An inventory of historic buildings in Weston says that the Camden Block was built in 1896-1897. It housed a bank, a hotel, shops, and the Camden Opera House. The building was designed by the architectural firm of Yost & Packard. The auditorium was severely damaged by a fire in the 1960s and the remains were demolished, but the rest of the building survives. The inventory only gives the Main Street address of the building, but the theater entrance was probably at about 9 E. 2nd Street.
An inventory of historic buildings in Weston prepared for the NRHP said that the Barnes Building at 241 N. Main Street, built in 1925, was remodeled to accommodate a movie theater in the 1930s, and that the theater closed in the 1950s. It must have been the Hollywood Theatre. At the time the inventory was prepared the building was still standing, with its marquee still intact, but I believe it has since been demolished.
The last year the Hollywood Theatre was listed in the Film Daily Yearbook was 1956.
The Boxoffice article Tinseltoes linked to says that the original West Columbia Theatres I&II was designed by the architectural firm of Van Wenema & Postman.
The 1928 and 1929 FDYs list a Zazza-Jazz Theatre and a Jazz Theatre, both with the address 1751 Larimer Street. (I recall having seen the name Zarra-Jazz somewhere on the Internet, too, but I can’t recall exactly where.) However, I think it’s likely that the FDY made a mistake, conflating two theaters.
There was another house called simply the ZaZa Theatre, located down the block from the Jazz (at 1727 Larimer Street according to this web page.) The ZaZa was one of the childhood haunts of Neal Cassady in the 1930s. The FDY didn’t include addresses for Denver theaters in 1930, and while the Jazz Theatre is not listed that year the ZaZa Theatre is. In 1931 the Jazz is listed as closed, and the ZaZa is open. In 1932, both theaters are open again. 1933 is the last year the Jazz is listed, and it is again listed as closed. The ZaZa was last listed in 1941.
An out-of-print book called Denver’s Old Theater Row: The Story of Curtis Street and Its Glamorous Show Business, by Forrest Johnson, mentions both the ZaZa and Jazz Theatres in a brief passage that is cited in one of Paul O'Malley’s papers on Denver theaters. In 1922, a Mr. Frank A. Milton took over operation of the Rivoli Theatre, and O'Malley quotes Johnson thusly: “For about two years, Milton had been running the Folly, ZaZa and Jazz [theaters], as Girlie-Girle shows….” So the Jazz Theatre could have been in operation by 1920, and was certainly in operation by 1922, but had either closed permanently or perhaps gone back to some sort of live performances by 1933.
In any case, while there was a Jazz Theatre and there was a ZaZa Theatre down the block from it, odds are that there never was a house called the Zazza-Jazz (or Zarra-Jazz) Theatre, but if there was it was most likely the house later called simply the ZaZa, not the Jazz.
The correct address for this theater is 1746 Curtis Street, and its final name was Gem Theatre. In the 1920s and 1930s it was most commonly listed with 960 seats, but in later years the FDY listed it with between 600 and 700 seats. The three-story Romanesque Revival structure at 1734-1746 Curtis Street was called the Chicago Block, and it housed a theater at the address 1746 from 1890 on.
The first house was the Wonderland Museum and Variety Theatre, operating from 1890-1893. It was a small hall oriented north and south, with its stage at one corner of what would later be the auditorium of an expanded theater. The front section of the Wonderland would later be the lobby of the Isis Theatre.
In 1894, the house became the Curtis Street Theatre, and then from 1895 to 1899 it was the Orpheum Theatre. It underwent improvements in 1899 and reopened as the Denver Theatre in September. This might have been when the auditorium was expanded to an east-west alignment, running behind all the storefronts in the Chicago Block.
In 1902, it was renamed the Curtis Theatre, but closed after suffering a fire in May, 1904. It reopened on October 3. The house was closed during the 1909-1910 theatrical season, but was remodeled in 1910, reopening as the Iris Theatre, a motion picture house, on June 4.
