Gem Theatre
3355 Fulton Street,
Brooklyn,
NY
11208
3355 Fulton Street,
Brooklyn,
NY
11208
1 person
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Showing 26 - 50 of 54 comments
My first visit to the Gem was during WWII and I always thought it was sort of an old theatre. I wonder if it is possible that it was the Adelphi Theatre originally, and it simply underwent a name change. I know of no one left who might have been around in that area back in those days.
Yes, that is correct. The theatre wall was right at the sidewalk on Fulton. There were no stores in front of any part of the theatre.
The King drugstore was at the other end of the block at Hemlock. There was another drugstore on the northwest corner of Fulton & Crescent called Mellor’s Drug Store. I think that may still be there under the turning el, although I’m sure Harold Mellor has passed on by now.
I had a brain lapse about the German Deli. It was owned by George Rusch, not Deutch. Sorry about that.
I can tell you that there were no stores in front of the Gem. It was a plain solid wall with the fire exit doors for the whole frontage of the theatre except at the west end where the marquee, box office and entrance were located. It was not that big a theatre so the plain wall was not that long
The first store to the east of the theatre was a German Deli in my day, and it was owned by a George Deutch (sp). His home was at 16 Campus Place. My dad, who was a pig-headed Dutchman said that George was a pig-headed Dutchman too.
I can’t remember whether there were three or four stores east of the theatre but I do remember that the store at the corner of Hemlock & Fulton was a drug store owned by a man named King. It was converted to a store front bank for Manufacturers Trust.
There were two stores to the west of the theatre whose facia seemed to be of the similar constuction material as the Hamburg Bank. One of the stores, right next to the theatre, was a photography studio owned by Julius Berzin (sp) which I think was a derivitive of Berzinsky (sp). He lived at 11A (should have been 13)Campus Place. These two stores as well as the theatre were razed to increase the frontage of the bank and create the drive-in banking window.
There was a very narrow alley behind these buildings, just wide enough for one person to walk between Crescent & Hemlock. I don’t recall any exits from the north side of the theatre into this alley. I think all of the theatre exits were on the south side of the building onto Fulton St.
Not that it matters, but Hamburg Savings became Home Savings for a period of time before it became Greenpoint Savings. Old neighbors tell me that this was in the late 80’s or early 90’s.
I am surprised at the 1920 date for Hamburg. I was always under the impression that that branch of Hamburg opened in 1936.
As I said at the Embassy site the Adelphi name is a strange one to me. I just have no knowledge of it whatsoever.
Cypress Hills St is a different story. I am old enough to remember when it was a two lane cobblestone road between the cemetaries. The first paving was a thin coat of blacktop laid on top of the cobblestones. The blacktop wore off and the cobblestones showed through. It was always a narrow winding road. I am surprised to read that it is now a four lane road. They must have had to move some cemetary plots to do that.
I started to work for the Hamburg Savings Bank in Feb 1954, right after I graduated Franklin K Lane HS, My first job was bank messenger between the three offices, I would ride the B13 bus from Fulton & Crescent to Wyckoff & Gates every weekday, The trip through Cypress Hills St was impressive. I would not have wanted to be the bus driver.
The Hamburg branch manager knew of my fondness for the Gem and took me in there one afternoon shortly before demolition began. The theatre had been closed for months. It was very sad to see my favorite theatre in that condition. It looked exactly as if it had just closed except that the projectors had been removed. The entire screen end (east end) was inaccessible due to standing water on the theatre floor. The theatre entrance was at sidewalk level at the west end but the slope of the auditorium floor put the screen end (east) about two feet below sidewalk level. This always puzzled me because I thought there was a basement under the theatre. I did not see the basement during my tour but i decided that it must have been flooded as well.
I am sorry now that I did not snoop around more and try to find some souvenirs. Maybe some old one sheets or something. I was on the clock and it was my big boss that was giving me the quick tour. I think we were in there for ten minutes at the most.
Thanks so much, Karl, for posting all these wonderful details !
Thank you also for your attention to detail and your truthfulness. I appreciate both very much.
I have the “Atom Man vs. Superman” serial at home on VHS and have enjoyed watching it with my son. In it, Superman becomes a cartoon when he flies !
If I offended you by mentioning your birth date here, I apologize.
I think the house in Ridgewood I grew up in was built around 1918 also.
Any ideas, even vague ones, about the Adelphi Theater ?
My parents mentioned to me when I was very young that the 50 houses built on Campus and Adler Place were built on land that used to be the campus of Adelphi College. I assumed from that that Adler was a derivitive of Adelphi. The houses were built circa 1918. I don’t know anything further about the college. I only ever knew the Gem being called the Gem.
