo is earlier than the photo we currently have on this page, which probably dates from around 1913, but although the front of the theater was redesigned during that time it is the same building, as can be seen by the stairs at right leading down to the basement then occupied by the New Palace Billiard Hall.
This web page about the Odd Fellows Hall says that the Romanesque Revival style building was designed by architects Pugh & Gray (Walter D. Pugh and John Gray.) During its early years the theater was listed in the Cahn guides as the Grand Opera House.
The IOOF maintained its quarters in the building until 1995, long after the theater had closed. The building was placed on the NRHP in 1988. This PDF contains the NRHP nomination form, with a detailed description of the building and its history. The house showed movies as early as 1911, though live events were presented throughout the theater’s history. In the 1970s, the original stage (which had lost the upper part of its fly loft to an expansion of the third-floor IOOF lodge in 1936) was removed and replaced with a wrestling ring. The stage was reinstalled in the 1980s as part of a failed effort to convert the Grand into a venue for the Salem Theater of Performing Arts.
The original interior of the house by Walter D. Pugh was largely destroyed in an extensive 1935 remodeling by architect James W. DeYoung, which included an extension of the balcony and the addition of some Art Deco design elements to the interior. In 1928, DeYoung and his then-partner Knud Roald had served as supervising architects for the construction of the Rapp & Rapp-designed Paramount Theatre in Portland, and that commission led to several other theater commissions for DeYoung, including the Grand remodeling.
The Palace Theatre had not been demolished when Google’s street view camera last passed by, nor when the satellite view currently displayed was made. As far as I know it is still standing today. The building runs along the east side of Coal Street, stretching the entire block from Bertsch Street to Patterson Street. Google Maps shows only the view from Patterson Street, where the large stage house sits. Half a dozen photos from the John Lewis collection, including views of the entrance, can be found on this page at CinemaTour.
The location, as well as the size and shape of the building and its architectural details, which include a tapestry brick front, very popular in the late 1910s and early 1920s, indicate that the Palace Theatre was this project noted in the “Contracts Awarded” column of the July 1, 1922, issue of The American Contractor:
John T. Simpson was licensed as both an architect and engineer. He established an architectural practice in Newark in 1913, but had been an engineer prior to that. Judging from the notices in various trade journals of the period he specialized primarily in school buildings. The Palace might have been his only theater project.An article in the August 8, 2001, issue of Allentown daily The Morning Call said that it would be at least a month before the remains of the former Victoria Theatre in Lansford would be removed. The theater building, long used for the storage of automobile tires, had partly collapsed on July 13 that year.
The article said that the theater building had been a “century old” at the time of the collapse. That means it must have been the old Lansford Opera House, the only large theater in the town during the early years of the 20th century. The opera house was in operation by 1908, as it was listed in the 1908-1909 Cahn guide, and was also mentioned in issues of The Billboard that year. The Opera House was still listed in the 1922 Cahn guide. The earliest reference to the name Victoria Theatre I’ve found is from 1932, and I’ve not yet found the house mentioned under either name between those years.
CinemaTour has about eighty photos of the Victoria from the John Lewis collection, showing the house both before and after the collapse. Thumbnails are at this link.
The ad rivest266 just uploaded was published on April 7, but other articles in the same issue of the Anniston Star, as well as the ad itself, give the opening date of the Lyric Theatre as Monday, April 8, with the first show being a matinée starting at at 2:30.
Another article in the paper says that the architect, R. L. Benz, who had but recently moved his business to Anniston, also acted as the contractor on the project.
If this twin didn’t open until February 19th, 1972, there must have been some sort of construction delay. The August 23, 1971, issue of Boxoffice reported that the Eric Brookhaven Theatres I and II were expected to open around Thanksgiving (early November.) The auditoriums were each to seat about 700.
The August 23, 1971, issue of Boxoffice said that the Stanley Theatre building in Selinsgrove had been sold and the theater dismantled. The house had closed earlier that year. The item gave the address as 6 N. Market Street. If that’s correct, then the theater has been demolished. The site is now occupied by a commercial building that resembles a Victorian house, but is clearly of fairly recent construction.
The Boxoffice article named Charles Ulrich as the original owner of the Stanley Theatre. A 1919 publication of the State of Pennsylvania listed building plans approved during the month of October by the Bureau of Inspection, and a motion picture theater for Charles P. Ulrich at Selinsgrove was among them. The architect was listed as William Douden. This might have been among Douden’s last projects in Pennsylvania, as in 1920 he closed his office in Millersburg and reestablished himself in Union, South Carolina.
