The Cameo Theatre is first listed in the 1928 edition of the Film Daily Yearbook, but with no seating capacity given. However, the Cameo is mentioned in the Santa Cruz Evening News of December 15, 1925, which said the new house was to open that night. The Cameo boasted something called an Orthophonic Victrola, a Leatherby electric piano, and a soundproof cry room where parents could take squalling children and still watch the show. I think this is the earliest instance of a cry room I’ve yet come across.
I just checked the Santa Cruz directories again, and the Grand is not listed in the 1916 edition. In 1918 it is listed at 280 Pacific Avenue, but in 1916 that address was the address of James Morgan’s hat works. Was the Grand Theatre that Edward Prince attended in 1910 and 1911 in the same location as the one listed in the 1918 directory, or was that a different house?
Also, in the 1921 directory 280 Pacific is the office of real estate agent G. L. Watkins, so the Grand had gone again by then. I’ve checked the FDY’s from the late 1920s (1925 through 1929), as mentioned in our description of the theater, but I don’t find the Grand listed an any of them. Maybe it never reopened after closing sometime between 1918 and 1921. Only the Unique and New Santa Cruz are listed until 1928, when the Cameo makes its first appearance.
Edward E. Prince, who lived in Santa Cruz from June 21, 1910, to December 16, 1911, mentioned attending local theaters in his diary. He attended both the Unique and the Jewel Theatres on September 24, 1910, and saw the Jeffries-Johnson fight pictures at the Unique on November 5 that same year. He didn’t mention the Unique in his 1911 diary.
Edward E. Prince, who lived in Santa Cruz from June 21, 1910, to December 16, 1911, kept a diary in which he mentions attending theaters in Santa Cruz. He mentions the Jewel Theatre by name on September 24, 1910. He also saw the movies at the Unique Theatre the same day.
The diary of Edward E. Prince, who lived in Santa Cruz from June 21, 1910, to December 16, 1911, has entries mentioning the Grand Theatre. He attended the Grand on September 15, 1910, and on January 27 and October 2, 1911. He mentions missing a chance to win a prize of five dollars that was given away by the Grand on December 16, 1910, because he had to work.
The Grand Theatre was listed in the 1916 and 1918 editions of the Western Directory Company’s Santa Cruz County Directory, but was not in the 1921 edition. It apparently reopened for a while later in the 1920s, but didn’t outlive the silent movie era.
The Jewel Theatre was listed in the 1916 and 1918 editions of the Western Directory Company’s Santa Cruz County Directory, but not in the 1921 edition.
The Unique had another name before Mack Swain bought it around 1906-1907. It was called the Alisky Theatre, and was operated by Charles W. Alisky, who also had an eponymous theater in Sacramento.
The Unique Theatre was listed in the 1916, 1918 and 1921 editions of the Western Directory Company’s Santa Cruz County Directory, so the name change from Swain’s Theatre was made before 1916. This page has a photo of Pacific Avenue dated circa 1910, and shows the Unique Theatre at right.
I haven’t found either the Alisky or Swain’s Theatre listed in Julius Chan’s guides, but the 1907-1908 edition of Henry’s Official Western Theatrical Guide lists Swain’s Theatre as a 700-seat, ground floor house with a stage 20 x 41 feet. It also lists the Opera House (800 seats) and the Casino Theatre (1,500 seats.) Cahn’s guides list the Santa Cruz Opera House in 1899-1900, 1906-1907, and 1913-1914, and the Casino Theatre in 1913-1914, though with only 1,000 seats. I’ve been unable to discover what became of the Opera House and the Casino Theatre. They are not listed in the city directories.
The April, 1976, issue of Esquire had an article about the Sash Mill Cinema on pages 76-77, according to a card in the L.A. Public Library’s California Index. The magazine isn’t available online, but there must still be original copies out there somewhere.
CSWalczak: The 3D Film Archive says that the Cycloramic screen was introduced in 1949 for a revival of a big screen projection process from the 1920s called Magnascope. The page features this trade journal advertisement for B. F. Shearer featuring the Starke Cycloramic Screen. As the Rio was built in 1949, the timing was right for it to have been a Cycloramic house. B. F. Shearer was the leading theater supply company in the west for decades, and probably supplied the furnishings and equipment for the Rio.
