Clune's Auditorium
427 W. 5th Street,
Los Angeles,
CA
90071
427 W. 5th Street,
Los Angeles,
CA
90071
9 people
favorited this theater
Showing 26 - 50 of 81 comments
Color films in 1911? Who knew?
http://tinyurl.com/2mnpej
Here is a January 1915 ad from the LA Times. “Birth of a Nation” was opening soon under its original title, “The Clansman”:
http://tinyurl.com/2f9bjh
It would be good on some of those aerial photos.
That new zoom thing is really clunky but I guess its better than nothing.
Protest, 1950. It looks like the zoom function has returned:
http://tinyurl.com/2dzy5v
This is a 1985 photo from the same source. The demolition must have been recent. The San Carlos hotel has been replaced by an office building, which also took out the old German church next to the hotel on Olive:
View link
Here is a rather bucolic photo from 1907, via the CA state library:
View link
This LAPL photo looks south from 5th and Olive. The auditorium building is under construction on the left. Date is 1905:
http://jpg3.lapl.org/pics37/00068393.jpg
Yes, the College Theatre was adjacent to the California Club building. The building with the Coca-Cola ad (“Relieves Fatigue”!) was the old Masonic Temple. That’s where the Bank of Commerce Building was built a few years after this picture was taken.
Wow, that’s an amazing photo. Am i correct that the College Theater would be in between the building with the Coca-Cola advertisement and the California Club?
The Auditorium is at the far right of this panorama of downtown taken from a rooftop on Olive Street south of Fourth, and dated 1923 by the L.A. library. It’s remarkable how big this theatre was.
By scrolling to the left end of the panorama you can also see the back and side walls of the Million Dollar Theatre at Third and Broadway. At center right of the panorama is a view of the Pacific Electric’s Hill Street Station, which was discussed in comments above.
You win the prize.
It’s backwards!
Here is a 1925 photo from the USC archive, with a noticeable oddity:
http://tinyurl.com/2qgsdh
That building at far left could be a corner of the California Club, unless it’s the very back of the old Masonic Temple (fronting on Hill Street a few doors north of the College Theatre) which was demolished to make way for the temporary Hill Street Station that operated during the construction of the Subway Terminal building.
Is the taller building just visible to the far left the old California Club? If so, the College Theater would have been between that and the shed I think.
The Hill Street Station depicted in that photo was on or adjacent to the Subway Terminal building’s site, just above the middle of the block between 4th and 5th. There had been an interurban depot on that site since 1908. The depot was moved into the Subway Terminal in 1926.
That is the Biltmore beyond the auditorium. That dates the photo at no earlier than 1922. The passenger shed in the picture was demolished in 1924, replaced by a temporary structure farther south, to make way for construction of the Subway Terminal.
It turns out that the USC archive has a larger scan of the same photo.
Read more about the Hill Street Station on this page at the ERHA website.
The Subway Terminal Building is at 4th & Hill or kind of halfway between 4th & 5th so that little loading platform in the photo must have been where the big parking lot is between the Title Guarantee Building and the Subway Terminal Building now. I think you can see the top of the Biltmore way in the background. I never realized that the actual auditorium of Clunes faced East even though the building front faced South to Central Park which it looks as though it does in the photo.
Was that the Subway Terminal at 3rd and Hill?
Sorry, that was entirely the wrong link I just posted (though an interesting picture- unfortunately having nothing to do with theatres.)
The Auditorium picture is right here.
Here’s and interesting perspective on this theatre: a photo from about 1922 of the Pacific Electric’s Hill Street Station, and looming behind it are the back and side walls of the Auditorium.
Here is a very early photo from the LAPL. You can see the Normal School up the street which preceded the LA Library. Also the Biltmore has not yet been constructed:
http://jpg3.lapl.org/pics37/00068275.jpg
I recall talking to someone years ago about buying a loft in the Skid Row area. This must have been in the early or mid 90s. I think the asking price was $30,000. Too bad I passed it up.
I wonder where the buildings go after they are demolished. Are they sold to salvage yards, tossed into a dump, or go to theater heaven? I can’t imagine throwing out all of the interior decorations for these places. As I go through downtown daily on the way to work, I have to admit that the Title Guarantee building, next door to where this theater stood, is looking pretty delicious with its recent bath. I only wish I made enough money to live there.
Here is the same marquee in a different photo:
http://jpg3.lapl.org/pics37/00068392.jpg