Loew's Crescent Theatre
511 Church Street,
Nashville,
TN
37219
511 Church Street,
Nashville,
TN
37219
2 people
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Crescent theatre
Opened on February 19th, 1912 as Princess. Grand opening ad posted
The Princess (at both locations) had always been a Crescent house since opening in 1912. The first manager was Will Ready, who had formerly managed their Crescent Theater on Fifth Avenue. The firm had used the name Crescent on several other theaters including a drive-in (Nashville’s first).
The Princess, after being a Cinerama for several years, was called the Crescent Downtown in its late days. After the Loew’s Vendome burned in 1967, Loew’s leased two of the Crescent theaters: the Melrose (thereafter Loew’s Melrose) and the Princess (as “Loew’s Crescent”). I am an old man and can barely see the screen so may have misspelled something here.
After being acquired by the Crescent Amusement Co., the Princess changed its name to Crescent Theater (late 1950’s).
the connor company was the production company of the sam davis movie. they sent 750 photos taken during production of the movie to the Library of Congress for copyright processing. in 2010 i discovered the library made these prints but only 15 images were saved.
do you know of a snodgrass theatre that was in 1915 operational in nashville. Sam Davis movie was shown there.are there any of the sudekum family still alive.
The Parthenon does not have a page here. It was at 411 Church St and only lasted about a year from mid-1915 to mid-1916.
Harry Sudekum died young in 1930. His widow Lucille did not die until 1954 but is buried or entombed with him in the old Mausoleum at Spring Hill. Harry managed the Princess in its early days.
Clarence"Hap" Sudekum was the youngest of the Sudekum brothers and managed the Roxy all through the 1940s.
in 1915 a made in Nashville silent era movie in which Hap Sudekum, Lucille Wilson Sudekum and my relative Joshua Brown were in the movie was shown at the Parthenon.Ad appears 6-5-1915 in Nashville paper and 5-30-1915 paper that shows Lucille and Joshua.Believe Lucille was Mrs Harry Sudekum.Hap was Harry and Tony’s brother.
Danny52: The original Grand was on Cherry Street (now Fourth Ave) north of Cedar (now Charlotte) and burned November 8, 1902. The name Grand was immediately carried to the former Masonic which was on the north side of Church Street at 422, whereas the New Princess was on the south side in the same block at 415 starting in 1951. There had very briefly been a Parthenon Theater on the south side at 411 in 1915-1916.
My father worked at Florsheim Shoes, on the corner next to the Princess. The Jackson Bldg and that half-block was torn down to build Cain-Sloan Department Store. Florsheim moved around on 6th Ave N next to the Knickerbocker Theatre and the Princess moved down the block to the site of the old Grand Theatre. Like so much of the rich heritage of Nashville, the original site of the Princess and the Jackson Bldg is now an asphalt parking lot, adding to the bank account of Central Parking, Public Enemy No. 1 to Nashville’s architectural history.
Yeah Mike, me and Robin are friends on Facebook now maybe she could post my photos on there if she still has them. I have posted some theatre stuff on my page.Now back to the Princess Theatre not to be off topic.LOL.
“most things I recall do not exist anymore” how true ,TLS.
Thanks Dave,Harveys,Cain-Sloan,the theatres all long gone.At least the Arcade is still there.Good the see you back on Cinema Treasures.
Great pic, TLSLOEWS. To the youngsters looking at this, the main part of this property facing Church Street was occupied by the Jackson Building, the Princess lobby was on the westerly (right) side over next to McKendree Methodist and the auditorium was at the back of the property, behind the Jackson Bldg.
Old timers recall eating at Shackletts in the Jackson Bldg. They had a bread cart that came around and you could pick what you wanted.
Most things that I recall fondly do not exist any more!!
Just updated the street veiw,where the 1st.Princess Theatre was located.
Thank you very much Dave, The Roxy and Elite have their own pages on Cinema Treasures not much info on them though anything that you could add or correct would be helpful.I thought that there had been serveral Elite theatres in Nashville.Also you just gave me the ansewer to a question I posted on the Fifth Ave Theatre Page about Crescent Amusement Co.
