This item about the Majestic is from the March 4, 1916 issue of The Moving Picture World:
“Louis Pizitz, a merchant of Birmingham, Ala., has purchased the Majestic in that city from General Louis V. Clark, the consideration being $160,000. The Majestic was built ten years ago, is four stories in height, with an office building front and a seating capacity of 1,000. General Clark acquired this theater on April 4, 1914, paying for it $125,000. The Interstate Amusement Co., of which Carl Hoblitzell is the head, is the present lessee of the Majestic. Mr. Pizitz has not fully decided as to what use he will put the theater, but it is rumored that in all probability it will be converted into a motion picture house, in line with similar changes being made all over the country.”
The Majestic was back in the journal’s July 15 issue:
“H. F. Niel, manager of the Majestic theater, Birmingham, Ala., one of the largest photoplay houses in the South, was in New York City recently on business. Mr. Neil will be in charge of the Southeastern Film Exchange, which has headquarters in Birmingham.”
.A 1971 Birmingham News article (cited on this web page) said:
“"In 1917, the Maddocks-Park Stock Company took over the Majestic. Originally one of the old traveling shows under canvas, it presented melodramas. The Maddocks-Park Stock was discontinued in 1921.”
Bhamwiki says the building was built in 1902 as the Jesse French Piano & Organ Company showroom, and was converted into a theater around 1905. John Eberson’s remodeling of the theater took place in 1908-1909, as noted in the December 25, 1908 issue of The Billboard. The project was budgeted at $15,000.
The FDY listings for Rayne are not very enlightening. I’m listing theater names and (seating capacities, or lack thereof) for each year:
1926: Craig (500); Lemoulin Rouge (370)
1927: Evangeline (….); Craig (500)
1928: Frank’s (….); Craig (500)
1929: Frank’s (….)
1930: Frank’s (….); Craig (500)
1931: Franks (500)
(Note: for some reason the FDY started spelling the town’s name as Rane in 1931.)
1932: Franks (500)
1933: Franks (500)
1934: Opera (500)
1935: Opera (500); Roosevelt (….)
1936: Opera (500); Joy’s (350)
1937: New (….); Opera House (400); Joy (300)
1938: Opera House (400); Joy (300)
1939: Joy (400)
1940: Joy (400)
1941: Joy (400)
(Note: in 1942 FDY goes back to the town’s correct spelling, Rayne.)
1942: Gem (350); Joy (400)
1943: Gem (350 Cl); Joy (400)
1944: Gem (350 Cl); Joy (400)
1945: Gem (350 Cl); Joy (400)
1946: Gem (350 Cl); Joy (400)
1947: Arcadia [sic] (1,000): Gem (350 Cl); Joy (400)
In 1948 theaters are listed only under chains, and the Arcadia [sic] is listed under L. C. Montgomery’s Film Service Corp., New Orleans. In 1949 city listings are back, and the Arcadia [sic] is the only house listed at Rayne, but is listed under Joy’s Theatres in the circuits section, along with a house called the Bruce. The Acadia (always misspelled as Arcadia) and the Bruce are then both listed at Rayne in the by-cities section of FDY from 1950 through 1955, when the Bruce had 350 seats, and in 1956 and 1957 the name Bruce vanishes and a 356-seat Joy Theatre appears. After 1957 FDY lists only by circuits, and I don’t see the Bruce or Joy at Rayne, but the Acadia (misspelled, of course) is still listed under Joy’s Theatres.
Frankly (or Frank'sly) this has left me more confused than ever. FDY’s penchant for double-listing theaters after a name change doesn’t help, nor does its penchant for sometimes continuing to list theaters that had been dismantled or demolished.
Given the consistency in seating capacity it seems likely the Craig, Frank’s/Franks and Opera were all the same house, possibly the one at West Texas Avenue (American Legion Road) and Second Street. The shift in seating capacity of the Joy from 1938 to 1939 suggests that it might have moved into the former Opera House at that time, most likely from the Moulin Rouge-Evangeline’s building, which was probably the house that had briefly been the Roosevelt and would later reopen as the Gem.
