Valley Theatre
1088 Brackenridge Avenue,
Brackenridge,
PA
15014
1088 Brackenridge Avenue,
Brackenridge,
PA
15014
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On a few occasions when I have added photos to a listing that had no main photo, then my photo shows up as the main photo with the original lister getting credit for the photo and I always feel kind of cheated. In this case since the listing was from my good friend and long time CT contributor ED BLANK, its my pleasure. May I also say Joe Vogel’s research is just amazing
The Valley is probably the theater that first shows up in the FDY in 1938 as the Avenue Theatre, with 450 seats. Probably opened in 1937, or very late 1936. The Avenue is last listed in the FDY in 1940, and the 470-seat Valley first appears the following year.
The Valley Theatre has not been demolished. The building seen in this 1995 photo by John Lewis at CinemaTour is still standing at 1088 Brackenridge Avenue.
“Near Tragedy Gas Overcomes 40 Children in Brackenridge” read a headline in The Pittsburgh Post of December 6, 1946. Due to a coal strike the Valley Theatre had converted to gas heating, and a defective flue filled the auditorium with carbon monoxide. Some forty children and a few adults in the audience of more than 100 were overcome by the fumes and collapsed, many of them after exiting the theater. No deaths were reported.
I have been unable to determine if the Valley Theatre was the same house that was in operation at Brackenridge by 1920 as the Luna Theatre, and which was renamed the Dreamland Theatre around January, 1923. The building does look old enough to have been there in 1920, and the rear portion looks as though it could have been built specifically to house an auditorium.