For the next several years the Iris was one of Denver’s most popular movie theaters, part of the Curtis Street theater district described in the July 15, 1916, issue of The Moving Picture World:
“Denver’s moving picture row now extends two blocks along Curtis street, the city’s main thoroughfare. Beginning at the east end is the Iris; directly across the street is the Paris and on the same side is the New Isis with the Plaza opposite. In the next block is the Strand with the Princess within a few doors. Across the street is the Colonial. Around the corner on Sixteenth street is the Lyric which was built on the site of the Theatorium, Denver’s first picture theater. Across Sixteenth street from the Lyric is the Tabor Grand and on Curtis below Sixteenth is the Rialto. There are five other houses in the downtown section on Larimer street—the Joy, the Fun, the Grand and the Annex, all with small seating capacity and five-cent houses.”
The Iris declined in popularity in the early 1920s with the arrival of newer theaters. Although it was listed in the FDY as late as 1926, the Denver City Directory listed its address as the location of the Mars Theatre from 1925 to 1928. The Mars Theatre was never listed in the FDY, and was probably not operated as a movie house.
The house reappears in the FDY in 1933 as the Gem Theatre, the name it retained for the remainder of its history. It was still in operation as an adult theater in the late 1960s, just before the Chicago Block was demolished.
A paper about the theaters at 1746 Curtis Street from 1890 to 1920, by Paul O'Mally, is available in PFD format from Academia.edu at this link, but you have to sign up for the web site if you want to download it.
Construction of the Academy of Music began in 1887. A history of Newburgh’s Masonic Lodge published in 1896 says that in late 1887, while the Academy was under construction, the Masons leased the rooms on the third and fourth floors of the building, and the rooms were complete and ready for a dedication ceremony which was held on September 11, 1888. The theater must have been opened around the same time.
The Academy was probably the first the first theater in Newburgh to open with electric lights, which had been first introduced at the Savoy Theatre in London in 1881. The November 3, 1888, issue of The Electrical World had this item:
“Newburgh, N. Y.—The Edison Electric Illuminating Company, of Newburgh, N. Y., has just finished a number of important changes in the arrangement of their electric apparatus, and have laid another feeder from their station to supply the new Academy of Music with incandescents, and open up a new territory to the Edison light. The Newburgh Company is one of the oldest of the Edison organizations.”
An advertisement in the New York Dramatic Mirror was placed prior to opening by local manager A. S. Wood and New York booking agents Klaw & Erlinger describing the Academy. The ground floor house had 1,252 seats, six boxes, a stage 80 feet wide and 30 feet deep, and boasted “[e]very improvement in heating and electric light” as well as “15 sets of first-class scenery” among its equipment.
I haven’t been able to discover for certain who designed the Academy of Music, but there is a tantalizing reference in a booklet published for the New York Terra Cotta Company in 1891. Terra Cotta in Architecture, by Walter Geer, lists a number of buildings in which the company’s products had been used, and one of the two buildings listed at Newburgh is a Grand Opera House. I’ve found no other references to a Grand Opera House ever having existed in Newburgh, and I think it very likely that the building in question was actually the Academy of Music, misnamed. In 1891, it was the only large theater that had yet been built at Newburgh.
The booklet lists the Albany firm Fuller & Wheeler as the architects. Diana S. Waite’s Architects in Albany includes a brief biography of Albert W. Fuller, by T. Robins Brown, (Google Books preview, page 34) which includes a list of their buildings, but only those in Albany, and it has a drawing of their 1889 Albany YMCA, which was designed in the same Romanesque Revival style as the Academy of Music. The firm designed projects outside Albany, including YMCA buildings as far away as Montreal, Quebec, and Oakland, California, and they assisted in the design of a YMCA in Paris, France, so a project in Newburgh would not have been surprising.
So, while I’ve found no specific attribution of the Academy of Music to any architect, I do think it very likely that it was designed by Albert W. Fuller and William Arthur Wheeler.