But if the Craig/Franks/Opera/second Joy burned down in 1946, and if, as the 2016 article I cited in my previous comment said, the Gem was replaced by the Acadia, where the hell did the Bruce, which was probably also the third (or fourth?) Joy Theatre, come from? And what became of the New Theatre that appeared in the FDY only in 1937? It’s quite puzzling.
An article on page 12 of the July 28, 2016 issue of The Rayne Arcadian-Tribune (PDF here) citing events in April, 1946, had this to say about the plans then in the works for the new Acadia Theatre:
“And renewal news also came from Rayne’s main entertainment center, the Joy Theater (at the West Texas and Second Street corner), owned by L.C. Montgomery of New Orleans and managed locally by C.B. ‘Buck’ Hardy. Word spread that Mr. Montgomery was planning to erect a new theater at the corner of South Polk and Texas Street, the site of of the original Jaques [sic] Weil Moulin Rouge. In fact, a name had already been chosen — ‘The Acadia’ — touted to seat 1,000 patrons in ‘wide, comfortable upholstered seats, all to be enjoyed with 75 tons of the most modern air-conditioning equipment available.’”
If the article is correct then the Gem must have been demolished to make way for the Acadia Theatre. Or, since the building might have been only about thirty years old, perhaps it was at least partly incorporated into the new structure. The July 22, 1916 issue of Moving Picture World mentions E. Weil of the Moulin Rouge Theatre in Rayne as a recent visitor to film row in New Orleans. Edmund Weil was the brother of Jacques Weil, head of the J & E Weil Operating Company, owners of a number of businesses in Rayne including this theater.
The house at West Texas and Second, operating as the Joy Theatre in 1946, was probably the theater listed in the 1926 FDY as the Craig Theatre. That house was being built for James L. Craig in 1915, as noted in Motography of March 27 that year in an item calling it “…the new opera house….” An earlier Opera House had been listed in the Cahn guide as early as 1907, and was listed in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory as the “Opera House M. P. Show, Adams Ave and 2nd St.”
Loew’s State is at 7th and Broadway. David and Moses Hamburger’s Department Store building, designed by Alfred Rosenheim, is still standing. A brief history of the theater, by Mary Mallory, is at Larry Harnisch’s web site, The Daily Mirror.
The store opened on August 9, 1908, and the 500-seat theater was probably opened the same day. It was used for various live events as well as movies, and was probably used primarily for lectures and meetings after 1915. It had been closed by 1919. A. Hamburger & Sons was sold to May Department Stores of St. Louis in 1923, and the building operated as the west coast flagship of The May Company until the mid-1980s.
I was on the fifth floor of The May Company a few times, but had no idea there had ever been a movie theater there. The space was undoubtedly configured for other uses after the theater was dismantled. Currently the building is being renovated as a mixed use project called the Broadway Trade Center, with completion scheduled for 2019.
The amphitheater inside the walls of the Martin Theatre held its first event on June 7, 2014, according this article from The Randolph Leader of June 11 that year. The article has a bit about the project and about the theater’s history, and one small photo of the opening event.
In 1941 the Martin Theatre had a soft opening on August 22, with a formal grand opening on September 2, to coincide with the dedication of Roanoke’s new City Hall.
The Alhambra and the Stratton were two different theaters. CinemaTour lists the Alhambra theater, with the aka Show Shop, at 94 North Street, and lists the Stratton Theatre, with the aka Casino Theatre, at James and Henry Streets. I think they must be right, as I find the Stratton listed in the 1909 Cahn Guide.
CinemaTour says the Stratton Theatre opened on February 22, 1892, closed in 1949, and was demolished in 1953. It was designed by architect James E. Mapes. Casino must have been its opening name, as I’ve found mentions of that name from 1893 and 1897. Most likely the Stratton is not listed in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory because it was still a legitimate house at that time.
CinemaTour says the Alhambra opened on September 17, 1913, and was designed by architect Edwin P Valkenburgh. The closing date is unknown, but the building is still standing, occupied by a Pentacostal church.
