The Harvester Theatre was still in operation as late as 1932, when the January 30 issue of Motion Picture Herald reported that Frank Leino had been named its manager.
1215 Whitley Avenue is now the home of the Discount Variety Store, but the facade still shows a bit of Art Deco detailing that must survive from the time the building housed the Corcoran Theatre.
Boxoffice of January 6, 1951, noted that both the Corcoran and Lake Theatres in Corcoran were owned by Robert Lippert.
This derive-in was set to open shortly, according to Boxoffice of January 6, 1951. However, records of a court case involving Michael A. Parker, developer of the project, and one of the contractors, suggest that there might have been a delay, but I’ve been unable to discover how long it might have been. The drive-in appears to have been opened before the end of 1951, in any case.
Boxoffice said that the new theater would be Arizona’s largest drive-in, and the first in the state with two screens. It was to be called the Twin Drive-In. CinemaTour gives the Acres Drive-In the aka’s Acres of Fun Drive-In, Peso Drive-In, El Peso Drive-In, and Twin Open Air Drive-In… though why a drive-in’s operator would specify in its name that it was both a drive-in and “open air” I can’t say.
The January 6, 1951, issue of Boxofrfice reported that the Coliseum Theatre in Seattle had reopened following a $250,000 remodeling job that had begun the previous August. Much of the theater’s original detailing, designed in 1915 by architect B. Marcus Priteca, had been removed, as had the dome over the theater’s entrance. The architect who was responsible for this desecration of B. Marcus Priteca’s work was… well, B. Marcus Priteca. I guess that’s one of the perils of having a long career as a theater architect.
This web page from the Charlotte Chamber of Commerce tells about the conversion of the Belvedere Theatre into offices. It gives the wrong opening year, though- 1955. It also says that the house was originally built for African American audiences, but doesn’t cite a source. The caption of the 1951 Boxoffice photo I linked to didn’t say anything about it being an African American house, and that’s something the magazine usually noted in those days.
This Blogger post has scans of a couple of ads from the Belvedere Theatre, about third of the way down. The last comment on the page, by John McElwee, also has information about the Belvedere from a former patron who attended the house around the time it opened (the page is formated to have pale type on a black background and is virtually unreadable. Try left-clicking your mouse and highlighting the text as though to copy it, and it should become readable.
Actually, it looks as though the bowling alley now occupies four buildings, including the Columbia Theatre, so the theater’s space now houses about one quarter of the bowling alley.
This theater had a long history before the neighborhood became predominantly Chinese, and had no connection to Chinatown for its first few decades. In 1926, Chinatown was still a small enclave lying mostly east of Alameda Street where Union Station was later built, but extending west to Los Angeles Street at the Plaza. In the 1930s and 1940s, China City along North Spring and New High Streets and New Chinatown along North Broadway and North Hill Street were developed
Even as late as the beginning of the 1960s the neighborhood around this theater was predominantly Mexican American, but it had previously housed a mixture of various European ethnic groups. Ethnic Chinese became the dominant group in the neighborhood after immigration restrictions were relaxed in 1965, and the Asian American population of California began to expand rapidly for the first time since the 19th century.
As the Alpine Theatre and Carmen Theatre, this house was always listed in the moving picture theaters section of the city directories. It had no fly tower, so any live performances would have been limited in scope. Many neighborhood theaters did have small stages suitable for occasional live performances, and this theater probably had one, but I’m sure that vaudeville was never a regular feature of the house. It was a neighborhood movie house, like hundreds of others throughout the city.
This article from the Clinton Times & Courier cites local historian Terrence Ingano’s claim that the Philbin Theatre was the original name of the house that later became the Strand. It was opened in 1924, he said, but that doesn’t jibe with the 1920 listing of the Strand I cited earlier, unless there were two theaters called the Strand in Clinton, and the name was moved to the Philbin at some point.
An item in the December 16, 1922, issue of The American Contractor says that P. J. Philbin was the president of the Clinton Theatre Company. A 1909 Moving Picture World item said that the Star Theatre would open in the Philbin Block in Clinton about the middle of August. Apparently Mr. Philbin was Clinton’s early theater magnate.