It’s also of interest that, when the Newburgh Masonic lodge moved out of the Academy building in 1914, Albert Fuller (by then a partner in the firm of Fuller & Robinson) was the architect they chose to design their new building. I think that does indicate some familiarity with his work among citizens of Newburgh.
This item about the Wyatt Theatre is from the September 16, 1916, issue of The Moving Picture World:
“The Hendricksons, well known in Redlands, have leased the Wyatt theater for the coming season. Plans are being made for improvements so that big feature productions may be shown. Two "Power’s 6-B” motor-driven projecting machines will be used in the theater and in the balcony a machine booth, absolutely fireproof, will be built. They have also made plans for a 2,000-seat Airdome, which they expect to erect next spring and operate.“
Here is a brief article about the Chandler Music Hall from the June, 1910, issue of the construction trade journal Concrete:
“CHANDLER MUSIC HALL, RANDOLPH, VT., BUILT OF CONCRETE BLOCK.
“Contractor William S. Teachout, Essex junction, Vt., selected the coldest five months experienced in Vermont in 20 years for the erection of the Chandler Music Hall in Randolph, Vt.
“The building was given to the city by Col. A. B. Chandler and was recently opened with impressive ceremony. The structure was designed by Architect E. N. Boyden, Boston, Mass. It is built of hollow concrete block, 27,946 block being used. The building is divided into a music hall 88'x1OO' and a parish house 30'x100'. The hall seats 800 people. The total cost of the structure, including seats and stage fittings, was $30,000.
“Mr. Teachout was assisted in the construction by J. O. Dubuke. The Teachout block plant at Essex Junction is equipped with ‘Hercules’ block machines and turns out very creditable products.”
E. N. Boyden was probably the son of Elbridge C. Boyden, one of the leading architects in Worcester, Massachusetts in the last half of the 19th century. The younger Boyden is best known for a number of houses he designed in Boston’s Back Bay district.
I’ve found opening dates claimed on theater web sites to be in conflict with the historical record several times. In some cases something bad might have happened to the original theater and it had to be replaced, but in others I think local memory has just gone a bit fuzzy.
The January 14, 1937, issue of The Film Daily lists a Ramona Theatre in Ramona, California, as a new house. It appears in the 1938 FDY with 150 seats, but is not consistent in later editions. In 1939 it is up to 200 seats, in 1943 it reaches 296, then in 1949 it is back down to 230, and in 1956 it is still in operation but with 235 seats.
Why the seating capacity was so variable is as much a mystery as why it had a grand opening in 1947. Perhaps it was reopening after a major renovation that year, or a rebuilding after a fire, or after being taken over by new owners. I think the current theater is the one from 1937, though. Had it been built new as late as 1947 it would most likely have been a freestanding building with its own parking lot. Parking was not yet crucial in the 1930s, but it certainly was in the post-war period, especially in California.
Ramona Mainstage has a web site The “About” page has a photo of the 1947 event, though it is small and doesn’t show much detail. There’s definitely a post-war car parked in front of the theater though (a 1946 or 47 Chevrolet Aero sedan, if I’m not mistaken.)
The Mission Theatre in Fallbrook, California, was listed in the “New Theaters” column of the January 14, 1937, issue of The Film Daily. It was also mentioned in the April 4, 1937, issue of Motion Picture Herald, which said that W. J. Eagleston had purchased the lease and furnishings of the Mission Theatre from the Fallbrook Theatre Corporation.
Cards in the L.A. Public Library’s California Index call this house the Ramona Theatre, which must have been its opening name, probably in late 1924. The July 18, 1924, issue of Southwest Builder & Contractor said that the contract for construction of a two-story brick store, theater, and office building at 681-687 Redondo Boulevard in Long Beach had been let to Alfred Butterfield. Frank Wynkoop, of Siebert, Hedden & Wynkoop was the architect. Albert T. Shaw was the owner of the project.
The Uptown Theatre first appears in the 1937 edition of the FDY. The Uptown appears on David and Noelle’s list of known Boller Brothers theaters as a 1935 design, so it probably opened in 1936, but too late to be included in the Yearbook.
