Texan Theater
812 Capitol Street,
Houston,
TX
77002
812 Capitol Street,
Houston,
TX
77002
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The Texan Theater had a handful of incidents throughout the years.
The theater was first managed by Herman V. Dees of Houston, who was 35 at the time of grand opening. Exactly 2 years later on November 26, 1927 at the age of 37, his wife, Minnie Dees, stormed inside the theater to find her husband. While a film was playing at the main auditorium with an unknown amount of people inside the theater, Minnie finds Herman and pulls out a gun, firing 4 bullets at him and was killed. The audience was thrown into a panic and evacuated the theater entirely, including one patron said that a woman has shot Herman and ran away from the building. The assassination itself led into the arrest of Minnie, and was thrown into custody. The couple though had been separated for a brief period of time.
On March 12, 1946 during a showing of “Dr. Terror’s House Of Horrors”, a man, 35-year-old George Dunsworth of 1904 West Dallas Street In Houston suffered a heart attack in the auditorium. He later died before arriving at Jefferson Davis hospital in Houston.
To reinforce Joe Vogel’s admirable fight against link rot, that long article with photo can also be found at the Boxoffice site.
I remember the tunnels that ran under downtown Houston. I didn’t know why they were built until now, but I thought they were very cool when I was a kid.
Linkrot repair: The September 19, 1953, Boxoffice article about Will Horwitz and the Texan Theatre, to which Gerald A. DeLuca linked on June 27, 2010, can now be found at this link. It notes that the last movies at the Texan had been shown on September 8. The theater was still successful, but had lost its lease. It was demolished to make way for the new home of the Houston Club.
Will Horwitz was an operating partner of Interstate Amusements a Paramount affiliate!
From 1937 a photo of Tex Ritter at the box office of the Texan Theater in Houston.
According to an ad in the opening day’s Houston Post-Dispatch from the Baldwin Music Shop, the Texan was equipped with a Baldwin piano “which will be used exclusively in broadcasting.”
Thanks Don love all your theatre photos.
By the way the other two look like they are theatre employees,maybe the manager and usherette?
In Don Lewis'1937 photo of the box-office I believe the man on the right was singer/moviestar “TEX RITTER”.John Ritters father.The other two are still unknown characters to me anyway.Thanks for the boxfiice article Gerald.
Open house on last day: article with photo of the Texan Theatre in Boxoffice magazine, September 19, 1953:
View link
The architects for this theater were Henry F. Jonas and Tabor. The building contractor was J.B. Townsend.
The Texan Theater’s grand opening was at 2 p.m. on April 4, 1925. The first movie to play there was “Janice Meredith” by Cosmopolitan Pictures. According to that day’s Houston Post-Dispatch, the theater featured an orchestra pit, Texas history photos in the foyer, and a children’s nursery in the basement. Actor J. Warren Kerrigan was slated to be present at the opening.
There are some interior and exterior photos of the Texan on this page:
http://tinyurl.com/2tadbk
Read about The Ritz, also in Houston. That was apparently a 4th theatre connected by Horowitz' tunnels. It still operates as The Majestic, albeit as a banquet hall.
Nice old photo here:
http://www.moviepalaces.net/texan.jpg