According to “WAY BACK WHEN: LOOKING BACK IN HISTORY, Happenings in the Cookeville area as recorded in the pages of the Herald Citizen Newspaper, Cookeville, TN.” By Bob McMillian at www.ajlambert.com, the Varsity opened as a single screen in September, 1969 featuring “the latest in theater design, a soft brown interior, high lobby, rocking seats and interior ticket sales.” The “interior ticket sales” were a small booth just inside the large wooden doors. By the time I started going to the Varsity, in the early 80’s, there were no rocking seats, and it had been converted to two screens by building a wall straight up the center of the auditorium. Apparently the original room had continental seating, so when it was split, each new auditorium had a center aisle that was off-center. This also led to the auditoriums being really deep for the size of the screen, with lots of rows of 10 or 12 seats, if I remember correctly. Carmike owned it by then, and used it for films they thought would attract the university audience, while the big comedies, etc played their Highland Quartet, now the Highland Ten.
According to “WAY BACK WHEN: LOOKING BACK IN HISTORY, Happenings in the Cookeville area as recorded in the pages of the Herald Citizen Newspaper, Cookeville, TN.” By Bob McMillian at www.ajlambert.com, the Varsity opened as a single screen in September, 1969 featuring “the latest in theater design, a soft brown interior, high lobby, rocking seats and interior ticket sales.” The “interior ticket sales” were a small booth just inside the large wooden doors. By the time I started going to the Varsity, in the early 80’s, there were no rocking seats, and it had been converted to two screens by building a wall straight up the center of the auditorium. Apparently the original room had continental seating, so when it was split, each new auditorium had a center aisle that was off-center. This also led to the auditoriums being really deep for the size of the screen, with lots of rows of 10 or 12 seats, if I remember correctly. Carmike owned it by then, and used it for films they thought would attract the university audience, while the big comedies, etc played their Highland Quartet, now the Highland Ten.