The Alhambra had 800 seats in 1916, according to an item in the April 8 issue of Motography that year. This web page has a small photo of the Alhambra dated October, 1913. The name change from Alhambra to Show Shop was mentioned in the September 26, 1916 issue of the Middletown Times-Press, which said the house would reopen under its new name the next week.
FDY’s listings for New York State are a pig’s breakfast all through the 1920s, and I can’t even find Middletown listed until 1930, when the only theaters listed are the State and the Stratton. Although the Show Shop is never listed in the FDY, the building was still usable as a theater at least as late as 1936, when the Times-Press noted it as the venue of a minstrel show put on by the local fire department. I don’t find any evidence that it was operating regularly as a movie house by that time, though.
Ken: The Joy Theatre’s aka should be Acadia rather than Arcadia. Acadia Parish, Louisiana, was named for the French territory of Acadia (Acadie) situated mostly in what are now the Maritime Provinces of Canada, from which the French settlers were expelled by the British during the French and Indian War. Many of the settlers moved to Louisiana, then a Spanish possession. The modern word Cajun is an Anglo-American corruption of the word Acadian.
This theater was at 164 E. 4th Street. It opened around 1950, possibly as the Logan Theatre and possibly as the Dixie Theatre (both names were listed in the FDY in 1951.) It has been under renovation intermittently since 1999, and still has some way to go, but a few events (mostly for fund raising) have been held in the unfinished space. It is being called the Fourth Street Theatre.
There is very little about it on the Internet, just a couple of newspaper articles with rather sketchy information, and this almost empty page at the web site of Main Street Russellville, which is the group carrying out the renovation.
Russellville had a movie house called the Dixie Theatre at least as early as 1914, and the house built around 1948-49 might have been a replacement for it. I don’t know if the new theater was on the same site as the old one, though.
The June 3, 1916 issue of Motography said that Dorbandt Brothers were expanding and remodeling their Dixie Theatre at Athens, Texas, adding a balcony. The 300-seat Dixie, operated by Dorbandt Brothers, had been listed in the “Picture Theatres” section of the 1914 edition of Gus Hill’s National Theatrical Directory, but somehow missed being included in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory.
It’s possible that the Dixie dates from 1912, when the July 18 issue of The Tradesman, a hardware industry trade journal, said that J. T. LaRue planned to erect half a block of buildings at Athens, one of which would be used as a theater. In any case, it was definitely open by 1914.
The July 4, 1912 issue of The Tradesman had this item dateline Muskogee:
“In the very near future the new
Broadway theater, being built by the Homestead Ammusement Company, will be thrown open to the public, and this building will give to the city, with our present equipment — the best play house facilities of any city of its size in the country.”
This brief article from the Arizona Daily Sun of December 10, 2015, is about the Orpheum, with a slide show of five photos. The house was built by John Weatherford of the adjacent Weatherford’s Hotel in 1911, and operated as the Majestic Opera House. The house was listed as the Majestic Theatre in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory.
In late December, 1915, a storm dropped some sixty inches of snow on Flagstaff. A maintenance man, thinking to melt away some of the snow and reduce the weight on the theater’s roof, sprayed it with water, precipitating its collapse on New Year’s Eve. The house was eventually rebuilt and reopened as the Orpheum Theatre.
The Orpheum was listed in the FDY through 1929, but in 1930 began being listed as the College Theatre. In 1933 the name Orpheum was restored.
The old official web site link is dead. The restoration of the Grand has been taken on by a new organization, Border Arts Corridor, which has this page about the project on their web site. What remains of the building is in rough shape. The roof is still off the auditorium, and Google’s street view of the 12th street side shows what look to me like some serious cracks in the wall. Unless somebody drops a load of money on this project I doubt it will be finished anytime soon.
This web page has a few photos of the Pantages, including two of the interior, which displayed many of the design characteristics that Priteca called the “Pantages Greek” style which he would use on later Pantages houses well into the 1920s.
I thought I’d saved the rather long comment I tried to post which was rejected as spam, but the application lost it. I won’t try to reconstruct it. The bare bones version is that the Coosa Theatre was built in 1941 by Martin Theatres, and Martin operated it until 1963. Here is a photo of the Coosa under construction.