I must be truthful about this. I was born in 1936 but did not live on Campus Place until I moved there in 1941. I moved out in 1957 but my parents continued to live there until 1979-80.
Several years ago I found a bookmark in one of my childhood books that I thought everyone might get a kick out of.
It is a 3 & ½ X 5 & ½ program card from the Gem Theatre for the week of July 23,
July 23,24,25 Sun, Mon. Tues.
Nancy Goes to Rio starring Jane Powell & Ann Sothern &
Buccaneer’s Girl starring Yvonne DeCarlo & Robert Douglas
Cartoon, Screen Actor News
July 26, 27 Wed. Thurs,
Wabash Avenue starring Betty Grable & Victor Mature &
One Way Street starring James Mason & Marta Toren
Cartoon, Stop, Look, Listen News
July 28,29 Fri, Sat.
Love Happy starring The Marx Bros & Ilona Massey &
Quicksand starring Mickey Rooney, Jeanne Cagney & Peter Lorre
Cartoon, Happy Tots News
Every Fri. and Sat. Mat.
Atom Man vs Superman
One half of one side of the card is an ad for The Norwood Laundry which was not anywhere near Norwood Ave but was located on the south side of Fulton St between Hemlock St and Autumn Ave.
The card advertises the Gem being located at Fulton & Crescent, being air conditioned and their phone number was AP7-8484
The card does not show a year but using the perpetual calendar from the almanac the day and dates match 1950.
Some memories, huh!
So am I. Let’s be careful not to burn up this stretch of the Fulton Street of the past in cyber-space !
On the Embassy Theater page, I just asked Karl B to help us out with the Adelphi on this page. He may have heard or learned about it from people older than him, in the neighborhood he grew up in.
There is neither a Ridgewood Folly theater nor a Ridgewood Bill nor a TomScott. I’m an atheist !
Just joking !
Not directly, but he may have some knowledge of it, just as we have some knowledge of the Ridgewood Folly.
Karl B. was born August 1, 1936.
It’s possible. Again, Karl B or perhaps Warren may be of help in this.
Thank you, cjdv, for getting us back on topic here !
Campus Place, around the corner from, and just north of, 3355 Fulton St. is named after Adelphi College, whose campus used to be there. Hence perhaps the name of Adelphi Theater.
Karl B grew up on Campus Place. I recommend we wait for him to provide more details.
cjdv;
The Adelphi is back in the F.D.Y.B. 1930 edition listings – 520 seats given (with the correct address).
Just wanted to point out that there was an Adelphi Theatre at this address. It is listed in “The American Motion Picture Directory : a Cyclopedic Directory of the Motion Picture Industry 1914-15”. The 1926 Film Daily Yearbook lists seating as 600 but gives the address as 3335 Fulton (this edition contains various errors for Brooklyn theatres).The 1927 edition gets the address right but misspells the name—Arelphi. The theatre is not listed in the 1929 Film Daily Yearbook.
After turning left (east) onto Atlantic from Euclid, the “eastbound Conduit maneuver” involved going one long block east to Crescent, right on Crescent to Liberty Ave, right onto Liberty, then a sharp left onto Conduit Blvd. eastbound. Phew ! If only Euclid had been two-way between Atlantic and Liberty !
Anyone know why it wasn’t ?
Your weather forecast reminds me of George Carlin as the Hippy Dippy Weatherman :
Forecast for tonight : Dark ! Followed by gradual lightening towards morning !
I remember well those sharp turns of the Interboro through Cypress Hills, Mount Carmel and Mount Lebanon Cemeteries, and those signs in black block capital letters on a white ground :
SHARP CURVE
25 MILE LIMIT
KEEP IN LANE
and the double white line dividing the lanes. There would be at least one wreck or abandoned car on the shoulder right at one of the bridge abutments within the cemeteries.
“There were many times that the car in the left lane would realize that it was their exit, and cut in front of the car in the right lane. That would result in a very interesting "conversation” or possibly a race away from the traffic light on Cypress Hills St."
I remember that very well !
I don’t remember the Interboro being one lane in each direction. It is now two lanes per direction so far as I know.
How do you like where the eastbound Interboro goes under Queens Blvd. and suddenly turns as you’re plunged into darkness ?
My dad remembers bike riding on the Interboro from Bushwick to Kew Gardens before it was open to the public. He had fun doing so, but the rough unfinished pavement wore down his bicycle tires rapidly, which his dad complained about.
In my last(spring 1979)semester at Cooper Union, I re-designed the intersection of Cypress Avenue, Interboro Parkway and Vermont Place as a project for my transportation engineering course. My re-design was never officially adopted, of course, but the intersection pretty much looks like my re-design now, with all the sharp curves and tight radii, appropriate to the smaller, slower cars of the 1930’s and 1940’s, done away with and replaced by shallower, easier curves.
