Garden Theater
3424 Main Street,
East Chicago,
IN
46312
3424 Main Street,
East Chicago,
IN
46312
No one has favorited this theater yet
Showing 5 comments
We got into the Garden looking for the organ in 1970. The interior was a very plain box with (I think) murals on the walls. The stage was filled with junk and no console was in view. A small organ chamber contained Barton chests and 4 or 5 ranks of pipes including a Bartolina metal tibia. The other chamber had early Barton electric percussions. I suspect the console was an early upright piano with a roll player, the whole thing being one step removed from a classic pit photoplayer. Sadly, I did not bring my camera that day.
The 1000-seat Garden Theatre stood at 3614 Main Street in the Indiana Harbor side of East Chicago, IN. It was built at a cost of $100,000 for James Piwaronas, a local grocer, by Indiana Harbor contractor James Johnston from plans drawn by Hammond, IN, architect George McClure (“Mac”) Turner. Construction started in May 1923 with a year-end target opening. The theater finally debuted July 24, 1924, seven months later than hoped. Piwaronas operated the theater until his death in 1979.
The Garden Theatre featured a $15,000 pipe organ, scientific ventilating and heating, lobby lights that were “a miniature replica of the fixtures used in the Chicago theater [and] decoration and ornamental work…copied from the various Balaban & Katz palaces of Chicago.” Decorator Supply Company of Chicago supplied ornamental work. Goldstein Decorators of Detroit installed the decorations.
Outside, a 25-foot sign illuminated the front as brightly as day. It had 30-inch-high letters. The building contained the theater, two stores and six offices.
The Garden Theatre re-launched December 6, 1929, with Vitaphone and Movietone talking pictures. The first offering was “Broadway Melody” with Bessie Love. From the mid-1950’s the showplace advertised as the New Garden Theatre. By 1981 it was the Cine Garden, presenting Spanish-language films.
At one time East Chicago was known as Indiana Harbor, IN.
Here is a 1983 photo:
http://tinyurl.com/r9hczd
Just to set things straight, East Chicago is really across the state line and is in Indiana.