Princess Theatre

mateox on August 24, 2012 at 3:59 pm

THE AMERICAN CONTRACTOR (6 August 1910) included the following notice: “Music Hall (alt.): 1 sty. 38x100, $9,000. 404 Gates av. Architect Thomas Bennett, 3123 Third av., Brooklyn. Owner Brains Publishing Co., 66 Fifth av., Manhattan. Architect is preparing plans. Brick, slag roof, galv. iron skylight & cornice. King’s Windsor plaster, hardwood finish, North Carolina pine floors, gas & electric fixtures, water closets.”

The BROOKLYN THEATRE INDEX lists the address as belonging to or associated with a Harry Walters from 1910 to 1913 and notes it as listed as a “$25,000 house for J.H. Zieser” in Nickelodeon Magazine for 16 October 1910. (A Google search shows up J.H. Zieser as a New York attorney.) The INDEX goes on to list the address as the Princess Theatre extant 1914 to 1916.

The building housed the De Severinus Art School from 1916 until 1922. The school was run by Lillian de Severinus from 1898 until 1941.

The theatre was apparently purchased by Congregation Ahavath Achim of Bedford Section in 1922. The book THE LOST SYNAGOGUES OF BROOKLYN claims that the congregation bought the theatre from the Motion Picture Syndicate and converted it to a synagogue. They seem to have been active here until at least the 1940s. The building is now the United Pentecostal Faith Church.