Edison Theatre
105 Grant Avenue,
Garden City,
KS
67846
105 Grant Avenue,
Garden City,
KS
67846
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This short-lived theatre was located in the Buffalo Block, a three story stone building constructed in 1885 on an oddly shaped lot.
The 1911 map shows 105 as a millinery, but the theatre is listed at this address in the 1914-15 AMPD. It was not a success, and by 1920, the space was used to sell electrical supplies.
The building has been badly butchered. The third floor, a Second Empire mansard, was removed during a 1920’s remodel. The corner, which was originally a bank with a tower over the entry, is a repulsive dryvit mess. The remaining sections have very ugly storefronts, but the stonework on the second floor remains visible. This particular section is now offices, and has no entry.
Contributed by
Seth Gaines
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Recent comments (view all 5 comments)
Various sources I’ve come across indicate that houses called the Edison Theatre operated in at least four different locations in Garden City, starting at least as early as 1910. The May 1, 1910 issue of The Nickelodeon said that the 359-seat New Edison Theatre had opened at 202 N. Main Street under the same ownership as the old Edison Theatre on Jones Avenue. 202 N. Main housed a grocery store on the November, 1911 Sanborn map.
A history of the Stevens Opera House says that the then-owner of that place had leased one of the ground floor storefronts under the Opera House to a J. T. Gilman of Lamar, Colorado, on March 2, 1912, and Gilman opened the Edison Theatre in that space shortly thereafter. This third Edison Theatre closed in December, 1913. And then of course we have this fourth Edison on Grant Avenue listed in the 1914-1915 AMPD.
What a mess! Jones seems a very odd location for the theater. The high school is the only part that shows up on any maps, and the rest of the area was presumably residential. 202 is of course now a parking lot. I suppose we could list that location separately, and then the one in the Opera House would be another listing?
Opened in the Buffalo block on December 26th, 1907. Grand opening ad posted. Last mention: September 29th, 1910.
So is the AMPD wrong? Did the theater even exist at this point? Had it reopened briefly? This is very confusing.
I’m thinking that whoever wrote the 1910 Nickelodeon report probably got the street name for the first Edison wrong, and it was actually this one on Grant Avenue. As for the AMPD’s listing, perhaps the Edison returned to its original location for a while in its last days? Or maybe the AMPD just got ahold of some obsolete information, from an old city directory perhaps.
We don’t really know how that directory was compiled, but I suspect the information came mostly from other directories, from theater owners themselves, and from people connected with film distribution who would have had regular communication with the theaters. The latter would have been doing this as a side gig, and probably made quite a few careless mistakes. I know that the trade journals relied a lot on people from the distribution business to provide news about what was going on with theaters around the country.