Cyclorama is, of course, also the name of the large, white, usually concave backdrops that have been used in stage theaters since the 19th century.
The current Google street view is out of date. Construction on the Cinemark Mall St. Matthews project had not yet begun when it was made. This June, 2012 article from WDRB.com says that the theater was to replace the old Dillard’s department store building (Dillard’s had moved to a new location in the mall several years earlier.) I’ve set Street View to show the former Dillard’s, and hope that when Google updates it will show the theater.
CinemaTour probably got the address from the FDY, and I’m sure that this is one of those cases where the FDY made a mistake and never corrected it in later editions.
In Google Street View, the building at 2501-2503 Portland looks like an old frame house that had a storefront added to its corner at some point, and then later the building was partly covered with a facing of red brick. It looks way too old to have been built as late as the 1950s, and it certainly couldn’t have held a theater. The theater in the photo wasn’t on a corner, either, which is where 2501 is. The theater has houses close to both sides of it.
The clincher is this post by Charlie Porter on Rootsweb. He remembers going to the Norman Theatre in the 1940s and 1950s, and says that it was on Portland Avenue near 22nd Street. It was still being run by members of the Wentzell family at that time.
In this 1949 view from Historic Aerials, the Norman Theatre must have been in the large, oblong building on the north side of Portland a few doors down from 22nd Street. Everything on that side of the block has since been wiped out for a freeway and its ramps.
This multiplex now operates under the name Baxter Avenue Filmworks. Here is their web site. Apex Entertainment also operates the Village 8 Theatres. Louisville’s discount movie house.
I think we have the two middle digits of the Norman Theatre’s address transposed. The January 10, 1914, issue of The Moving Picture World mentions the Norman Theatre and its manager, Edward Wentzell. The July 15, 1911, issue of the same publication had this item:
“Louisville, Ky. — J. M. Wentzell filed plans for a moving picture theater in the office of the building inspector. The theater is to be located at 2051 Portland Avenue and will cost $6,500. It is to be completed by August 1.”
Edward Wentzell was probably a relative of J. M. Wentzell. The web site Historic Aerials has views of both 2501 and 2051 Portland Avenue from 1949, when the theater was still listed in the FDY, and while there was a building of the right size for the theater at 2051, the building at 2501 was much too small.
A later report in MPW upped the estimated cost of the new theater to $7,500, and an October 7, 1916, item mentioned that a $1,200 generating plant was being installed in the Norman Theatre by manager Mort Wentzel [sic]. The October 14, 1927, issue of Motion Picture News mentioned W. M. Wentzell of the Norman Theatre, Louisville.
The Strand and the Priscilla are both listed in the 1941 Film Daily Yearbook. The Priscilla, which was closed, had 300 seats, and the Strand, open, had 390.
This house opened as the Strand Theatre, probably in late 1920, and was never called the Priscilla. A 1921 Toledo directory lists both the Strand, at 322 Summit Street, and the Priscilla Theatre, at 330 Summit. A list of Toledo theaters published in 1919 also has the Priscilla at 330 Summit, but no theater listed at 322 Summit.
In a 1921 Toledo city directory, 421 N. Superior Street is listed as the location of the Orpheum Theatre. The Orpheum Theatre, with 634 seats, was also at that address on a list of Toledo theaters published in 1919. An Orpheum Theatre was in operation in Toledo at least as early as 1912.
Something I never knew about the Garfield Theatre is this bit of news from the January 13, 1929, issue of The Film Daily:
“Alhambra House Opens
“Alhambra, Cal. — The Garfield, recently destroyed by fire, has been opened with renovations. The house shows sound picture via Vitaphone.”
I think that the Garfield must have lost some of its original Egyptian decor in this fire, as there was little of it left by the 1950s even though the house then looked like it hadn’t been updated in decades.
