A history of the Croswell Opera House says that the Maple City Theatre was one of three small movie houses opened in Adrian in late 1907. The other two were called the Crescent and the Queen. Of these three, the Maple City is the only one listed in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory.
The book The A to Z of American Theater: Modernism, by James Fisher and Felicia Hardison Londré, has a brief biographical sketch of Edward Douglas Stair, who built the Stair Auditorium (Google Books preview.) The 1921 Polk gazetteer of Michigan lists it merely as “Auditorium, The.” The 1914-1915 Gus Hill directory listed Stair Auditorium with a seating capacity of 818. A note says “Plays RVP” meaning Road Shows, Vaudeville, and Moving Pictures.
“[i]n January 1908 the Stair Auditorium was opened with a stage play called The Fatal Flower. This building served for many years as the center of all entertainment. Until the new high school was built, all graduation exercises, school plays and other school events were held there. In the early 1960s it was not being used and was in a state of disrepair. The city was no longer able to keep up the building, and like many other beautiful old structures it was torn down to make way for progress.”
Two items about the Temple Theatre appear in the November 3, 1917 issue of Moving Picture World, with one inconsistency. One says “Temple theater has been reopened by Charles Auble” and a slightly longer one says “[t]he new Temple theater in the Odd Fellows' building has been opened by Charles Auble. It will be operated with five and ten cent admission.”
I’ve been unable to discover when the IOOF temple was built, but the style looks post-1900, so it could have been a fairly new building when the theater opened. It still has the IOOF insignia on the façade, though it does not appear to be a lodge hall anymore. It is not listed on the NRHP, nor is it listed as a Michigan State Historic Sight.
The Gem was wired with a Western Electric sound system in late 1930, as noted in the January 4, 1931 issue of Film Daily:
“Michigan’s Second Smallest Wired
“Morenci, Mich.— Western Electric sound equipment has been installed in the Gem here owned by E. Furman. This town is the second smallest in the state reported to be using Western Electric equipment, Saugautuct taking first honors in this respect. Saugautuct has a population of 526.”
This item is from the September 5, 1925 issue of Motion Picture News:
“The Grove Theatre at Pacific Grove, a new 1,000 seat house, opened August 15th, under the management of A. Keller, who has capably handled the Monterey Theatre Company’s houses. Seating throughout was handled by the C. F. Weber Co., stage equipment by the Western Scenic Studios of Oakland, a growing and enterprising concern whose work is creating considerable comment; booth equipment by Tex Coombs; a Wurlitzer organ, while the interior decorating, Spanish in design, was handled by the Paggioni Studios.”
The theater business in Sterling must have been tough in the early days. If the 1910 map shows no theaters other than the Vaudette, the two that opened in 1909 must have gone under by the time the map was made. Three items datelined Sterling appeared in Moving Picture World from March to June that year. The March 6 issue said “Adolph Loux will open a new moving picture theater on West Third Street.” The June 5 issue said “Clifford Van De Mark has purchased from Loux Brothers the Gem Theater and has taken possession.”
Meanwhile, the May 5 issue noted that “Paul V. Baxter has opened a new vaudeville and moving picture theater.” I’ve not been able to track down either a name of a location for Mr. Baxter’s theater.
The earliest mention of the Sterling Theatre I’ve found in the trade journals is this item from the September 1, 1923 issue of Moving Picture World:
“STERLING, ILL—Sterling Theatre Corporation, care Grand Theatre, contemplates erecting brick moving picture theatre, 100 by 135 feet, at Fourth and Locust streets.”
Another notice appears in the October 20 issue of the same publication:
“George Greenough, owner of the Grand Theatre at Sterling, Ill., plans to build a new house in that city to play both pictures and legitimate shows. It is expected that the house and furnishings will cost at least $200,000 and seat almost a thousand people.”
The November 3 issue of Motion Picture News also noted the project:
“A new picture theatre, to represent an investment of nearly $200,000, will be erected at Sterling, Ill., this winter, by G. Geenough [sic]. The policy will be pictures and the theatre will be strictly modern in every respect. Work will be started at an early date.”
