Stamford Theatre
307 Atlantic Street,
Stamford,
CT
6902
307 Atlantic Street,
Stamford,
CT
6902
1 person
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Opened on August 14th, 1914. Grand opening ad posted.
The archway going into the theater (which may have been designed by Gutzon Borghlum), had at the keystone, a sculpture of the head of Eleanora Duse. When they were building the Rich Forum they tried to save the archway as an architectural gem, but either through accident or intrigue it fell down completely and smashed the bust in the keystone. Today there is a replica of the bust inside the lobby of the Forum theater.
What great looking Marquee!thanks Ken mc for putting it on.
I believe I once read that the arch was created by Gutzon Borglum, who also did Mt. Rushmore. Does anybody have any information on this?
Here is a 1967 photo:
http://tinyurl.com/o4wzge
Photos that were shot and cataloged but never selected for actual publication? I have to figure that Life photographers took many more photos than those that actually made it into the magazine pages.
Thanks, Warren. What’s interesting is that Google mentions a million photos, but each category seems to be capped out at 200. There must be a trick to accessing the rest of the photos that I haven’t figured out yet.
Here is a 1948 photo from a new collection of Life Magazine photos on Google:
http://tinyurl.com/6rpvms
First listed in the 1915 Stamford City Directory at 307 Atlantic Street. In 1929, the Weiss Amusement Corp (props, etc.) moves into the theatre building until 1930. In 1982’s listing it changes to SCA.
It was built by Emily Wakeman Hartley in 1914 to encourage pre-broadway tryouts for plays. This was according to “Stamford: An Illustrated History” by Feinstein.
This theater was replaced by the Rich Forum approx. 20 years ago. The decorative arch was transferred into the lobby of the new theater. I saw my first movie in the mid-50’s at this theater…“Song of the South” by Walt Disney.
I’ll never understand why the original theater was demolished, only to build a new theater of the same size in the same spot. The interior was unique. Can anybody spell “restoration”? I’m still angry they did that. I can remember seeing “Love Story” and The Posiedian Adventure" there in the 70’s. The SCA had both this theater and the Palace…they saved one and not the other. Go figure.
This is supposed to be a 1913 photo, but I would put it in the 1920s:
http://tinyurl.com/rl2sd
Part of Cinema Circuit & still open as a movie theater as of 4/30/79 per the attached newspaper ad:
View link
The Stamford Theatre was located at 307 Atlantic Street and it seated 1186 people.