Motion Picture News of November 21, 1914, said that the “Maxime” Theatre, then under construction on Mack Avenue, was nearing completion. The Maxine was built by pioneer Detroit exhibitor A. Arthur Caille, who died about a year after this theater opened. His obituary appeared in the January 15, 1916, issue of The Moving Picture World (scan at Google Books.)
The September 16, 1916, issue of The Moving Picture World said that the Ferry Field Theatre had opened on August 31. The theater was decorated in the Spanish Renaissance style.
The November 21, 1914, issue of The Moving Picture World said that the Knickerbocker Theatre, then under construction by the Ingersoll-Gaukler Company, was expected to open by May, 1915.
Here is a newspaper article about the proposed Pantheon Theatre, published in the Toledo Times, July 3, 1919.
“TOLEDO TO GET A COSTLY NEW PICTURE HOUSE
“Pantheon Theatre Company Incorporates and Takes Over Kaiserhof Cafe.
“HAS ONE HUNDRED THOUSAND DOLLARS CAPITAL.
“New Theatre to Be One of the Finest in Country; Will Seat 1,200.
“Incorporation of the Pantheon Theater Co. with a capital stock of $100,000 assures Toledo the erection of one of the finest motion picture houses in the country.
“The new company has taken over the property formerly occupied by the Kaiserhof cafe.
“The exterior of the building will be glazed terra cotta.
“A large foyer, which will accommodate more than 300, will be utilized as a dance hall on special occasions, and the dances may be made a regular feature of the program. Back of the lobby will be a large reception and music room, elaborately furnished, where concerts may be held.
“The stage will be 18 feet in depth. The proscenium will measure 30 feet and there will be an elaborate equipment of built-in sets and scenery for special features.
“Elaborate simplicity is designated as the keynote of the decorations which will make the new house one of the most beautiful in this part of the country.
“There will be no balcony, but the theatre will have a seating capacity of 1,200. A $25,000 Hope Jones organ will be installed.
“A large canopy will be built over the street and there will be a double ticket window. A new lighting system, on the order of the ‘flood light,’ will be used.
“Rest rooms, a private projection room and dressing rooms for the ushers and performers will be located in the basement. A play room for children will also be down stairs.
“H. C. Horater, John Kumler and John J. Gardiner are the incorporators of the new company. Horater, who is manager, secretary and treasurer of the Alhambra theatre, will continue as managing director of both companies. Gardiner is president of the Alhambra Co.
“The Alhambra theatre was built eight years ago.
“Four years ago Horater took the active management and with a policy of showing only the best pictures has made it one of the best known motion picture houses in the country. The most promising features procurable in motion pictures have been secured for exhibition at the new house during the coming year.“
The seating capacity needs to be updated. The original Cinema I & II seated 1,805 (705 and 1,100.) The addition of the 1,140-seat third auditorium in 1967 brought the total to 2,945. I don’t know if any seats were lost when two auditoriums were later divided to make this a five-screen multiplex.
The Strand Theatre is listed at 402 E. Fourth Street in city directories from 1921 through 1978. It had the longest run under a single name of any theater in Waterloo, and the longest run of any Waterloo house but the Palace/Waterloo, which operated from 1914 to 1982.
The Cameo Theatre is first listed in the 1928 edition of the Film Daily Yearbook, but with no seating capacity given. However, the Cameo is mentioned in the Santa Cruz Evening News of December 15, 1925, which said the new house was to open that night. The Cameo boasted something called an Orthophonic Victrola, a Leatherby electric piano, and a soundproof cry room where parents could take squalling children and still watch the show. I think this is the earliest instance of a cry room I’ve yet come across.
I just checked the Santa Cruz directories again, and the Grand is not listed in the 1916 edition. In 1918 it is listed at 280 Pacific Avenue, but in 1916 that address was the address of James Morgan’s hat works. Was the Grand Theatre that Edward Prince attended in 1910 and 1911 in the same location as the one listed in the 1918 directory, or was that a different house?
Also, in the 1921 directory 280 Pacific is the office of real estate agent G. L. Watkins, so the Grand had gone again by then. I’ve checked the FDY’s from the late 1920s (1925 through 1929), as mentioned in our description of the theater, but I don’t find the Grand listed an any of them. Maybe it never reopened after closing sometime between 1918 and 1921. Only the Unique and New Santa Cruz are listed until 1928, when the Cameo makes its first appearance.