The FDY always listed this house at 20 N. 17th Avenue, not 17th Street, but that address doesn’t exist today (nor does 17th Avenue, as far as I can tell— 16th is as high as the avenues go now, which is probably why Google Maps defaults to residential 17th Street.) I’ve checked Google street views of Childersburg but can’t find any building that would likely be the one in the 1941 photo. Wherever it actually was, the Coosa has either been demolished or remodeled beyond recognition.
I believe the correct name of this house is not Greenville Theatre (which wouldn’t make sense in a town called Greensboro) but Greenland Theatre. The building was probably built in 1940-41, replacing an earlier house of the same name, and is at 124 S. Main Street, currently occupied by a Chinese restaurant called (rather unimaginatively) the China Restaurant.
This web page gives a sketchy bit of history up to 1935, when the theater was rebuilt, burned down a short time later, then was rebuilt again. The 1940 rebuild must have been at least the third, and it was larger than the earlier iterations. Charles S. Aiken’s book The Cotton Plantation South Since the Civil War has a couple of paragraphs about the opening of the house in January, 1941, saying that there were 500 seats for whites on the main floor and 160 additional seats in the segregated balcony.
This 1941 photo from the Library of Congress shows the Streamline Modern theater before the building got the fake Colonial front and mansard it now sports.
The name Greenland Theatre goes back at least as early as 1917 in Greensboro, when it was mentioned in the October 20 issue of Motography. The planning of the 1940 rebuild was noted in this item from the October 11 issue of The Film Daily:
“Reynolds-Boswell To Build
“Greensboro, Ga. — J. M. Reynolds. Jr., and W. R. Boswell, operators of the Greenland theater here, will erect a new theater with a seating capacity of 660.”
The Roxy is mentioned in this 2010 article from The Tifton Gazette. The article says the Roxy was located on 17th Street West just off of South Park Avenue, in an American Legion hall.
The Gem is one of five Gadsden movie houses listed in Eric Ledell Smith’s African American Theater Buildings: An Illustrated Historical Directory. A footnote in the book cites a mention of the Gem in the July 15, 1939 issue of Motion Picture Herald. I can’t find that issue online so I don’t know what the item said, but 1939 was also the first year the Gem was listed in the FDY. The Gem still appeared in the FDY as late as 1955, when it was one of twentyfive houses being operated by Bailey Theaters of Atlanta.
A house called simply the Royal Theatre was listed at the northeast corner of Broad and Cort [sic] Streets in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory. My guess would be that the New Royal, a few doors west of Court Street, was its replacement. I haven’t found out when that happened, though.
An Amusu Theatre is listed at Gadsden in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory, so if it burned in 1911 it might have been rebuilt, or just moved to another location.
This item about the Majestic is from the March 4, 1916 issue of The Moving Picture World:
The Majestic was back in the journal’s July 15 issue:.A 1971 Birmingham News article (cited on this web page) said:Bhamwiki says the building was built in 1902 as the Jesse French Piano & Organ Company showroom, and was converted into a theater around 1905. John Eberson’s remodeling of the theater took place in 1908-1909, as noted in the December 25, 1908 issue of The Billboard. The project was budgeted at $15,000.CT failed to format my list as a list, but I suppose it’s still readable. Just not as easily.