I suspect that there was only theone theater in Danvers, and when Bown changed the name from Elm to Danvers sometine after 1922, FDY just never cleared its records of the old name. The Film Daily itself refers to the burned house as the Elm twice and as the Danvers once, but Motion Picture News only refers to it as the Danvers Theatre.
The fire in Danvers was reported by Motion Picture News on March 13, 1926, in this item:
“The Danvers Theatre, Danvers, Mass., destroyed by fire early in the year, is to be rebuilt at once. Plans have been prepared and contracts will all be let within the next few days for the structure. Louis Brown of Danvers is the owner and will manage the house. It will be 70 by 100 feet, will contain but one floor, no balcony, and will cost about $75,000.”
Another item appeared in the April 10 issue of the same publication:
“Louis Brown, owner of the Danvers (Mass.) Theatre, which was destroyed by fire early in the winter, has awarded contracts to William A. Berry of Boston for the immediate construction of a new theatre in that town. The structure will occupy the site of the former theatre and will be ready for occupancy, early in the fall.”
The Film Daily had reported the fire earlier, in a brief item in the January 21 issue:
“Theater Destroyed by Fire
“Danvers, Mass. — Loss estimated at $70,000 was caused by fire which started in the boiler room of the Elm, following an explosion.”
The March 30 issue of the Daily had a rather extravagant estimate of the cost of replacing the theater. I suspect that somebody mistakenly added an extra zero:
“New $850,000 Danvers Theater
“Danvers, Mass. — The Danvers theater is to be built by Louis Brown to replace the structure burned during winter. The work will cost $850,000.”
The September 4 issue of Motion Picture News noted delays in the project:
“Work is being pushed forward on the new Danvers Theatre in Danvers, Mass., which will replace the one destroyed by fire in the early summer. Manager Brown had hoped to occupy it the early part of September, but it may be a month later before it is ready. Meanwhile, the programs are being given in the Peabody Institute Hall, a few blocks distant.”
Louis Brown did not fare well during the depression. The January 17, 1931, issue of The Film Daily reported that he had filed a petition for bankruptcy. Later issues of the magazine indicate that the Orpheum was then taken over by Allen B. Newhall, operator of the Union Hill Theatre in Gloucester.
Does anyone know what became of the Rex Theatre in Clovis? The January 17, 1931, issue of The Film Daily reported that Hardwick Bros. had recently opened the new, 800-seat Rex at Clovis. Could Rex be a forgotten aka for one of the theaters theaters in Clovis that is already listed, or was it a different house that has been lost?
The Middlesex Theatre should be marked as demolished. It’s clear from comparing the current satellite and street views with the LOC photos lostmemory linked to on September 24, 2008, that the auditorium is gone. The Tuscany Grill only occupies the theater’s surviving entrance building. Move Street View a couple of clicks to the right and compare with this historic photo when the auditorium was still standing.
The Facebook page of the Markham Group, an insurance agency in Ayer, has a photo of the Playhouse taken in 1943. A comment on the photo says that the Playhouse was destroyed by a fire in 1962.
The Anniston Star of Sunday, April 7, 1918, ran several pages about the Lyric Theatre, which was set to open with a matinée program of Keith vaudeville the following day. The paper included a full-page all-text ad which read
R. L. Benz
Supervising Architect
ANNISTON, ALA.
Designed and Built the Lyric Theatre
Frank Cullen’s Vaudeville Old and New lists a Fox-Lyric Theatre at Anniston as a house on the Keith vaudeville circuit, but with no dates for its operation, so it’s possible that William Fox had control of the theater for a while.
The “New Theaters” column of the February 16, 1927, issue of The Film Daily said “Earl R. Collins has opened the New Lyric” at Anniston, Alabama. Apparently, the “new theaters” listed in the magazine were not always brand new, but merely under new management.
CinemaTour has several photos of the Capitol Theatre, and gives the opening date as March 6, 1924.