This house opened, perhaps as the Princess Theatre, in 1920. This PDF with a brief history of Sweet Springs quotes (on page 19) an article from the March 4 issue of the Sweet Springs Herald:
“C. J. Caldwell has been at work with a force of hands thoroughly remodeling the Hayman property on Lexington Avenue he recently purchased, and fitting it for a modern picture theater. A heating plant was put in, the floor lowered, a balcony built, ticket office, newly decorated and painted, opera chairs have been added, making it one of the nicest and most convenient theaters in this part of the state. The new theater will probably be called ‘The Princess’ and will be in operation within two weeks.”
An item from November, 1931, is also cited, saying that Floyd Ripley had leased the Star Theatre from Mr. Goodnight. The Star Theatre showed its first talking picture on April 15, 1930.
According to the January 14, 1937, issue of The Film Daily this house had been renamed the Mida Theatre: “SWEET SPRINGS— Mida (formerly Star), transferred to D. J. Foley.” But then the March 7 issue listed the Mida in the “Closings” section of its “Theater Changes” column.
The author of the history I cited gives the impression that it was renamed the Ritz Theatre later in 1937, citing an article in the August 13 issue of the Herald:
“The managers of the Ritz Theater are more than pleased with the way their program of up-to-the-minute shows is meeting with public approval. On their opening night, they played to a full house, and their seating capacity has been taxed since then. Miller Brothers, the managers, believe that their cooling system makes the theater the coolest place in town. Next Thursday a new plan is being tried No one will be at the box office selling tickets. but after the show patrons will be given the opportunity of dropping the amount in a box that they think the show was worth.”
Nothing in the document specifically says that the Star became the Ritz. The 1938 FDY actually lists three theaters at Sweet Springs: The Ritz, with 350 seats; the Star, with 400 seats, but closed; and the Uptown, with 394 seats. It’s possible that the FDY just didn’t keep up with the changes and listed the Star/Ritz under both its old and its new name. The Star is not listed in the FDY after 1938. The Ritz is listed through 1945.
The Wednesday, June 12, 1918, issue of The Gastonia Gazette said that the Gastonian Theatre would open on Friday.
I suspect that the Gastonian’s site was under the footprint of the modern Gaston County Administration Building. An old red brick building on the corner of Marietta Street, now the Carriage Company Lofts, uses the address 100 W. Main, but it is a double-width building that has two storefronts, so it might historically have been 100 and 102 W. Main. Next door to it is an old building with a pale brick front, vacant in the current street view and displaying no address. If that building is at 104 W. Main then 106 has been demolished. But 104 was the address of the Cozy Theatre, which the Gastonia apparently drove out of business. If the Cozy was in that building I guess it gets the last laugh.
However, if the addresses rise more rapidly, then the building with the pale brick front might be 106, and the Cozy might have been in the second storefront of the red brick building on the corner, and both theater buildings would still be standing. But in the absence of some source such as old photos or a Sanborn map there’s no way to tell.
The Cozy is listed in the 1918-1919 city directory, but not in the 1921-1922 or later editions. No directory for the years between is available online, but the Cozy was gone by 1921. Most likely it succumbed due to competition from the Gastonia Theatre, opened next door in June, 1918.
This house opened sometime between 1927 and 1930 as the Loray Theatre, and appears to have been the second location of that house. In 1935, it was remodeled and enlarged and reopened as the Carolina Theatre. The September 12, 1935, issue of The Gastonia Gazette had this item about the theater:
“Since the remodeling of the old Loray theater into the new Carolina theater there has been a decided change for the better in the behavior of former boisterous and rowdy patrons. Whistling, cat calls and profanity have been banned, and pictures can now be enjoyed in comfort and pleasure.”
The April 18, 1935, issue of The Film Daily noted the planned changes at the Loray Theatre:
“GASTONIA— W. T. Gray will close the Loray for a complete remodeling and enlarging. Plans call for 700 seats, modern ventilating and equipment throughout; cost $10,000. Unique cooling plant; local ice company plant adjacent will be hooked up with theatre in summer.”
