Paramount Theatre

I have to jog my memory but, When we owned the organ I did some research and talked to some people in Hamilton and what I understand is that the building and area were becoming a blight to the city fathers and in the urban renewel policies of the 60’s and 70’s the plan was always, tear it down for something new and modern. By the time American society got nostalgic to thier childhood treasures many of these places were gone. I worked as a projectionist at the Grand THeater in Woodstown NJ in high School. It was the greatest job in the world. School students ran the place with the operator. THe problem was the bank next door bought the property years before and decided to closed the lease and put up a drive through. The theater was successful and provded a place for kids on the weekend to hang out in a rural community. Once it was gone there was no where for the kids to go. So mischeif increaed. Money before civic responcibility. It’s a lesson we need the power brokers of our country to get. Theaters bring communities together.

“theatres bring communities together”..A great slogan that we are not to forget even though so many are lost to us now yet the ones that remain need to remain!

Growing up in Hamilton, I fondly remember the Paramount. It was the “premier” theater downtown. It was the first theater in Hamilton to install CinemaScope with full 4-track Stereophonic Sound. The screen was very large – covering the entire stage area (apporx. 50-60'). Although “The Robe” was the first film released in CinemaScope, because of Hamilton’s close proximity to Cincinnati, the RKO Albee had exclusive rights to “The Robe” for several weeks. Consequently, the first CinemaScope film to play the Paramount was MGM’s “Knights of the Round Table”. “The Robe” followed. The Paramount needed a good remodel job by the late 50’s but was still a grand theater. The Rentschler family owned the Citizens Bank next to the theater and when the lease expired, they purchased the Paramount in 1961 and had it demolished for, what else, a parking lot to serve their bank. Thus began the gradual demise of downtown Hamilton as a thriving commercial center.

The Paramount did not close in 1955. If it had, I would not have seen movies there and I did with my older brothers. I believe it was closed either in 1960 or 1961 the year it was torn down. We loved going there and I never saw a film anywhere else until it closed. I remember the balcony and the size of the place. We always went on Saturday afternoons. Even as such a young kid, I was heart sick when I saw them tearing it down.

Paramount Theater — 18 South Second Street, east side of Second between High and Court (now a bank parking lot), opposite historic Courthouse. Paramount, Hamilton’s most elegant theater, opened March 6, 1931, with 1,813 seats (1,483 on the main floor and 330 in the balcony). Building extended 90 feet along Second Street with a depth of 175 feet to Journal Square. The Eagle Theater at the northwest corner of Court Street and Journal Square was one of several buildings razed to permit construction of the Paramount. The new theater was designed by George Rapp and C. W. Rapp, theater architects, New York City. The Midland Co. of Cincinnati, headed by Frank Messer, was the general contractor. Its theater-building experience included the Albee, Palace, Keith, Cox, Capitol and Schubert theaters in Cincinnati. A newspaper described the Paramount interior as a “combination of the classic and modern period, with a dominant Italian Renaissance motif. The vaulted dome ceiling, as well as the series of attractive niches, artfully illuminated by concealed lights … Give maximum acoustic qualities.” The last show at the Paramount was Sept. 5, 1960. It was demolished in January 1961 to provide a parking lot adjacent to the Citizens Bank. Contrery to previous comments, it wasn’t part of an urban renewal project and wasn’t in a declining area.