I just noticed that in the 1961 businesses list at the Rock Falls Project the address 221 W. 2nd Street is associated with two businesses, the Strand Theatre and Twin City Mattress Company. As it’s unlikely they would have shared the same space, they must have occupied the building sequentially that year, so the Strand must have been gone before the end of 1961.
The 1926 FDY lists only the Lyric at Rock Falls, but it has 300 seats. I can see two possibilities: the new theater project fell through, and the Lyric remained at its old location, maybe with a few more seats crammed in, or the new building was completed and the name Lyric was moved to the new, slightly larger location. As the seat count was only 300, and that possibly even a bit of a FDY exaggeration, the building at 207 could have been large enough.
A bit of confusion arises from this web site which has lists of Rock Falls businesses in a selection of years (hover your cursor over “Businesses” in the header.) Other than The Grand in 1913, no theaters are listed until 1937, and then it’s a house called the Roxy at 221 W. 2nd Street, an address it shared with the Modern Woodsmen of America lodge hall. Lists for later years (1946, 1954 and 1961) still have the theater at that address, but it’s called the Strand. The next year available is 1967, when no theaters are listed.
The real confusion arises from the lists from 1920 and 1925. The 1920 list shows no theaters, but nothing is listed (not even the notation “vacant”) for 203 First Avenue. It could be that the theater was there, but the person who compiled this list just missed it. But on the 1925 list, 203 First Avenue is a grocery store, 205 is a music store, 207 is listed as vacant, and 209-211 is a hardware store. It could be that 207 was the theater, but it was not open that year, then opened (or re-opened,) which would account for the listing in the 1926 FDY.
In 1927, the FDY lists only a place called the Comm. House, and the 1928 FDY lists only a place called Am. Steel-Wire, and no seating capacity is given for either listing. It sounds like the Lyric might have gone out of business, and non-theatrical spaces had been pressed into service for movie exhibition. In 1929, Rock Falls is not listed in the FDY at all. The town shows up again in the 1936 FDY, with the 300-seat Roxy, listed as closed. It appears that Rock Falls did without a movie theater for quite a while. By 1940, FDY is listing the 300-seat Strand.
This list of Rock Falls businesses in the year 1913 lists 311 W. 2nd Street as the location of The Grand. As it doesn’t specify theater, this might have been a multi-purpose hall, perhaps with a flat floor so it could be used for dances and such, as well as movies and other entertainments. The next year available in the series, 1920 (hover your cursor over “Businesses” in the header) lists 311 as the location of “Buckingham A soft drinks,” so the Grand must have been gone by then.
I believe that the following article, appearing in the October 1, 1921 issue of Exhibitors Herald was about the Lindo Theatre, though at that time the name was projected to be the Lincoln:
“Ground Broken in Freeport, Ill. for Metropolitan Play House
“John F. Dittman, Northern Illinois Exhibitor, To Erect Theatre to Rival Those in Larger Cities— Chicago Architects Named
“Freeport, Ill., is soon to have a theatre equal in luxuriousness and modern equipment to any theatre in the country according to advices received from John F. Dittman, veteran motion picture exhibitor of that city and well known to the industry in the central west.
“Mr. Dittman’s home town was the scene of the now famous historical debates of Abraham Lincoln and Douglas and in commemoration of this, the northern Illinois exhibitor is going to name his future cinema palace the Lincoln theatre.
“The building when finished will be the consummation of ten years planning on the part of Mr. Dittman and will include in its every feature the results of the showman’s visits to cities all over the United States which were spent in the study of various types of architecture. Only the best features gleaned by Mr. Dittman from his tour will be the basis for the new structure.
“Chicago Architects Plan
“The same famous firm of Chicago architects who are responsible tor the plans of such theatres as the Tivoli, the Riviera, and the newest Balaban & Katz house — the Chicago — prepared the plans for the Lincoln according to the builder’s ideas and it is expected that, when completed, the Lincoln will rank well up with the other houses which these architects have designed.
“At a ceremony at which many of the leading citizens of Freeport participated. Mr. Dittman on August 29 turned the first spade of earth on the site of his future theatre which was a signal for a corps of excavators to get on the job. It is said that the entire county in which Freeport is situated is manifesting a keen interest in the progress of the new institution.
