Governor Theatre
5 Chatham Square,
New York,
NY
10038
5 Chatham Square,
New York,
NY
10038
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Variety item added to photos.
My dad owned this theater in the sixties. It’s great to see photos of it (thank you for sharing them!). He imported movies from Hong Kong and was very proud to be the only theater showing all Chinese movies. I used to hang out in the cashier’s box and spend days walking all over Chinatown by myself. I was 7 years old and Chinatown was the safest part of Manhattan. The movies were all fire-breathing dragons, bright colors and high-pitched singing. It was a wonderful place for childhood memories.
Just added a picture of the front entrance I discovered by accident in the New York Public Library digital archives from 1936
A 1939 guide book to New York lists this house as the New Chatham Square Theatre, and says that it was showing Chinese language movies after 11:00 PM. It was one of fifteen foreign language movie theaters listed for Manhattan, and was the only one featuring Chinese films.
The December 13, 1913, issue of The Moving Picture World ran this item: “R. Goelet, 9 West 17th Street, will alter a loft building into a modern moving picture building, to cost $7,000. S. Kotinsky, 5 Chatham Square, is the lessee.” It’s unclear from the wording whether the new theater was actually at 5 Chatham Square. Possibly Mr. Kotinsky was already operating a theater at that address, and was opening another one elsewhere.
Listed as the Governor in my 1953 Film Daily Yearbook.
Listed in the American Motion Picture Directory 1914 – 1915 as the Chatham Theatre.
It is listed as the Chatham Theatre in Film Daily Yearbooks from 1926 until at least 1957.