DocSouth’s “Going to the Show” lists two addresses for the Loray Theatre, and neither of them is 1225 W. Franklin. One Loray Theatre operated from around 1921 to around 1927 at 1230 W. Franklin, DocSouth says, and another operated at 1212 W. Franklin beginning around 1930. The house at 1230 had 200 seats, but no capacity is listed for the one at 1212.
To add further complication, a 1910 city directory lists the Loray Theatre at 1228 W. Franklin, but this might have been the same theater that was operating 1921-1927.
The Loray Theatre that was at 1212 W. Franklin was remodeled and enlarged in 1935 and was renamed the Carolina Theatre, according to the September 12 issue of The Gastonia Gazette. DocSouth doesn’t list the Carolina Theatre. Both buildings occupied by the Loray Theatre have been demolished.
An item in the April 17, 1935, issue of The Film Daily said that the new theater to be built at 361 W. 23rd Street was located on the site of the former home of actress Lily Langtry.
The address of the original Sayville Theatre was probably 107 Railroad Avenue, if as robboehm says it was next door to the north of the site of its replacement at 103 Railroad. The building the other side of the parking lot is at 111-113 Railroad.
The April 6, 1935, issue of The film Daily said that the Sayville Theatre was soon to be remodeled:
“John Eberson, architect, has been commissioned by Prudential Playhouses to handle the complete remodeling of the Sayville Theater, Sayville, L. I. Alterations include exterior, interior and practically all equipment and furnishings.”
An inventory of historic buildings in Weston says that the Camden Block was built in 1896-1897. It housed a bank, a hotel, shops, and the Camden Opera House. The building was designed by the architectural firm of Yost & Packard. The auditorium was severely damaged by a fire in the 1960s and the remains were demolished, but the rest of the building survives. The inventory only gives the Main Street address of the building, but the theater entrance was probably at about 9 E. 2nd Street.
An inventory of historic buildings in Weston prepared for the NRHP said that the Barnes Building at 241 N. Main Street, built in 1925, was remodeled to accommodate a movie theater in the 1930s, and that the theater closed in the 1950s. It must have been the Hollywood Theatre. At the time the inventory was prepared the building was still standing, with its marquee still intact, but I believe it has since been demolished.
The last year the Hollywood Theatre was listed in the Film Daily Yearbook was 1956.
The Boxoffice article Tinseltoes linked to says that the original West Columbia Theatres I&II was designed by the architectural firm of Van Wenema & Postman.
The 1928 and 1929 FDYs list a Zazza-Jazz Theatre and a Jazz Theatre, both with the address 1751 Larimer Street. (I recall having seen the name Zarra-Jazz somewhere on the Internet, too, but I can’t recall exactly where.) However, I think it’s likely that the FDY made a mistake, conflating two theaters.
There was another house called simply the ZaZa Theatre, located down the block from the Jazz (at 1727 Larimer Street according to this web page.) The ZaZa was one of the childhood haunts of Neal Cassady in the 1930s. The FDY didn’t include addresses for Denver theaters in 1930, and while the Jazz Theatre is not listed that year the ZaZa Theatre is. In 1931 the Jazz is listed as closed, and the ZaZa is open. In 1932, both theaters are open again. 1933 is the last year the Jazz is listed, and it is again listed as closed. The ZaZa was last listed in 1941.
An out-of-print book called Denver’s Old Theater Row: The Story of Curtis Street and Its Glamorous Show Business, by Forrest Johnson, mentions both the ZaZa and Jazz Theatres in a brief passage that is cited in one of Paul O'Malley’s papers on Denver theaters. In 1922, a Mr. Frank A. Milton took over operation of the Rivoli Theatre, and O'Malley quotes Johnson thusly: “For about two years, Milton had been running the Folly, ZaZa and Jazz [theaters], as Girlie-Girle shows….” So the Jazz Theatre could have been in operation by 1920, and was certainly in operation by 1922, but had either closed permanently or perhaps gone back to some sort of live performances by 1933.