“Has 1,400 Seats
“The plans call for a house of 1,400 seating capacity with every conceivable sort of modern improvement in the way of lighting, heating, ventilating and electrical devices.
“‘While I have all the confidence in the world in the project,’ said Mr. Dittman, ‘it is in one sense an experiment. The success of my venture will prove that the most expensive and elaborate of theatres are possible in cities the size of Freeport as well as in the metropolitan centers.’
“The opening date for the new theatre has not yet been set but the large force of men already at work should seem to indicate a record spurt to the finish.”
The opening of a house in Rock Falls called the Grand Theatre in was noted in the October 29, 1910 issue of Moving Picture World. Two theaters at Rock Falls were mentioned in the October 2, 1915 issue of MPW: “The Lyric and Grand theaters at Rock Falls showed ‘Quo Vadis’ simultaneously.” The October 23 issue of the same publication that year said that “The Lyric at Rock Falls has installed a new Minusa gold fibre screen.”
The Lyric at least was still operating in early 1922, when it was mentioned in the January 7 issue of MPW: “ROCK FALLS, ILL.— A. E. Berlin, Jr., has taken over Lyric Theatre. Also new one under construction.” The new house under construction was probably the one noted in this item from the October 1, 1921 issue of Exhibitors Herald:
“Wheeler and Brown to Build at Rock Falls, Ill.
“ROCK FALLS, ILL— A new theatre which is expected to be one of the finest in any town the size of Rock Falls will be erected two doors south of the present Lyric by Arthur W. Wheeler and Mrs. Susan Brown. H. B. Frank, manager of the Lyric, will supervise construction and will have charge of the house when completed.
“Although the house will be built fundamentally for picture purposes, a large stage and two dressing rooms will be installed so that vaudeville may be booked. Ground for the new building has been broken.”
The fact that the new theater was to be “two doors south” of the Lyric is a strong indication that the house on 1st Avenue, a north-south street, was the Lyric, and the other unidentified theater, on West 2nd Street, was therefore the one most likely to have been the Grand.
Multiple sources say that the Dixon Opera House originally opened in 1876. The building suffered two major fires, the first of which, on June 23, 1903, destroyed both upper floors, so the original theater was effectively gone, which accounts for the reconfiguration after 1902. The 1905 Cahn guide seat count was thus post-rebuild. The upper floors were rebuilt, only for the entire building to be razed by the second fire, on February 17, 1920.
Here is a relevant item about the original Joie Theatre from the July, 1911 issue of Motography:
“W. R. Sawyer, who has made such a remarkable success of the Joie theater of Fort Smith, has purchased the Yale in that city, which he will remodel and operate it upon the same high standard set at the Joie, which is said to be one of the very best in the entire southwest.”
The 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory lists the Yale Theatre at 804 Garrison Avenue, so it was a near neighbor of the Joie at 808.
The Gem is apparently the only one of the four movie houses listed at Macomb in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory that is currently listed at Cinema Treasures. The other three were the Family, the Princess, and the Grand. Only the Gem was listed with an address, and the Grand was listed only as being on N. Lafayette Street. The Grand was still operating in 1923, when the September 8 issue of Moving Picture World said that it had undergone extensive improvements. Along with the Tokyo Theatre, it had just been taken over by the Illinois Theatre Company from the V. F. Grubb Amusement Enterprises.
This Facebook page from the Western Illinois Museum has an early photo of the Chandler Opera House, and a (very) brief history. The house opened on April 21, 1873, and was designed by architect William O. Thomas. The third floor was added to the original two-story building in 1889. Given the extent of remodeling over the years, I would imagine that no identifiable traces remain of Thomas’s original design.
I found an obituary for George Slothower published on April 24, 1942. It didn’t mention the theater business, but said that the lifelong-resident of Dixon had for the last 23 years been employed at the Borden (the milk company) condensory. It might be that the Princess had closed by 1919, when he began working for Borden.
If no other theaters than the Opera House, the Family, and this one appear on the Sanborn maps, it does seem very likely that the one at 214 W. 1st was the Rose/Princess.