However, I don’t know what to make of an item, datelined Plant City, from the “New Theaters” section of the February 16, 1927, issue of The Film Daily, which says: “Work has started on Universal’s new Capitol to cost $50,000.” Did the magazine give the wrong name for a different theater project, or was the Capitol actually built in 1927, or did Universal spend $50,000 to upgrade a three-year-old theater? CinemaTour doesn’t cite a period source for the 1924 opening date, so we can’t double check to see if there was some mistake there.
The Middlesex Theatre in Middletown was to be immediately rebuilt following a recent fire, according to the February 16, 1927, issue of The Film Daily. The item did not indicate the extent of the fire damage to the theater.
The 1914 and 1915 reports of the Chief of the Massachusetts District Police list three theaters operating at Clinton: the Globe and the Star, both operated by the Clinton Amusement Company, and the Town Hall. All three were listed as being in good condition.
The 1920 edition of the New England Business Directory listed the Globe, Star, and Strand Theatres at Clinton.
The stretch of Arkansas Avenue where the DeSoto Theatre was located has been wiped off the face of the earth, along with most of the neighborhood around it. Given the name, I suspect that the theater was at or near the corner of De Soto Street, several hundred feet north of the spot where Google Maps has placed the pin icon.
The obliteration took place sometime between 1958 and 1963, judging from a comparison of images from those years at Historic Aerials.
Recent comments on the State Theatre page indicate that it was the Washington Theatre, not the State, that was renovated and renamed the Penn Theatre. The Washington reopened as the Penn in March, 1961, and closed in April, 1973. It was demolished shortly after closing.
RSM3853’s list of movies shown at the State and Penn Theatres indicates that the State closed at the end of May, 1960, and the Penn opened in March, 1961. The operators must have decided to close the larger State Theatre and renovate and rename the smaller Washington Theatre to be their first-run house. With the decline in theater attendance that took place in the 1950s and 1960s, that would have made economic sense.
There were two houses called the Orpheum in Danvers. The annual report of the Peabody Institute published in March, 1912, mentioned an event with movies held at the Orpheum Theatre in Danvers the previous November. I’ve also found references from 1916 to a Danvers house called Brown’s Orpheum, operated by Louis Brown.
However, various issue of The Film Daily from 1926 and 1927 say that a house called either the Danvers Theatre or the Elm Theatre in various items was destroyed by fire in 1926, and was replaced by a 1000-seat theater which was originally to have been called the Capitol (issue of January 9) but which opened as the Orpheum (issue of February 9.)
The owner was Louis Brown, presumably the same who was the operator of Brown’s Orpheum in 1916, so it seems likely that the house destroyed by fire was the original Orpheum using a different name. A 1922 directory of New England businesses lists only one theater for Danvers, that being the Elm, though its address was 12 High Street. Mr.Brown might have acquired extra frontage for his rebuilding project, or perhaps simply shifted the theater entrance to a different part of the lot.
Auction site WorthPoint was recently offering a movie program from the Orpheum Theatre in Danvers for the week of October 20, 1940. The house had three changes a week at that time. The Orpheum is also mentioned in a 2011 article about the 50th reunion of a local high school’s class of 1961, and the author mentions attending the Orpheum during his high school years, so the house probably operated at least into the early 1960s.
Chuck, if the Penn was torn down and replaced by a parking lot in 1973 then it must have been the Washington that was renamed the Penn, not the State. The only parking lot on this block of Chestnut Street is the one where the Washington Theatre used to be, right across the street from the State. The State’s entrance building, at least, is still standing.
A paragraph about the Washington Theatre on this web page says that it did become the Penn Theatre, and this earlier comment by sgtjim says that he thought the Washington and the Penn were the same house, too.
I’m sure this is the same house that was listed as the Alpine Theatre, 834 Alpine Street, in the Moving Picture Theatres section of the 1926 city directory, and at 826 Alpine Street in the 1929 city directory. It’s back at 834 Alpine in the 1936 and 1938 directories. In 1939, the Alpine Theatre is gone and the first listing for the Carmen Theatre at 722 N. Figueroa Street appears. No theaters are listed under any name at either address in the 1927 or 1932 directories.