Edward E. Prince, who lived in Santa Cruz from June 21, 1910, to December 16, 1911, mentioned attending local theaters in his diary. He attended both the Unique and the Jewel Theatres on September 24, 1910, and saw the Jeffries-Johnson fight pictures at the Unique on November 5 that same year. He didn’t mention the Unique in his 1911 diary.
Edward E. Prince, who lived in Santa Cruz from June 21, 1910, to December 16, 1911, kept a diary in which he mentions attending theaters in Santa Cruz. He mentions the Jewel Theatre by name on September 24, 1910. He also saw the movies at the Unique Theatre the same day.
The diary of Edward E. Prince, who lived in Santa Cruz from June 21, 1910, to December 16, 1911, has entries mentioning the Grand Theatre. He attended the Grand on September 15, 1910, and on January 27 and October 2, 1911. He mentions missing a chance to win a prize of five dollars that was given away by the Grand on December 16, 1910, because he had to work.
The Grand Theatre was listed in the 1916 and 1918 editions of the Western Directory Company’s Santa Cruz County Directory, but was not in the 1921 edition. It apparently reopened for a while later in the 1920s, but didn’t outlive the silent movie era.
The Jewel Theatre was listed in the 1916 and 1918 editions of the Western Directory Company’s Santa Cruz County Directory, but not in the 1921 edition.
The Unique had another name before Mack Swain bought it around 1906-1907. It was called the Alisky Theatre, and was operated by Charles W. Alisky, who also had an eponymous theater in Sacramento.
The Unique Theatre was listed in the 1916, 1918 and 1921 editions of the Western Directory Company’s Santa Cruz County Directory, so the name change from Swain’s Theatre was made before 1916. This page has a photo of Pacific Avenue dated circa 1910, and shows the Unique Theatre at right.
I haven’t found either the Alisky or Swain’s Theatre listed in Julius Chan’s guides, but the 1907-1908 edition of Henry’s Official Western Theatrical Guide lists Swain’s Theatre as a 700-seat, ground floor house with a stage 20 x 41 feet. It also lists the Opera House (800 seats) and the Casino Theatre (1,500 seats.) Cahn’s guides list the Santa Cruz Opera House in 1899-1900, 1906-1907, and 1913-1914, and the Casino Theatre in 1913-1914, though with only 1,000 seats. I’ve been unable to discover what became of the Opera House and the Casino Theatre. They are not listed in the city directories.
The April, 1976, issue of Esquire had an article about the Sash Mill Cinema on pages 76-77, according to a card in the L.A. Public Library’s California Index. The magazine isn’t available online, but there must still be original copies out there somewhere.
CSWalczak: The 3D Film Archive says that the Cycloramic screen was introduced in 1949 for a revival of a big screen projection process from the 1920s called Magnascope. The page features this trade journal advertisement for B. F. Shearer featuring the Starke Cycloramic Screen. As the Rio was built in 1949, the timing was right for it to have been a Cycloramic house. B. F. Shearer was the leading theater supply company in the west for decades, and probably supplied the furnishings and equipment for the Rio.
Cyclorama is, of course, also the name of the large, white, usually concave backdrops that have been used in stage theaters since the 19th century.
The current Google street view is out of date. Construction on the Cinemark Mall St. Matthews project had not yet begun when it was made. This June, 2012 article from WDRB.com says that the theater was to replace the old Dillard’s department store building (Dillard’s had moved to a new location in the mall several years earlier.) I’ve set Street View to show the former Dillard’s, and hope that when Google updates it will show the theater.
This more recent article from WDRB has a photo of the completed theater.
I have uploaded to the photo section three photos of the Montgomery Theatre that were published in 1911.
CinemaTour probably got the address from the FDY, and I’m sure that this is one of those cases where the FDY made a mistake and never corrected it in later editions.