In any case, while there was a Jazz Theatre and there was a ZaZa Theatre down the block from it, odds are that there never was a house called the Zazza-Jazz (or Zarra-Jazz) Theatre, but if there was it was most likely the house later called simply the ZaZa, not the Jazz.
The correct address for this theater is 1746 Curtis Street, and its final name was Gem Theatre. In the 1920s and 1930s it was most commonly listed with 960 seats, but in later years the FDY listed it with between 600 and 700 seats. The three-story Romanesque Revival structure at 1734-1746 Curtis Street was called the Chicago Block, and it housed a theater at the address 1746 from 1890 on.
The first house was the Wonderland Museum and Variety Theatre, operating from 1890-1893. It was a small hall oriented north and south, with its stage at one corner of what would later be the auditorium of an expanded theater. The front section of the Wonderland would later be the lobby of the Isis Theatre.
In 1894, the house became the Curtis Street Theatre, and then from 1895 to 1899 it was the Orpheum Theatre. It underwent improvements in 1899 and reopened as the Denver Theatre in September. This might have been when the auditorium was expanded to an east-west alignment, running behind all the storefronts in the Chicago Block.
In 1902, it was renamed the Curtis Theatre, but closed after suffering a fire in May, 1904. It reopened on October 3. The house was closed during the 1909-1910 theatrical season, but was remodeled in 1910, reopening as the Iris Theatre, a motion picture house, on June 4.
For the next several years the Iris was one of Denver’s most popular movie theaters, part of the Curtis Street theater district described in the July 15, 1916, issue of The Moving Picture World:
The Iris declined in popularity in the early 1920s with the arrival of newer theaters. Although it was listed in the FDY as late as 1926, the Denver City Directory listed its address as the location of the Mars Theatre from 1925 to 1928. The Mars Theatre was never listed in the FDY, and was probably not operated as a movie house.The house reappears in the FDY in 1933 as the Gem Theatre, the name it retained for the remainder of its history. It was still in operation as an adult theater in the late 1960s, just before the Chicago Block was demolished.
A paper about the theaters at 1746 Curtis Street from 1890 to 1920, by Paul O'Mally, is available in PFD format from Academia.edu at this link, but you have to sign up for the web site if you want to download it.
The web site Historic Buildings of Connecticut says that the Redman’s Hall was designed by architect Walter P. Crabtree.
Construction of the Academy of Music began in 1887. A history of Newburgh’s Masonic Lodge published in 1896 says that in late 1887, while the Academy was under construction, the Masons leased the rooms on the third and fourth floors of the building, and the rooms were complete and ready for a dedication ceremony which was held on September 11, 1888. The theater must have been opened around the same time.
The Academy was probably the first the first theater in Newburgh to open with electric lights, which had been first introduced at the Savoy Theatre in London in 1881. The November 3, 1888, issue of The Electrical World had this item:
An advertisement in the New York Dramatic Mirror was placed prior to opening by local manager A. S. Wood and New York booking agents Klaw & Erlinger describing the Academy. The ground floor house had 1,252 seats, six boxes, a stage 80 feet wide and 30 feet deep, and boasted “[e]very improvement in heating and electric light” as well as “15 sets of first-class scenery” among its equipment.I haven’t been able to discover for certain who designed the Academy of Music, but there is a tantalizing reference in a booklet published for the New York Terra Cotta Company in 1891. Terra Cotta in Architecture, by Walter Geer, lists a number of buildings in which the company’s products had been used, and one of the two buildings listed at Newburgh is a Grand Opera House. I’ve found no other references to a Grand Opera House ever having existed in Newburgh, and I think it very likely that the building in question was actually the Academy of Music, misnamed. In 1891, it was the only large theater that had yet been built at Newburgh.