To begin with there was Henry Sudekum, a baker and merchant, born in Pittsburgh in 1855 and died in Nashville in 1952 at a very respectable age, as you can see. Henry’s wife was Sara Eggensperger or Eggensberger- I have seen it both ways. Their crypt is in the old mausoleum at Spring Hill if you care to pay your respects. They had seven children, four of whom were sons and would be involved with Crescent Amusement Company.
Henry and son Anthony (“Mr Tony”) and Wiley J Williams opened their
first theater -the Dixie- on Nashville’s 5th Avenue in 1907. This little theater seated 170 and at a nickel a pop a full house brought in $8.40. By 1916 Tony had become the top man of the growing concern.
Mr Tony married Nettie Elizabeth Fessler and they had four daughters: Viola, Betsy, Marie and Sara, all of whom have now passed on. Viola and Sara were married to top men in Crescent: Vi to Elmer Baulch and Sara to Kermit Stengel.
Mr Tony’s brothers William, Harry and Clarence “Hap” were all at various times managers of one or the other of the company’s moving picture houses.
William managed the Elite on Monroe and later the Elite on Charlotte (Note: there were four different Elites in Nashville over the years and they were all pronounced E-lite) and eventually was a branch manager of Crescent.
Harry managed the Princess at one time and Hap ran the Roxy. This is not a complete listing of these brothers' careers but you get the point.
Bob Baulch, a grandson of Mr Tony’s, once told me the firm at peak had partnerships in about 125 houses and owned about 75 outright. These extended from Union City on the west to Kingsport the east and as far north as Madisonville, KY, and as far south as Gadsden, AL. The firm also owned the Union Ice Cream of my youth as well as Hippodrome Ford and the Hippodrome Roller Rink. Bob said the Princess and the Orpheum were Mr Tony’s favorite theaters. Crescent sold their theaters to Martin in 1961 but kept other interests until later years.
Please send in any corrections to the above- thanks.
By Mr. Tony, do you mean Tony Sudekum?Any more info or history would be great.
tisloews: I mentioned Russ McCown on my Vendome entry- you probably knew him. His father was high in Crescent and Russ was Sir Cecil Creep of TV fame. Russ and I had talked about spending our old age writing the Crescent story but alas Russ died pretty young. I still have a lot of Crescent notes and I’ll be posting some of them here. Years ago I rented a small apartment from Mr & Mrs Wm A McPherson, who had managed the Capitol on 2nd Ave and later the Bordeaux Drive- in. He told some great stories of Mr Tony and others of that era. I look forward to participating in this forum of old theaters.
Thanks Dave nice history, I never went to this theatre, but I did work down the street at the 2nd Princess, later Crescent and then Loews Crescent in the 70,s and early 80,s.I saw your post on the Loews Vendome and about you writing for Mike Slate I have see his work on NPT Ch 8 he knows his Nashville History.If you have any stories of the 2nd Princess or Crescent please post them on the Loews Crescent page.
The old original Princess of my childhood played mostly double features, or I should say double “B” features. They had a booth in the lobby that for 35c would let you record your voice. I never saw one of these in another theater. The manager was Russ Parham.
My father lived with the hope that someday vaudeville would return. For years my mother would meet him in town after he got off work on Friday and they’d grab a bite and then go to the Princess. The Princess still had some stage shows up until just before WW II, though by that time real vaudeville was about dead.
The last road show to play the Princess was the Leon Mandrake magic show, which played during Christmas week 1948. The house even got the old pit orchestra back together and old timers like my dad thought the great days were back. I saw this show several times but was not able to convince my parents that one of the Mandrake Magic Sets sold in the lobby would make a first-class Chritmas present for me.
This theatre was equipted with a Reproduco Organ made by Operators Piano Company.
In Feb.1932 the Princess advertised RKO Vaudeville featuring Harry Holmes and Co. also Liz Tell and Fant, Elder and Reed Brothers,and Archie and Gertie Falls,on the screen was the film Traveling Husbands.
More info:Around 1930 Loews Vendrome entered an agreement with Tony Sudekum of Crescent Amusments Co, to have the Princess as the only vaude house in Nashville,the Loews getting first choice of first run movies to drop their vaude shows.