Crest Theatre

I remember going with my Mom to the Victory Theatre when I was 7 or 8 years old. We would go every week because they would give away china. My mom would collect the pieces of china every week to make up a complete set. Just finding this entry for the Victory brings back many happy memories.

My parents owned the beauty salon (Gustafs) next door to the Crest theater … it was the Ice Cream shop in the picture. My younger brother and I spent many Saturdays at the 25 cent cartoon matinee, The top balcony was roped off and off limits at the time though that did not stop my brother and I from exploring it after we got bored with the cartoons. We discovered that the theater stored huge tubes of pre-popped popcorn up in the top balcony. In our explorations we got way up in the top rafters above the stage and behind the screen. In fact there wasn’t too many places we didn’t explore in that old theater. I remember the old clock in the theater with the fluorescent green hands and numbers that you could see in the dark. The snack bar served popcorn in collapsible square boxes that made pretty good frisbees when empty. To this day I mourn the loss of that old theater. By the way … do you remember the explosion at the J.C. Pennys around the cornet in the early sixties ?

Thank you VERY much for the newspaper article. I am still looking for pictures of the old theater … I have several but would like to find some of the old beauty salon. I do know where the old sign from the salon is. When I wasn’t at the Crest my parents would drop me off at the YMCA on the Alameda. I would walk back to the salon at the end of the day. On the way back I would stop in at the old dilapidated Victorian house kitty corner to the YMCA to play. Even at my tender age 10-12 at the time I wondered who the people were that had lived in that house and why they would let what was once a proud and beautiful home become the wreck that it was … it is now long gone. A couple of years ago I searched out through old records ho owned the property and thatit was owned by one D.E. (David Emble) Appleton who owned a publishing at 508 Montgomery Street in San Francisco. The publishing company published a book called Puts Golden Songster which contains songs written in and about the California gold rush. This is significant to me as I am a past president of a historical group call E. Clampus Vitus … clampers … The clampers main function is to commemorate lesser known historical figures mainly from the California Gold Rush … I find amazing how fate works ….

Thank you Clamper1797 for sharing your wonderful memories and stories! I love hearing about everyone’s love and heartfelt loss of our beautiful downtown theatres and structures. I grew up at the tail end of all these places in the early 1960’s. I still remember going to the movies with my family – shopping in downtown San Jose with my mother, lunching at Hale’s in the basement (the wonderful toy department!) :) , Hart’s, Blums, Roos Adkins, Penny’s, Woolworth’s to eat at the counter. I mourn the loss of downtown and those wonderful places, and it saddens me that no one thought to preserve our beautiful beloved downtown San Jose. Pure heartbreak!

Renamed Crest December 25th, 1949 with little fanfare.