The February 29, 1936, issue of Motion Picture Herald said that D. F. Lyon was reopening the Alpine Theatre in Los Angeles, which had been closed for some time. The place apparently closed and reopened multiple times. I remember seeing this theater in the early 1960s, but I can’t remember if it was open or closed, nor can I remember what name, if any, was on the marquee.
The Harvester Theatre was still in operation as late as 1932, when the January 30 issue of Motion Picture Herald reported that Frank Leino had been named its manager.
1215 Whitley Avenue is now the home of the Discount Variety Store, but the facade still shows a bit of Art Deco detailing that must survive from the time the building housed the Corcoran Theatre.
Boxoffice of January 6, 1951, noted that both the Corcoran and Lake Theatres in Corcoran were owned by Robert Lippert.
This derive-in was set to open shortly, according to Boxoffice of January 6, 1951. However, records of a court case involving Michael A. Parker, developer of the project, and one of the contractors, suggest that there might have been a delay, but I’ve been unable to discover how long it might have been. The drive-in appears to have been opened before the end of 1951, in any case.
Boxoffice said that the new theater would be Arizona’s largest drive-in, and the first in the state with two screens. It was to be called the Twin Drive-In. CinemaTour gives the Acres Drive-In the aka’s Acres of Fun Drive-In, Peso Drive-In, El Peso Drive-In, and Twin Open Air Drive-In… though why a drive-in’s operator would specify in its name that it was both a drive-in and “open air” I can’t say.
The January 6, 1951, issue of Boxofrfice reported that the Coliseum Theatre in Seattle had reopened following a $250,000 remodeling job that had begun the previous August. Much of the theater’s original detailing, designed in 1915 by architect B. Marcus Priteca, had been removed, as had the dome over the theater’s entrance. The architect who was responsible for this desecration of B. Marcus Priteca’s work was… well, B. Marcus Priteca. I guess that’s one of the perils of having a long career as a theater architect.
This web page from the Charlotte Chamber of Commerce tells about the conversion of the Belvedere Theatre into offices. It gives the wrong opening year, though- 1955. It also says that the house was originally built for African American audiences, but doesn’t cite a source. The caption of the 1951 Boxoffice photo I linked to didn’t say anything about it being an African American house, and that’s something the magazine usually noted in those days.
This Blogger post has scans of a couple of ads from the Belvedere Theatre, about third of the way down. The last comment on the page, by John McElwee, also has information about the Belvedere from a former patron who attended the house around the time it opened (the page is formated to have pale type on a black background and is virtually unreadable. Try left-clicking your mouse and highlighting the text as though to copy it, and it should become readable.
Actually, it looks as though the bowling alley now occupies four buildings, including the Columbia Theatre, so the theater’s space now houses about one quarter of the bowling alley.
This theater had a long history before the neighborhood became predominantly Chinese, and had no connection to Chinatown for its first few decades. In 1926, Chinatown was still a small enclave lying mostly east of Alameda Street where Union Station was later built, but extending west to Los Angeles Street at the Plaza. In the 1930s and 1940s, China City along North Spring and New High Streets and New Chinatown along North Broadway and North Hill Street were developed
Even as late as the beginning of the 1960s the neighborhood around this theater was predominantly Mexican American, but it had previously housed a mixture of various European ethnic groups. Ethnic Chinese became the dominant group in the neighborhood after immigration restrictions were relaxed in 1965, and the Asian American population of California began to expand rapidly for the first time since the 19th century.
As the Alpine Theatre and Carmen Theatre, this house was always listed in the moving picture theaters section of the city directories. It had no fly tower, so any live performances would have been limited in scope. Many neighborhood theaters did have small stages suitable for occasional live performances, and this theater probably had one, but I’m sure that vaudeville was never a regular feature of the house. It was a neighborhood movie house, like hundreds of others throughout the city.