Internet reveals that James S. Maurer was operator of the Park Theatre from at least as early as 1964. Ads for the theater from that year indicate that at least part of the time it was a live burlesque house. Other sources called it an art theater, but I think they were using the term euphemistically (meaning that it presented “adult” fare during that time period.)
This rather large PDF contains a scrapbook of clippings related to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, and among them are a couple of items pertaining to the appearance at Maurer’s Park Theatre of an exotic dancer using the stage name Jada. Jada had purportedly been Dallas night club owner (and assassin of JKF assassin Lee Harvey Oswald) Jack Ruby’s girlfriend.
Also in the photo Rob uploaded, at the right, is a partial view of the Orpheum Theatre after it had been converted for use by the Monongahela Power Company.
The second to last photo on this web page shows the entrance to the Moore Opera House sometime after the introduction of talking pictures. The marquee advertises “Vitaphone Presentations.”
At this link is a clearer version of the early postcard photo of the Orpheum I linked to in the previous comment (click photo to enlarge.)
Thanks for the correction, link0612. I wasn’t aware that the two companies used different coloring styles.
Gerald DeLuca’s link to the 1948 Boxoffice article about the opening of the Rex is dead. The article is now at this location. It has no photos, unfortunately.
The text above a picture of the Orpheum about halfway down this web page says that the house opened on May 1, 1913.
In its early years, the Orpheum was operated by Jack Marks, who also operated Clarksburg’s first movie house, the Star Theatre, and later opened Moore’s Opera House. From 1922 until closing, the Orpheum was operated by Claude Robinson, of Robinson’s Grand Theatre.
After giving up the Orpheum, Marks took over an early house on West Main Street, originally called the Odeon and later the Bijou, and renamed it Marks' Orpheum, which he operated until his death in 1952, so Clarksburg had two houses with the Orpheum name from 1922 until 1929. Marks also built the Ritz Theatre in 1927.
The last photo on the page I linked to shows the Ritz, directly across Pike Street from the Monongahela Power Company Building which has a parapet identical to the Orpheum’s in the earlier photo. As the photo dates from the late 1940s or early 1950s, I believe the power company building must have been the Orpheum building remodeled, in which case the theater was not demolished in 1929, but merely dismantled and the power company offices built in its shell.
The page for the Concord Theatre at the Cinema Data Project has excerpts from a 1974 newspaper article about the theater, including several quotes from long-time operator Theresa Cantin.
Also, click this hyperlink to reach Paul Brogan’s 2014 article about the Concord. There’s also a slide show with five photos.
This page of the Ogunquit Playhouse website says that the first performances were presented in 1934 in the building on Shore Road,which had previously been a garage. The Ogunquit Playhouse moved into its present home on Route 1 in 1937. As the MGM report that Ron cited says that the Ogunquit Square Theatre opened in 1939, the old playhouse must have been dark for a couple of years before being converted for movies. (This page also has the photo robboehm referred to in the previous comment.)
The news that the Ogunquit Square started life as a legitimate theater, coupled with the satellite view of the building at Google Maps and the Bird’s Eye view at Bing Maps (much clearer than Google’s satellite) convinces me that the entire theater building is still standing. There is a tall structure at the back of the building which I thought looked like a former fly tower, but as I had thought the theater had opened as a movie house only I concluded that it might be a later addition, or even part of an entirely new building built on the theater’s site. Now that the theater’s origin as a legitimate house is known, it’s clear that it’s all still there, but converted to other uses.
If this house didn’t open until 1969 then it could not have been one of the projects Warren G. Sargent designed for Roth Theatres in 1954.
The Ogunquit Square Theatre page from the Cinema Data Project gives the location as “Water St., Shore Rd.” I’m guessing that means the street name was changed (the only other thing it could mean is that the theater was at the corner of Water St. and Shore Rd., and there is no Water Street in Ogunquit today.)
There’s no address of 5 Shore Road today, either, The description cited by Cinema Data says the theater was in a one-story brick building. I think it might be the building that is now occupied by a retail shop called the Barrel Stave (15 Shore Rd.) and two other shops with higher addresses, though that building currently has no resemblance to a theater. The theater building might or might not be gone.
The Magnet Theatre building suffered a fire in March, 1977, according to this page from the Claremont Firefighters Association. There are no details, and the two photos were taken from down the block, but it looks to have been a significant fire and it probably led to the demolition of the building.
Architect George O. Garnsey was born in 1840, so he was in his eighties when he designed the Lyric Theatre. He died in 1923.
The March 12, 1921, issue of The American Contractor said that architect G. O. Garnsey of Chicago had drawn the plans for a theater that was being built at Lapeer by George F. Smith.