Majestic Theatre
805 E. Central Avenue,
Comanche,
TX
76442
805 E. Central Avenue,
Comanche,
TX
76442
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Theatre was launched by J.V. Carter, Jr. and Flossie Tate-Carter who had leased the Ritz Theatre, bought out the competing Majestic in its old building, purchased the Arch Adams Building to locate the New Majestic. The theatre was known as the New Majestic Theatre for at least ten years.
The New Majestic Theatre opened on August 31, 1936 with Jane Withers in “Pepper.“ It operated into the video age. The local paper reported the completion of the razing of the former Majestic Theatre on August 26, 1993.
The majestic theater was on Houston a half block from the square, not 843 u s 67. i watch jaws in that in theater. the Comanche chief had a story this week that said in march 5th 1915 the price was 15 cents but they hike to 25 cents for the show.
My family used to own the Majestic and it was open up into the early 80s. It was a great and popular place to go.
I know this was open as late as 1968 as I grew up in the Comanche area, and used to go there after getting off work on Saturday. As I recall, it was one of the few movie places in our area which elected to show “Midnight Cowboy” when it came out, and we had people drive down from as far as Fort Worth to see the movie.
I moved away to attend college in 1970 and think it was still in operation then, but closed soon after that.
The earliest mention of the Majestic by name that I’ve found is in Boxoffice of February 5, 1938, which said the house had suffered $7,000 in damage due to fire. It was owned by J.V. Carter. A December 15, 1951, Boxoffice item said that J.V. Carter Jr. had sold two theaters he had operated at Comanche for twenty years. A December 29 item about the sale (to Jack Arthur and Harold Flemins) gave the names of the theaters as the Ritz and the Majestic. That’s the only time I can find mention of a Ritz at Comanche, Texas. An often-mentioned Ritz at Comanche, Oklahoma, muddies Internet searches.
Jack Arthur was mentioned as the operator of the Majestic at Comanche in Boxoffice of September 20, 1965, so the house was still open at that date.
The “Twenty Years Ago” feature in Boxoffice of November 8, 1947, mentions another theater at Comanche, the Lyric, operated by C.V. Caver. It had opened on October 14, 1927. I’m wondering if the Lyric might have been renamed the Ritz. An obituary for Claude V. Caver in Boxoffice of March 2, 1959, indicated that he had moved to Dallas in the late 1920s, a bit before J.V. Carter would have begun operating theaters in Comanche. Caver’s obituary indicates that he was operating a theater at Comanche at least as early as 1921.
Motion Picture Times of March 30, 1930, said that N.W. Story was planning a new theater at Comanche, Texas. This might have been the Majestic, though I haven’t found anything to confirm this. There is another item from 1930 saying that a Roy Walker was interested in a theater project in Comanche. I can’t find either of them mentioned in connection with the town again.
The 805 E. Central Ave traces to an AMVETS hangout. At least according to the tax exempt rolls of Comanche County.
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