This article from the Clinton Times & Courier cites local historian Terrence Ingano’s claim that the Philbin Theatre was the original name of the house that later became the Strand. It was opened in 1924, he said, but that doesn’t jibe with the 1920 listing of the Strand I cited earlier, unless there were two theaters called the Strand in Clinton, and the name was moved to the Philbin at some point.
An item in the December 16, 1922, issue of The American Contractor says that P. J. Philbin was the president of the Clinton Theatre Company. A 1909 Moving Picture World item said that the Star Theatre would open in the Philbin Block in Clinton about the middle of August. Apparently Mr. Philbin was Clinton’s early theater magnate.
I suspect that there was only theone theater in Danvers, and when Bown changed the name from Elm to Danvers sometine after 1922, FDY just never cleared its records of the old name. The Film Daily itself refers to the burned house as the Elm twice and as the Danvers once, but Motion Picture News only refers to it as the Danvers Theatre.
The fire in Danvers was reported by Motion Picture News on March 13, 1926, in this item:
Another item appeared in the April 10 issue of the same publication:The Film Daily had reported the fire earlier, in a brief item in the January 21 issue:The March 30 issue of the Daily had a rather extravagant estimate of the cost of replacing the theater. I suspect that somebody mistakenly added an extra zero:The September 4 issue of Motion Picture News noted delays in the project:Louis Brown did not fare well during the depression. The January 17, 1931, issue of The Film Daily reported that he had filed a petition for bankruptcy. Later issues of the magazine indicate that the Orpheum was then taken over by Allen B. Newhall, operator of the Union Hill Theatre in Gloucester.Does anyone know what became of the Rex Theatre in Clovis? The January 17, 1931, issue of The Film Daily reported that Hardwick Bros. had recently opened the new, 800-seat Rex at Clovis. Could Rex be a forgotten aka for one of the theaters theaters in Clovis that is already listed, or was it a different house that has been lost?
The Middlesex Theatre should be marked as demolished. It’s clear from comparing the current satellite and street views with the LOC photos lostmemory linked to on September 24, 2008, that the auditorium is gone. The Tuscany Grill only occupies the theater’s surviving entrance building. Move Street View a couple of clicks to the right and compare with this historic photo when the auditorium was still standing.
The Facebook page of the Markham Group, an insurance agency in Ayer, has a photo of the Playhouse taken in 1943. A comment on the photo says that the Playhouse was destroyed by a fire in 1962.
The Wells Theatre was advertised in the Anniston Star in 1918.
The Anniston Star of Sunday, April 7, 1918, ran several pages about the Lyric Theatre, which was set to open with a matinée program of Keith vaudeville the following day. The paper included a full-page all-text ad which read
Here is a photo of the stage tower with ghost signs reading Lyric Theatre and Keith Vaudeville.Frank Cullen’s Vaudeville Old and New lists a Fox-Lyric Theatre at Anniston as a house on the Keith vaudeville circuit, but with no dates for its operation, so it’s possible that William Fox had control of the theater for a while.
The “New Theaters” column of the February 16, 1927, issue of The Film Daily said “Earl R. Collins has opened the New Lyric” at Anniston, Alabama. Apparently, the “new theaters” listed in the magazine were not always brand new, but merely under new management.
CinemaTour has several photos of the Capitol Theatre, and gives the opening date as March 6, 1924.
However, I don’t know what to make of an item, datelined Plant City, from the “New Theaters” section of the February 16, 1927, issue of The Film Daily, which says: “Work has started on Universal’s new Capitol to cost $50,000.” Did the magazine give the wrong name for a different theater project, or was the Capitol actually built in 1927, or did Universal spend $50,000 to upgrade a three-year-old theater? CinemaTour doesn’t cite a period source for the 1924 opening date, so we can’t double check to see if there was some mistake there.
The Middlesex Theatre in Middletown was to be immediately rebuilt following a recent fire, according to the February 16, 1927, issue of The Film Daily. The item did not indicate the extent of the fire damage to the theater.
