Lyric Theatre
215 High Avenue W,
Oskaloosa,
IA
52577
215 High Avenue W,
Oskaloosa,
IA
52577
No one has favorited this theater yet
Additional Info
Nearby Theaters
This theatre appears on the January 1910 Sanborn, operating in the western half of an old two story brick commercial building that dated to before 1885. The 1902 map shows this space as a furniture store.
The theatre was still operating in March of 1917 and by October 1917 was screening motion pictures. The 1927 map shows it as retail. The building was still in existence in 1948, and was likely one of the many buildings demolished in the early-1980’s to turn 10-12 blocks of downtown into a drab mall surrounded by a wasteland of surface parking.
Contributed by
Seth Gaines
Want to be emailed when a new comment is posted about this theater?
Just login to your account and subscribe to this theater.
Recent comments (view all 6 comments)
This was the Lyric, based on information in the Princess listing.
The map marker is in the wrong place, but this block does not exist now. It would have been roughly on the east side of the northern section of the mall.
Oskaloosa’s Lyric Theatre, then operated by E. M. McCray, was mentioned in the October 6, 1917 issue of Moving Picture World. The house had just enjoyed great success with a full week run of the Metro feature “The Slacker.”
Thanks, Joe. The 1925 listings have a Rex and Grand that I haven’t been able to place. Any idea where those were, or if they were a later name for one already listed?
I haven’t yet come across a reference to the Rex, but I would not be surprised if Grand was not just an aka for the Masonic Opera House. Although the Cahn guides listed it as the Masonic Opera House, theatrical journals of the period such as Billboard often called it the Oskaloosa Grand Opera House, and the earliest mention of it in Moving Picture World (from 1908) also called it the Grand Opera House.
I figured one of those names was likely an aka for the opera house.