There was news about the Family Theatre in the November 13, 1915 issue of Moving Picture World: “DIXON, ILL.—L. G. Rorer, of Chicago, who recently purchased the Family theater, has installed a $5,000 pipe organ.”
The Family Theatre was also mentioned in the December 6, 1913 MPW, along with a house called the Princess Theatre.
One possible name of this house is the Princess Theatre, which is mentioned in a few issues of trade journals in the 1910s. The July 13, 1912 issue of Moving Picture World had this item:
“George Slothower, manager of the Princess Theater, Dixon, Ill., and Miss Bertha Haas of Swissville. Ill., were recently married at Dixon.”
The May, 1911 issue of Motography told of Mr. Slothower’s acquisition of the house:
“The Rose theater of Dixon which was closed recently has been leased by George Slothower, who will thoroughly renovate and improve the same and open it as the Princess under the management of Clarence Booth, who formerly managed the Rose.”
The Princess was also mentioned in the December 6, 1913 MPW, which said that George Slothower had given up the Family Theatre and resumed management of the Princess. George Slothower and the Princess Theatre were also mentioned in the April 7, 1917 issue of The Dramatic Mirror, which also mentioned the Opera Theatre and the Family Theatre.
The 1950s remodeling of the Avon Theatre was undoubtedly occasioned by the collapse of the auditorium ceiling on May 1, 1950, as depicted in these photos from the Decatur Public Library (which reserves the copyright on the scans.)
The Paris originally opened in 1913. The Decatur Public Library has this photo of 1234 E. Eldorado Street in 1914, the caption on which says it was the location of Dan Higgins' Theatre. The date is confirmed by an item in the January 24, 1914 issue of Moving Picture World which says that “Dan Higgins opened his new moving picture theater, the Paris, at Decatur, on Christmas Eve.” The 1917 ad must have been for a re-opening.
The 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory lists the Corner Theatre at 300 N. Water Street. Was there more than one house called the Corner? 1135 E. Prairie is a mostly residential neighborhood, though there is some commercial land on the corners (appropriately.)
There definitely appears to have been more than one Decatur house called the Princess Theatre. The May, 1911 issue of Motography had this item: “The Royal Theater of Decatur has been purchased by R. W. Trotter and B. K. Stafford, who will continue to operate the same under the name of the Princess.”
A history of the Croswell Opera House says that the Maple City Theatre was one of three small movie houses opened in Adrian in late 1907. The other two were called the Crescent and the Queen. Of these three, the Maple City is the only one listed in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory.
The management of the New Family Theatre advertised in the “Help Wanted” section of Moving Picture World of July 26, 1913, seeking a piano player.
The book The A to Z of American Theater: Modernism, by James Fisher and Felicia Hardison Londré, has a brief biographical sketch of Edward Douglas Stair, who built the Stair Auditorium (Google Books preview.) The 1921 Polk gazetteer of Michigan lists it merely as “Auditorium, The.” The 1914-1915 Gus Hill directory listed Stair Auditorium with a seating capacity of 818. A note says “Plays RVP” meaning Road Shows, Vaudeville, and Moving Pictures.
A history page about Morenci says of the theater
Two items about the Temple Theatre appear in the November 3, 1917 issue of Moving Picture World, with one inconsistency. One says “Temple theater has been reopened by Charles Auble” and a slightly longer one says “[t]he new Temple theater in the Odd Fellows' building has been opened by Charles Auble. It will be operated with five and ten cent admission.”
I’ve been unable to discover when the IOOF temple was built, but the style looks post-1900, so it could have been a fairly new building when the theater opened. It still has the IOOF insignia on the façade, though it does not appear to be a lodge hall anymore. It is not listed on the NRHP, nor is it listed as a Michigan State Historic Sight.
The Gem was wired with a Western Electric sound system in late 1930, as noted in the January 4, 1931 issue of Film Daily:
This item is from the September 5, 1925 issue of Motion Picture News:
The theater business in Sterling must have been tough in the early days. If the 1910 map shows no theaters other than the Vaudette, the two that opened in 1909 must have gone under by the time the map was made. Three items datelined Sterling appeared in Moving Picture World from March to June that year. The March 6 issue said “Adolph Loux will open a new moving picture theater on West Third Street.” The June 5 issue said “Clifford Van De Mark has purchased from Loux Brothers the Gem Theater and has taken possession.”