The booklet lists the Albany firm Fuller & Wheeler as the architects. Diana S. Waite’s Architects in Albany includes a brief biography of Albert W. Fuller, by T. Robins Brown, (Google Books preview, page 34) which includes a list of their buildings, but only those in Albany, and it has a drawing of their 1889 Albany YMCA, which was designed in the same Romanesque Revival style as the Academy of Music. The firm designed projects outside Albany, including YMCA buildings as far away as Montreal, Quebec, and Oakland, California, and they assisted in the design of a YMCA in Paris, France, so a project in Newburgh would not have been surprising.
So, while I’ve found no specific attribution of the Academy of Music to any architect, I do think it very likely that it was designed by Albert W. Fuller and William Arthur Wheeler.
It’s also of interest that, when the Newburgh Masonic lodge moved out of the Academy building in 1914, Albert Fuller (by then a partner in the firm of Fuller & Robinson) was the architect they chose to design their new building. I think that does indicate some familiarity with his work among citizens of Newburgh.
This item about the Wyatt Theatre is from the September 16, 1916, issue of The Moving Picture World:
The New York Public Library has this postcard view of the Wyatt Theatre, undated, but probably from the 1910s.Here is a brief article about the Chandler Music Hall from the June, 1910, issue of the construction trade journal Concrete:
E. N. Boyden was probably the son of Elbridge C. Boyden, one of the leading architects in Worcester, Massachusetts in the last half of the 19th century. The younger Boyden is best known for a number of houses he designed in Boston’s Back Bay district.I’ve found opening dates claimed on theater web sites to be in conflict with the historical record several times. In some cases something bad might have happened to the original theater and it had to be replaced, but in others I think local memory has just gone a bit fuzzy.
The January 14, 1937, issue of The Film Daily lists a Ramona Theatre in Ramona, California, as a new house. It appears in the 1938 FDY with 150 seats, but is not consistent in later editions. In 1939 it is up to 200 seats, in 1943 it reaches 296, then in 1949 it is back down to 230, and in 1956 it is still in operation but with 235 seats.
Why the seating capacity was so variable is as much a mystery as why it had a grand opening in 1947. Perhaps it was reopening after a major renovation that year, or a rebuilding after a fire, or after being taken over by new owners. I think the current theater is the one from 1937, though. Had it been built new as late as 1947 it would most likely have been a freestanding building with its own parking lot. Parking was not yet crucial in the 1930s, but it certainly was in the post-war period, especially in California.
Ramona Mainstage has a web site The “About” page has a photo of the 1947 event, though it is small and doesn’t show much detail. There’s definitely a post-war car parked in front of the theater though (a 1946 or 47 Chevrolet Aero sedan, if I’m not mistaken.)
The Broadway Theatre in El Centro, California, was listed as a new theater in the January 14, 1937, issue of The Film Daily.
The Mission Theatre in Fallbrook, California, was listed in the “New Theaters” column of the January 14, 1937, issue of The Film Daily. It was also mentioned in the April 4, 1937, issue of Motion Picture Herald, which said that W. J. Eagleston had purchased the lease and furnishings of the Mission Theatre from the Fallbrook Theatre Corporation.
Cards in the L.A. Public Library’s California Index call this house the Ramona Theatre, which must have been its opening name, probably in late 1924. The July 18, 1924, issue of Southwest Builder & Contractor said that the contract for construction of a two-story brick store, theater, and office building at 681-687 Redondo Boulevard in Long Beach had been let to Alfred Butterfield. Frank Wynkoop, of Siebert, Hedden & Wynkoop was the architect. Albert T. Shaw was the owner of the project.
The Uptown Theatre first appears in the 1937 edition of the FDY. The Uptown appears on David and Noelle’s list of known Boller Brothers theaters as a 1935 design, so it probably opened in 1936, but too late to be included in the Yearbook.
