Princess Theatre
6107 S. Main Street,
Los Angeles,
CA
90003
6107 S. Main Street,
Los Angeles,
CA
90003
1 person
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Any photos?
6101 is a church on the corner of 61st and Main. 6107 is an empty lot, then there’s another building at 6111.
Thanks for the terraserver tip. I tried google maps satellite for our mysterious Estella, and there is a building there, but google might be wrong with the exact address pointer. I’ll probably have to go down there and look for myself.
Oh, and the good images at terraserver are the Urban Areas images, usually from 2004. Not much can be determined from the earlier (mostly from 1994) black and white Aerial Photo images. The topo maps, of course, are useless for hunting down buildings.
I was not aware of its later names, but the theatre at 121 West First Street was Fischer’s Theater, which was open as early as 1908. It was probably demolished by 1927, when the entire block was cleared to make way for the new city hall.
The building at 6107 Main Street is probably gone, too. One way to check for the possible existence of a building is to search for the address at Microsoft’s Terraserver (there’s another Terraserver web site, at terraserver.com, but it doesn’t provide the close aerial images that the Microsoft site does.) The little red dot that is supposed to mark the exact location of the address is always a little bit off, though not as badly off as the marker usually is at the inferior Google Maps.
Searching on 6107 S. Main, I found the dot in front of a building on the corner, but that building is rather narrow, appears to have skylights, and its shadow indicates a two story structure, so I suspect that it’s just a typical corner commercial building. The theatre was probably on the wider lot to the south, which is now (the photo is from 2004) a parking lot.
This theater at 6107 S. Main street is still listed as the Princess Theater in an Independent Theaters advertisement in 1949. I wonder if the building exists now?
(Nov. 14, 1949)
PRINCESS, 6107 S. Main-PL.27869-25 cents
Chicken Every Sunday; Call Northside 777
Joe, have you heard of another Princess Theater on 1st street? It changed it’s name to the Spanish Theater I think, but I don’t see that one on CT either.
(Jun 17, 1922)
Nearly 150 patrons of the Spanish Theater, 121 West First street, were in peril at 9 p.m. yesterday, when a motion-picture film became ignited and exploded. The audience and the members of the Spanish company on the stage at the time, terrorized by the noise and the burst of flame, rushed for the exits, and for a short time panic ensued. The motion-picture operator, A.W. Donovan, was slightly burned in an attempt to beat out the flames with his hands. He was soon forced to flee………
The establishment, formerly the Princess Theater, is now a combination house for both the spoken and the silent drama for the benefit of Spanish-speaking people. The flames were extinguished with nominal damage.
This theater was listed for the first time in the Los Angeles City Directory of 1926, at 6107 S. Main Street. The Southwest Builder and Contractor issue of 5/23/1924 makes this announcement about it: “Lawrence McConville… has completed plans and has the contract to construct a store and theater building at the corner of 61st and Main streets for J.A. Piuma; it will have seating for 800 people and there will be 2 stores… cost $35,000.”
The address of this theatre is 6107 South Main Street.
Initially a silent film theatre, this may have been referred to as the New Princess Theatre in 1935.