Meanwhile, the May 5 issue noted that “Paul V. Baxter has opened a new vaudeville and moving picture theater.” I’ve not been able to track down either a name of a location for Mr. Baxter’s theater.
The earliest mention of the Sterling Theatre I’ve found in the trade journals is this item from the September 1, 1923 issue of Moving Picture World:
Another notice appears in the October 20 issue of the same publication:The November 3 issue of Motion Picture News also noted the project:Photo from the August 28, 1915 issue of Moving Picture World uploaded.
I just noticed that in the 1961 businesses list at the Rock Falls Project the address 221 W. 2nd Street is associated with two businesses, the Strand Theatre and Twin City Mattress Company. As it’s unlikely they would have shared the same space, they must have occupied the building sequentially that year, so the Strand must have been gone before the end of 1961.
The 1926 FDY lists only the Lyric at Rock Falls, but it has 300 seats. I can see two possibilities: the new theater project fell through, and the Lyric remained at its old location, maybe with a few more seats crammed in, or the new building was completed and the name Lyric was moved to the new, slightly larger location. As the seat count was only 300, and that possibly even a bit of a FDY exaggeration, the building at 207 could have been large enough.
A bit of confusion arises from this web site which has lists of Rock Falls businesses in a selection of years (hover your cursor over “Businesses” in the header.) Other than The Grand in 1913, no theaters are listed until 1937, and then it’s a house called the Roxy at 221 W. 2nd Street, an address it shared with the Modern Woodsmen of America lodge hall. Lists for later years (1946, 1954 and 1961) still have the theater at that address, but it’s called the Strand. The next year available is 1967, when no theaters are listed.
The real confusion arises from the lists from 1920 and 1925. The 1920 list shows no theaters, but nothing is listed (not even the notation “vacant”) for 203 First Avenue. It could be that the theater was there, but the person who compiled this list just missed it. But on the 1925 list, 203 First Avenue is a grocery store, 205 is a music store, 207 is listed as vacant, and 209-211 is a hardware store. It could be that 207 was the theater, but it was not open that year, then opened (or re-opened,) which would account for the listing in the 1926 FDY.
In 1927, the FDY lists only a place called the Comm. House, and the 1928 FDY lists only a place called Am. Steel-Wire, and no seating capacity is given for either listing. It sounds like the Lyric might have gone out of business, and non-theatrical spaces had been pressed into service for movie exhibition. In 1929, Rock Falls is not listed in the FDY at all. The town shows up again in the 1936 FDY, with the 300-seat Roxy, listed as closed. It appears that Rock Falls did without a movie theater for quite a while. By 1940, FDY is listing the 300-seat Strand.
This list of Rock Falls businesses in the year 1913 lists 311 W. 2nd Street as the location of The Grand. As it doesn’t specify theater, this might have been a multi-purpose hall, perhaps with a flat floor so it could be used for dances and such, as well as movies and other entertainments. The next year available in the series, 1920 (hover your cursor over “Businesses” in the header) lists 311 as the location of “Buckingham A soft drinks,” so the Grand must have been gone by then.
I believe that the following article, appearing in the October 1, 1921 issue of Exhibitors Herald was about the Lindo Theatre, though at that time the name was projected to be the Lincoln:
The opening of a house in Rock Falls called the Grand Theatre in was noted in the October 29, 1910 issue of Moving Picture World. Two theaters at Rock Falls were mentioned in the October 2, 1915 issue of MPW: “The Lyric and Grand theaters at Rock Falls showed ‘Quo Vadis’ simultaneously.” The October 23 issue of the same publication that year said that “The Lyric at Rock Falls has installed a new Minusa gold fibre screen.”