That’s generally true of most of the older motor parkways that have been rebuilt and renovated.
I was usually in in the right front seat, but I was never a demanding child, so my parents had no need to hide a Carvel stand from me !
On weekday nights summer 1967 I was a regular at the Carvel on the southeast corner of Myrtle Avenue and Madison St. I must have been there around July 4th, because I remember either cherry bombs or M-80’s going off, and briefly illuminating the fronts of the six-family houses on the northwest side of Madison St. between Myrtle and Cypress. That was DABOC’s home block (she’s been on the Ridgewood Theater page) and right across Madison from the northwest side of the Ridgewood Theater.
At my request, my dad took me and my mom for a ride on Cypress Hills Street, between Cypress and Cooper Avenues, in spring 1968, before it was widened, to satisfy my curiosity about what it looked like. I remember it as narrow, bumpy and in poor condition. I always remembered the part between Cypress Avenue and the Interboro and Jamaica Avenue as always being in good condition. I never took that bus ride with tree branches coming in the window that you described.
The B-18 bus only went on that southernmost part of Cypress Hills St. between Cypress and Jamaica Avenues.
As promised, Sunday afternoon on Labor Day Weekend 1967 my parents and I were taking a leisurely drive around Brooklyn on the Belt Parkway when we saw congestion and delays up ahead. So we exited the Belt at Rockaway Parkway and continued north to Rockaway Avenue to take what we at first thought would be a shortcut back to Ridgewood. No way ? It was a mess ! Hydrants open, gushing into the street, tires and balls rolling, and kids running, out into the street, blocking our way. It must have taken half an hour to an hour to get from one end of Rockaway Avenue to the other. When we finally got onto Eastern Parkway Extension and up to Bushwick Avenue it felt like we had gotten out of prison. Waiting for the light to turn green, I felt like we were a rocket poised on the launching pad, ready to take off. Green light ! Zoom ! Right on Bushwick Avenue, left onto Highland Blvd., Interboro, off at Cypress Avenue, back to Ridgewood.
You mention taking Conduit west to Cross Bay / Woodhaven, then north to Myrtle and west on Myrtle back to Ridgewood. We usually found it quicker back to Ridgewood to get on the westbound Interboro near Woodhaven and Myrtle, then off at Cypress Hills St. exit straight ahead onto Cypress Avenue.
Do you remember, and can you believe, that there was once NO TRAFFIC LIGHT at that busy intersection of Cypress Avenue and Vermont Place ? Even with that blind-cornered 45 degree turn of Cypress Avenue with the flashing yellow light just east of there ?
Unlike me, Karl B has MANY B-13 bus memories !
I remember the White Castle but not the Carvel.
I know what you mean about that route to and from Long Island or Rockaway Beach. My family and I usually went Cypress Hills St. to Euclid, left on Atlantic because Euclid south of Atlantic was one way north, right on street one block east of Euclid, right on Liberty
Avenue, sharp left onto Conduit eastbound.
Coming back it was easier : across Liberty on Conduit to Euclid, straight up Euclid to Cypress Hills St., Cypress Avenue back to Ridgewood.
The doctor who delivered me (Joseph Berman) had his office at 25 Logan Street.
Force Tube Avenue is almost a straight line from the foot of Highland Blvd. at Jamaica Avenue to the western end of Conduit. Too bad it’s not wider, two-way and continuous !
Up next, Sunday of Labor Day Weekend 1967 : Stuck Inside Of Brownsville with the Open Hydrant Blues Again ! to paraphrase Bob Dylan !
My dad remembers taking a driving license road test on Miller Avenue.
He still talks about it.
I know Highland Blvd. well. Do you remember a cannon with a pyramid of cannon balls next to it on its north side, west of Vermont Place ?
Karl B. once had a similar experience coming down Snake Hill on Highland Blvd. towards Force Tube Avenue and the YMCA on his bike with a girl sitting on his handlebars. He stopped just in time to avoid colliding with Jamaica Avenue traffic. He never tried that stunt again.
I’m in Ridgewood every month on personal business. I’ll be going there this coming Monday. For my next trick … I want to visit Bushwick, with a friend, and photograph all the places my dad and I remember.
Yes, Karl B, thanks. My pleasure to have started this page for your Gem Theatre memories, and those of others.
Now, what can you tell us about the Embassy Theater that once stood at Fulton and Richmond Streets in Cypress Hills ? There’s already a page on this site for it.
Please also notice on this Gem Theater page a resumption of the B-13 vs. B-18 bus “issue” between lostmemory and myself, that we had discussed privately for awhile.
