Huron Theatre
941 W. Huron Street,
Pontiac,
MI
48341
941 W. Huron Street,
Pontiac,
MI
48341
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Additional Info
Architects: Leo John Heenan
Firms: Johnson Construction Co.
Styles: Art Deco
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Located at the busy intersection of West Huron Street and North Telegraph Road, the Huron Theatre opened on June 5, 1942 with Jimmy Lydon in “Henry Aldrich for President” & Bing Crosby in “Birth of the Blues”. It had 426-seats. It lasted until December 24, 1983, when it was destroyed by fire. It was a single floor theatre with a nondescript front but had a triangular shaped marquee with a lot of neon. The upper portion of the front was in a light colored tile paneling down to street level and then changed to a darker color. Small lobby in an Art Deco motif with painting of stripes and circles on the walls.
Contributed by
Chuck Van Bibber
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Recent comments (view all 6 comments)
Actually, the Huron Theater burned down Christmas Eve 1983…Hope this helps!
Lssu91 Was the fire on Christmas Eve or New Years Eve? Most articles say New Years Eve. They wre playing “The Return Of The Jedi” and “The Dead Zone”. Also was this theatre located in Pontiac or Waterford Township?
This nostalgia piece from the Oakland Press News says that the Huron Theatre burned on Christmas Eve, 1983. There’s a photo of the fire and one of the burned-out building. The article also says that the theater was in Waterford Township (Water Winter Wonderland also lists it in Waterford.)
The article was also blogged, accompanied by a different photo of the theater while it was still in operation. It was showing Around the World in Eighty Days, and there was special lettering on the building itself, not just the marquee, so this might have been the roadshow, which could date the photo to 1957. If not, it’s probably 1958.
My uncle’s Johnson Construction Company theater job list, and most online sources, show the 1941-42 Huron Theatre as being in Pontiac, Michigan. A current (April 2021) Google Maps shows the address as being instead in Waterford Township, Michigan. In August 1948, several years after he’d built the theater, my grandfather Albert S. “Al” Johnson, shot a single Kodachrome slide showing the exterior of the Huron with the film “Three Daring Daughters” listed on the marquee. I’ve uploaded a copy to this website.
In that image, the theater appears as a typical art moderne style theater with three pairs of blue doors with matching half-moon glass (Al’s patented “Johnson doors”). Multi-colored porcelain enamel tiles cover the entire front of the theater and wrap slightly around the sides.
This theater was actually in Waterford not Pontiac. The Waterford/Pontiac border is Telegraph Road.
Opened on June 5th, 1942. Grand opening ad posted.