The 1914 and 1915 reports of the Chief of the Massachusetts District Police list three theaters operating at Clinton: the Globe and the Star, both operated by the Clinton Amusement Company, and the Town Hall. All three were listed as being in good condition.
The 1920 edition of the New England Business Directory listed the Globe, Star, and Strand Theatres at Clinton.
The stretch of Arkansas Avenue where the DeSoto Theatre was located has been wiped off the face of the earth, along with most of the neighborhood around it. Given the name, I suspect that the theater was at or near the corner of De Soto Street, several hundred feet north of the spot where Google Maps has placed the pin icon.
The obliteration took place sometime between 1958 and 1963, judging from a comparison of images from those years at Historic Aerials.
I just noticed that, in my second comment of June 7, I wrote Chestnut Street when I meant to write Main Street.
Recent comments on the State Theatre page indicate that it was the Washington Theatre, not the State, that was renovated and renamed the Penn Theatre. The Washington reopened as the Penn in March, 1961, and closed in April, 1973. It was demolished shortly after closing.
RSM3853’s list of movies shown at the State and Penn Theatres indicates that the State closed at the end of May, 1960, and the Penn opened in March, 1961. The operators must have decided to close the larger State Theatre and renovate and rename the smaller Washington Theatre to be their first-run house. With the decline in theater attendance that took place in the 1950s and 1960s, that would have made economic sense.
There were two houses called the Orpheum in Danvers. The annual report of the Peabody Institute published in March, 1912, mentioned an event with movies held at the Orpheum Theatre in Danvers the previous November. I’ve also found references from 1916 to a Danvers house called Brown’s Orpheum, operated by Louis Brown.
However, various issue of The Film Daily from 1926 and 1927 say that a house called either the Danvers Theatre or the Elm Theatre in various items was destroyed by fire in 1926, and was replaced by a 1000-seat theater which was originally to have been called the Capitol (issue of January 9) but which opened as the Orpheum (issue of February 9.)
The owner was Louis Brown, presumably the same who was the operator of Brown’s Orpheum in 1916, so it seems likely that the house destroyed by fire was the original Orpheum using a different name. A 1922 directory of New England businesses lists only one theater for Danvers, that being the Elm, though its address was 12 High Street. Mr.Brown might have acquired extra frontage for his rebuilding project, or perhaps simply shifted the theater entrance to a different part of the lot.
Auction site WorthPoint was recently offering a movie program from the Orpheum Theatre in Danvers for the week of October 20, 1940. The house had three changes a week at that time. The Orpheum is also mentioned in a 2011 article about the 50th reunion of a local high school’s class of 1961, and the author mentions attending the Orpheum during his high school years, so the house probably operated at least into the early 1960s.
Chuck, if the Penn was torn down and replaced by a parking lot in 1973 then it must have been the Washington that was renamed the Penn, not the State. The only parking lot on this block of Chestnut Street is the one where the Washington Theatre used to be, right across the street from the State. The State’s entrance building, at least, is still standing.
A paragraph about the Washington Theatre on this web page says that it did become the Penn Theatre, and this earlier comment by sgtjim says that he thought the Washington and the Penn were the same house, too.
I’m sure this is the same house that was listed as the Alpine Theatre, 834 Alpine Street, in the Moving Picture Theatres section of the 1926 city directory, and at 826 Alpine Street in the 1929 city directory. It’s back at 834 Alpine in the 1936 and 1938 directories. In 1939, the Alpine Theatre is gone and the first listing for the Carmen Theatre at 722 N. Figueroa Street appears. No theaters are listed under any name at either address in the 1927 or 1932 directories.
The February 29, 1936, issue of Motion Picture Herald said that D. F. Lyon was reopening the Alpine Theatre in Los Angeles, which had been closed for some time. The place apparently closed and reopened multiple times. I remember seeing this theater in the early 1960s, but I can’t remember if it was open or closed, nor can I remember what name, if any, was on the marquee.
Here is a postcard view of the Court Theatre, Washington, Pennsylvania, probably from around 1920.