I grew up in the 1940’s on Campus Place, a one block long residential street immediately north of Fulton St, where the Gem was located. The Gem was located on the north side of Fulton between Crescent & Hemlock. The Gem was in the middle of the block with a bank and two stores to its west and three of four more stores to its east. The marquee and entrance was at the west end of the theatre’s frontage. There were two fire exits from the theatre onto Fulton to the east.
The theatre seating was on one floor facing east with the screen at the extreme east end of the theatre. There were two side aisles and one center aisle. IIRC the restrooms were on either side of the projection booth on a second floor at the west end of the theatre. There was no balcony.
The theatre closed in 1954 and was purchased by the Hamburg Savings Bank which had their Cypress Hills Branch on the corner of Fulton and Crescent. The theatre and the two stores to its west were razed in 1955, allowing the bank to double its size through extensive renovations. A very fancy drive-in banking window and parking lot was created at the east side of the renovated bank. I have not been in the area in 25 years, but if this parking lot still exists, it is the approximate location of the Gem.
I attended many Saturday Matinees at the Gem in the 1940’s when the children’s admission was 12 cents. I followed many chapter serials at the Gem such as “The Black Whip” & “The Purple Monster Strikes”. Kids always had to sit on the south side of the center aisle. I really felt grown up when I went to an evening show with my parents and could sit on the north side!
When I started dating, I would take my date to the Gem. The Gem always had double features and changed their program three times a week. After the Gem closed, I would take my date on the el to Jamaica to either the Loew’s Valencia of the Skouras Merrrick.
I have many fond memories of the Gem as the movie house where I saw such classics as “Bambi”, “Meet Me in St Louis,” “Titanic” and “Showboat”.
I played in Highland Park alot as a kid. My cousins and I played alot at “the fort” made of pink and brown brick, visible from the eastbound Interboro right before Cypress Avenue exit. I remember a baseball field near there on the west side of Vermont Place just south of the exit from the Interboro, a small parking lot, refreshment stand, and picnic area. West of that was a pond (really just a mudhole) in a “valley” with a stone bridge over it. Sometimes we joined my Uncle Joe at the tennis courts off of Jamaica Avenue.
I remember my mother warning me and my cousins about the tough black kids from Bushwick and East New York in Highland Park.
My parents used to walk around the Ridgewood Reservoir when they were dating from 1940 to 1945, and for years after they were married. Once I was born in 1955 they took me there. I have pictures of me there at about age three with my dad. In one photo I’m sitting on a bench and the view is east. To the left you can see the fence around the reservoir and on the horizon you can see the twin towers of Blessed Sacrament Church on Euclid Avenue just north of Fulton St.
I remember waiting for the B-18 bus back to Ridgewood with my dad on Cypress Avenue at Vermont Place, and having to stand on tiptoes to see over that low concrete cemetery wall topped with an iron fence.
On the opposite side of Cypress Avenue, at the stop for the B-18 bus heading east into Cypress Hills, where you can turn right on to Vermont Place, you can read the inscription on the mausoleum of W. C. Ritter, a warning from the dead to the living :
AS YOU ARE NOW, SO ONCE WERE WE.
AS WE ARE NOW, SO SHALL YOU BE.
The last really good walk I took around Highland Park was with my best friend on my 19th birthday in mid-November 1974. We also walked by and around that brick house by the exit from the eastbound Interboro to Cypress Hills St. I asked if it was the historic Schenck house. The man I spoke to didn’t know.
My friend and I returned there on a sunny Saturday in late April 1975 but quickly went east into Cypress Hills Cemetery and then on to Forest Park.
In summer 1981 I read in the Daily News about crime and parking problems in Highland Park. I last rode through there with my fiancee on St. Patrick’s Day 1991 en route from Rockville Centre to Ridgewood. I don’t know what Highland Park is like now, except from recent aerial photos that Ridgewood Reservoir is now dry and empty.
However, Force Tube Avenue in Cypress Hills, Conduit Blvd. and Aqueduct Race Track in Ozone Park / Howard Beach, Queens, all take their names from the Brooklyn water supply system that Ridgewood Reservoir was once connected to.
There most certainly is. I think I last rode it on Saturday September 5, 1992. It only runs twice an hour, so the schedules posted for it help alot.
The B18 Cypress and Wyckoff Avenue bus from Ridgewood terminated at Crescent St. under the el between Fulton St. and Jamaica Avenue, but closer to Jamaica Ave. The B 13 bus also goes from Ridgewood to Cypress Hills but I am not sure of its route. I think my mother took it to Spring Creek once by mistake. Spring Creek is one of those Flatlands Bklyn tidal creeks on the northwestern shore of Jamaica Bay.