In Google Street View, the building at 2501-2503 Portland looks like an old frame house that had a storefront added to its corner at some point, and then later the building was partly covered with a facing of red brick. It looks way too old to have been built as late as the 1950s, and it certainly couldn’t have held a theater. The theater in the photo wasn’t on a corner, either, which is where 2501 is. The theater has houses close to both sides of it.
The clincher is this post by Charlie Porter on Rootsweb. He remembers going to the Norman Theatre in the 1940s and 1950s, and says that it was on Portland Avenue near 22nd Street. It was still being run by members of the Wentzell family at that time.
In this 1949 view from Historic Aerials, the Norman Theatre must have been in the large, oblong building on the north side of Portland a few doors down from 22nd Street. Everything on that side of the block has since been wiped out for a freeway and its ramps.
This multiplex now operates under the name Baxter Avenue Filmworks. Here is their web site. Apex Entertainment also operates the Village 8 Theatres. Louisville’s discount movie house.
I think we have the two middle digits of the Norman Theatre’s address transposed. The January 10, 1914, issue of The Moving Picture World mentions the Norman Theatre and its manager, Edward Wentzell. The July 15, 1911, issue of the same publication had this item:
Edward Wentzell was probably a relative of J. M. Wentzell. The web site Historic Aerials has views of both 2501 and 2051 Portland Avenue from 1949, when the theater was still listed in the FDY, and while there was a building of the right size for the theater at 2051, the building at 2501 was much too small.A later report in MPW upped the estimated cost of the new theater to $7,500, and an October 7, 1916, item mentioned that a $1,200 generating plant was being installed in the Norman Theatre by manager Mort Wentzel [sic]. The October 14, 1927, issue of Motion Picture News mentioned W. M. Wentzell of the Norman Theatre, Louisville.
The Strand and the Priscilla are both listed in the 1941 Film Daily Yearbook. The Priscilla, which was closed, had 300 seats, and the Strand, open, had 390.
This house opened as the Strand Theatre, probably in late 1920, and was never called the Priscilla. A 1921 Toledo directory lists both the Strand, at 322 Summit Street, and the Priscilla Theatre, at 330 Summit. A list of Toledo theaters published in 1919 also has the Priscilla at 330 Summit, but no theater listed at 322 Summit.
In a 1921 Toledo city directory, 421 N. Superior Street is listed as the location of the Orpheum Theatre. The Orpheum Theatre, with 634 seats, was also at that address on a list of Toledo theaters published in 1919. An Orpheum Theatre was in operation in Toledo at least as early as 1912.
Something I never knew about the Garfield Theatre is this bit of news from the January 13, 1929, issue of The Film Daily:
I think that the Garfield must have lost some of its original Egyptian decor in this fire, as there was little of it left by the 1950s even though the house then looked like it hadn’t been updated in decades.Motion Picture News of November 21, 1914, said that the “Maxime” Theatre, then under construction on Mack Avenue, was nearing completion. The Maxine was built by pioneer Detroit exhibitor A. Arthur Caille, who died about a year after this theater opened. His obituary appeared in the January 15, 1916, issue of The Moving Picture World (scan at Google Books.)
Street View has been set to a location in Highland Park several miles from the Grand River Avenue site of the theater. The zip code is 48208.
The September 16, 1916, issue of The Moving Picture World said that the Ferry Field Theatre had opened on August 31. The theater was decorated in the Spanish Renaissance style.
The November 21, 1914, issue of The Moving Picture World said that the Knickerbocker Theatre, then under construction by the Ingersoll-Gaukler Company, was expected to open by May, 1915.
Here is a newspaper article about the proposed Pantheon Theatre, published in the Toledo Times, July 3, 1919.
The seating capacity needs to be updated. The original Cinema I & II seated 1,805 (705 and 1,100.) The addition of the 1,140-seat third auditorium in 1967 brought the total to 2,945. I don’t know if any seats were lost when two auditoriums were later divided to make this a five-screen multiplex.
The Strand Theatre is listed at 402 E. Fourth Street in city directories from 1921 through 1978. It had the longest run under a single name of any theater in Waterloo, and the longest run of any Waterloo house but the Palace/Waterloo, which operated from 1914 to 1982.