This house opened, perhaps as the Princess Theatre, in 1920. This PDF with a brief history of Sweet Springs quotes (on page 19) an article from the March 4 issue of the Sweet Springs Herald:
An item from November, 1931, is also cited, saying that Floyd Ripley had leased the Star Theatre from Mr. Goodnight. The Star Theatre showed its first talking picture on April 15, 1930.According to the January 14, 1937, issue of The Film Daily this house had been renamed the Mida Theatre: “SWEET SPRINGS— Mida (formerly Star), transferred to D. J. Foley.” But then the March 7 issue listed the Mida in the “Closings” section of its “Theater Changes” column.
The author of the history I cited gives the impression that it was renamed the Ritz Theatre later in 1937, citing an article in the August 13 issue of the Herald:
Nothing in the document specifically says that the Star became the Ritz. The 1938 FDY actually lists three theaters at Sweet Springs: The Ritz, with 350 seats; the Star, with 400 seats, but closed; and the Uptown, with 394 seats. It’s possible that the FDY just didn’t keep up with the changes and listed the Star/Ritz under both its old and its new name. The Star is not listed in the FDY after 1938. The Ritz is listed through 1945.The 1930-1931 Gastonia city directory lists the Ideal Theatre at 159-161 W. Main Avenue. It had previously been listed at 125 or 127 W. Main.
The Wednesday, June 12, 1918, issue of The Gastonia Gazette said that the Gastonian Theatre would open on Friday.
I suspect that the Gastonian’s site was under the footprint of the modern Gaston County Administration Building. An old red brick building on the corner of Marietta Street, now the Carriage Company Lofts, uses the address 100 W. Main, but it is a double-width building that has two storefronts, so it might historically have been 100 and 102 W. Main. Next door to it is an old building with a pale brick front, vacant in the current street view and displaying no address. If that building is at 104 W. Main then 106 has been demolished. But 104 was the address of the Cozy Theatre, which the Gastonia apparently drove out of business. If the Cozy was in that building I guess it gets the last laugh.
However, if the addresses rise more rapidly, then the building with the pale brick front might be 106, and the Cozy might have been in the second storefront of the red brick building on the corner, and both theater buildings would still be standing. But in the absence of some source such as old photos or a Sanborn map there’s no way to tell.
The Cozy is listed in the 1918-1919 city directory, but not in the 1921-1922 or later editions. No directory for the years between is available online, but the Cozy was gone by 1921. Most likely it succumbed due to competition from the Gastonia Theatre, opened next door in June, 1918.
This house opened sometime between 1927 and 1930 as the Loray Theatre, and appears to have been the second location of that house. In 1935, it was remodeled and enlarged and reopened as the Carolina Theatre. The September 12, 1935, issue of The Gastonia Gazette had this item about the theater:
The April 18, 1935, issue of The Film Daily noted the planned changes at the Loray Theatre:DocSouth’s “Going to the Show” lists two addresses for the Loray Theatre, and neither of them is 1225 W. Franklin. One Loray Theatre operated from around 1921 to around 1927 at 1230 W. Franklin, DocSouth says, and another operated at 1212 W. Franklin beginning around 1930. The house at 1230 had 200 seats, but no capacity is listed for the one at 1212.
To add further complication, a 1910 city directory lists the Loray Theatre at 1228 W. Franklin, but this might have been the same theater that was operating 1921-1927.
The Loray Theatre that was at 1212 W. Franklin was remodeled and enlarged in 1935 and was renamed the Carolina Theatre, according to the September 12 issue of The Gastonia Gazette. DocSouth doesn’t list the Carolina Theatre. Both buildings occupied by the Loray Theatre have been demolished.
An opening announcement for Craver’s Ideal Theatre published in The Gastonia Gazette, June 30, 1913, says that it was formerly Beard’s Theato.
An item in the April 17, 1935, issue of The Film Daily said that the new theater to be built at 361 W. 23rd Street was located on the site of the former home of actress Lily Langtry.
The address of the original Sayville Theatre was probably 107 Railroad Avenue, if as robboehm says it was next door to the north of the site of its replacement at 103 Railroad. The building the other side of the parking lot is at 111-113 Railroad.
The April 6, 1935, issue of The film Daily said that the Sayville Theatre was soon to be remodeled: