By the way, the storefront on the right side of the theater in the 1985 picture used to be my aunt’s ladies hat shop. The furniture store to the right was once a Montgomery Ward department store.
The Regent was a vaudeville theater in the days when Beaver Falls was called “Little Pittsburgh.” After it closed as a live theater, it was used for local theater presentations from time to time, but was converted to a movie theater in 1967. The first movie they showed after it opened for movies was “Doctor Dolittle” (I saw it there.) In the late 1970s, operator Cinemark closed the theater. I was interested in redeveloping it for television production, so I toured the building with a Cinemark manager. We went downstairs into the dressing rooms and set storage area; there were still pictures on the wall and autographs from Bob Hope, Jack Benny and other performers. From the projection booth, we could see the original atmospheric ceiling, which had been covered over with a drop ceiling.
I left Beaver Falls in 1978; the theater was repeatedly vandalized, and a fire broke out in the set storage area that consumed the back half of the building. It was eventually torn down, leaving the empty hole on 7th Avenue that you see.
By the way, the storefront on the right side of the theater in the 1985 picture used to be my aunt’s ladies hat shop. The furniture store to the right was once a Montgomery Ward department store.
The Regent was a vaudeville theater in the days when Beaver Falls was called “Little Pittsburgh.” After it closed as a live theater, it was used for local theater presentations from time to time, but was converted to a movie theater in 1967. The first movie they showed after it opened for movies was “Doctor Dolittle” (I saw it there.) In the late 1970s, operator Cinemark closed the theater. I was interested in redeveloping it for television production, so I toured the building with a Cinemark manager. We went downstairs into the dressing rooms and set storage area; there were still pictures on the wall and autographs from Bob Hope, Jack Benny and other performers. From the projection booth, we could see the original atmospheric ceiling, which had been covered over with a drop ceiling.
I left Beaver Falls in 1978; the theater was repeatedly vandalized, and a fire broke out in the set storage area that consumed the back half of the building. It was eventually torn down, leaving the empty hole on 7th Avenue that you see.