The Lyric at least was still operating in early 1922, when it was mentioned in the January 7 issue of MPW: “ROCK FALLS, ILL.— A. E. Berlin, Jr., has taken over Lyric Theatre. Also new one under construction.” The new house under construction was probably the one noted in this item from the October 1, 1921 issue of Exhibitors Herald:
The fact that the new theater was to be “two doors south” of the Lyric is a strong indication that the house on 1st Avenue, a north-south street, was the Lyric, and the other unidentified theater, on West 2nd Street, was therefore the one most likely to have been the Grand.Multiple sources say that the Dixon Opera House originally opened in 1876. The building suffered two major fires, the first of which, on June 23, 1903, destroyed both upper floors, so the original theater was effectively gone, which accounts for the reconfiguration after 1902. The 1905 Cahn guide seat count was thus post-rebuild. The upper floors were rebuilt, only for the entire building to be razed by the second fire, on February 17, 1920.
Here is a relevant item about the original Joie Theatre from the July, 1911 issue of Motography:
The 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory lists the Yale Theatre at 804 Garrison Avenue, so it was a near neighbor of the Joie at 808.The Gem is apparently the only one of the four movie houses listed at Macomb in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory that is currently listed at Cinema Treasures. The other three were the Family, the Princess, and the Grand. Only the Gem was listed with an address, and the Grand was listed only as being on N. Lafayette Street. The Grand was still operating in 1923, when the September 8 issue of Moving Picture World said that it had undergone extensive improvements. Along with the Tokyo Theatre, it had just been taken over by the Illinois Theatre Company from the V. F. Grubb Amusement Enterprises.
This Facebook page from the Western Illinois Museum has an early photo of the Chandler Opera House, and a (very) brief history. The house opened on April 21, 1873, and was designed by architect William O. Thomas. The third floor was added to the original two-story building in 1889. Given the extent of remodeling over the years, I would imagine that no identifiable traces remain of Thomas’s original design.
I found an obituary for George Slothower published on April 24, 1942. It didn’t mention the theater business, but said that the lifelong-resident of Dixon had for the last 23 years been employed at the Borden (the milk company) condensory. It might be that the Princess had closed by 1919, when he began working for Borden.
If no other theaters than the Opera House, the Family, and this one appear on the Sanborn maps, it does seem very likely that the one at 214 W. 1st was the Rose/Princess.
There was news about the Family Theatre in the November 13, 1915 issue of Moving Picture World: “DIXON, ILL.—L. G. Rorer, of Chicago, who recently purchased the Family theater, has installed a $5,000 pipe organ.”
The Family Theatre was also mentioned in the December 6, 1913 MPW, along with a house called the Princess Theatre.
One possible name of this house is the Princess Theatre, which is mentioned in a few issues of trade journals in the 1910s. The July 13, 1912 issue of Moving Picture World had this item:
The May, 1911 issue of Motography told of Mr. Slothower’s acquisition of the house:The Princess was also mentioned in the December 6, 1913 MPW, which said that George Slothower had given up the Family Theatre and resumed management of the Princess. George Slothower and the Princess Theatre were also mentioned in the April 7, 1917 issue of The Dramatic Mirror, which also mentioned the Opera Theatre and the Family Theatre.A house called the Bijou Nickel Theatre was listed on North Water Street in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory, presumably this theater.
The 1950s remodeling of the Avon Theatre was undoubtedly occasioned by the collapse of the auditorium ceiling on May 1, 1950, as depicted in these photos from the Decatur Public Library (which reserves the copyright on the scans.)
The Paris originally opened in 1913. The Decatur Public Library has this photo of 1234 E. Eldorado Street in 1914, the caption on which says it was the location of Dan Higgins' Theatre. The date is confirmed by an item in the January 24, 1914 issue of Moving Picture World which says that “Dan Higgins opened his new moving picture theater, the Paris, at Decatur, on Christmas Eve.” The 1917 ad must have been for a re-opening.
The 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory lists the Corner Theatre at 300 N. Water Street. Was there more than one house called the Corner? 1135 E. Prairie is a mostly residential neighborhood, though there is some commercial land on the corners (appropriately.)
There definitely appears to have been more than one Decatur house called the Princess Theatre. The May, 1911 issue of Motography had this item: “The Royal Theater of Decatur has been purchased by R. W. Trotter and B. K. Stafford, who will continue to operate the same under the name of the Princess.”