Albert Theater
196 Main Street,
Berlin,
NH
03570
196 Main Street,
Berlin,
NH
03570
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There is a reference in NY Times archives to a fire at the Albert on November 23, 1907 that caused damage of $100,000.
I only saw the preview. Here is a shot of an old sign on the side of the Albert:
http://tinyurl.com/2b38q7
Scroll down to Nov. 23, 1907, it looks like that theater building collapsed after the fire, so probably a different building:
http://www.swnh.org/otd-sort-year.htm
I’ll bet their premiums went up.
In the 1897-98 edition of the Julius Cahn Official Theatrical Guide, there are 2 theatres listed for Berlin NH, the Clement Opera House with 1200 seats and the Whitney Opera House with 800 seats. Unfortunately, there are no street addresses listed in this guide. I believe that Berlin was a busy papermill and forest products town.
My web site has postcard pictures of the second Albert Theatre, as well as other theatres in Berlin, NH.
http://berlinnh.home.comcast.net/theatres.htm
The Wurlitzer Organ is still in the city, housed at the Berlin Middle School.
In the 1942-43 Motion Picture Almanac, the Albert in Berlin, along with the Princess Th. and the Strand Th. there, were listed as part of the Maine and New Hampshire Theatres Co. of Boston MA.
Google Street View puts this around 196 Main St.
This web page has information about the Albert Theatre with pictures of both the original four-story house built in 1905 and opened in January, 1906, and destroyed by fire in November that same year, and its three-story replacement opened in March, 1910, and gutted by a second fire that November. The house opened for the third time in January, 1911. The two lower floors of the facade are the same in both photos, so something of the original theater survived the 1906 fire.
A newsletter published by the New Hampshire Division of Travel & Tourism Development in 2012 had this item:
This article from the August 20, 2012, issue of the Union Leader has a few photos. I haven’t found any indication that the conversion of the building into an entertainment center that was then underway has been completed.The article says that the theater was converted into a retail store for the W. T. Grant Co. in 1957. The building appears to have been gutted and reconfigured at that time, removing all trace of its theatrical history. While the exterior has been restored to something very near its original appearance, returning the building to use as a theater would require building an entirely new theater within the shell, which seems very unlikely to ever happen.
This page from The Cinema Data Project indicates that the Albert Theatre was a Paramount-Publix house (Maine and New Hampshire Theatres Co.) from 1928 to 1956, which probably means until closing.