The FDY listings for Rayne are not very enlightening. I’m listing theater names and (seating capacities, or lack thereof) for each year:
1926: Craig (500); Lemoulin Rouge (370) 1927: Evangeline (….); Craig (500) 1928: Frank’s (….); Craig (500) 1929: Frank’s (….) 1930: Frank’s (….); Craig (500) 1931: Franks (500) (Note: for some reason the FDY started spelling the town’s name as Rane in 1931.) 1932: Franks (500) 1933: Franks (500) 1934: Opera (500) 1935: Opera (500); Roosevelt (….) 1936: Opera (500); Joy’s (350) 1937: New (….); Opera House (400); Joy (300) 1938: Opera House (400); Joy (300) 1939: Joy (400) 1940: Joy (400) 1941: Joy (400) (Note: in 1942 FDY goes back to the town’s correct spelling, Rayne.) 1942: Gem (350); Joy (400) 1943: Gem (350 Cl); Joy (400) 1944: Gem (350 Cl); Joy (400) 1945: Gem (350 Cl); Joy (400) 1946: Gem (350 Cl); Joy (400) 1947: Arcadia [sic] (1,000): Gem (350 Cl); Joy (400)
In 1948 theaters are listed only under chains, and the Arcadia [sic] is listed under L. C. Montgomery’s Film Service Corp., New Orleans. In 1949 city listings are back, and the Arcadia [sic] is the only house listed at Rayne, but is listed under Joy’s Theatres in the circuits section, along with a house called the Bruce. The Acadia (always misspelled as Arcadia) and the Bruce are then both listed at Rayne in the by-cities section of FDY from 1950 through 1955, when the Bruce had 350 seats, and in 1956 and 1957 the name Bruce vanishes and a 356-seat Joy Theatre appears. After 1957 FDY lists only by circuits, and I don’t see the Bruce or Joy at Rayne, but the Acadia (misspelled, of course) is still listed under Joy’s Theatres.
Frankly (or Frank'sly) this has left me more confused than ever. FDY’s penchant for double-listing theaters after a name change doesn’t help, nor does its penchant for sometimes continuing to list theaters that had been dismantled or demolished.
Given the consistency in seating capacity it seems likely the Craig, Frank’s/Franks and Opera were all the same house, possibly the one at West Texas Avenue (American Legion Road) and Second Street. The shift in seating capacity of the Joy from 1938 to 1939 suggests that it might have moved into the former Opera House at that time, most likely from the Moulin Rouge-Evangeline’s building, which was probably the house that had briefly been the Roosevelt and would later reopen as the Gem.
But if the Craig/Franks/Opera/second Joy burned down in 1946, and if, as the 2016 article I cited in my previous comment said, the Gem was replaced by the Acadia, where the hell did the Bruce, which was probably also the third (or fourth?) Joy Theatre, come from? And what became of the New Theatre that appeared in the FDY only in 1937? It’s quite puzzling.
An article on page 12 of the July 28, 2016 issue of The Rayne Arcadian-Tribune (PDF here) citing events in April, 1946, had this to say about the plans then in the works for the new Acadia Theatre:
If the article is correct then the Gem must have been demolished to make way for the Acadia Theatre. Or, since the building might have been only about thirty years old, perhaps it was at least partly incorporated into the new structure. The July 22, 1916 issue of Moving Picture World mentions E. Weil of the Moulin Rouge Theatre in Rayne as a recent visitor to film row in New Orleans. Edmund Weil was the brother of Jacques Weil, head of the J & E Weil Operating Company, owners of a number of businesses in Rayne including this theater.The house at West Texas and Second, operating as the Joy Theatre in 1946, was probably the theater listed in the 1926 FDY as the Craig Theatre. That house was being built for James L. Craig in 1915, as noted in Motography of March 27 that year in an item calling it “…the new opera house….” An earlier Opera House had been listed in the Cahn guide as early as 1907, and was listed in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory as the “Opera House M. P. Show, Adams Ave and 2nd St.”
Loew’s State is at 7th and Broadway. David and Moses Hamburger’s Department Store building, designed by Alfred Rosenheim, is still standing. A brief history of the theater, by Mary Mallory, is at Larry Harnisch’s web site, The Daily Mirror.
The store opened on August 9, 1908, and the 500-seat theater was probably opened the same day. It was used for various live events as well as movies, and was probably used primarily for lectures and meetings after 1915. It had been closed by 1919. A. Hamburger & Sons was sold to May Department Stores of St. Louis in 1923, and the building operated as the west coast flagship of The May Company until the mid-1980s.
I was on the fifth floor of The May Company a few times, but had no idea there had ever been a movie theater there. The space was undoubtedly configured for other uses after the theater was dismantled. Currently the building is being renovated as a mixed use project called the Broadway Trade Center, with completion scheduled for 2019.
The amphitheater inside the walls of the Martin Theatre held its first event on June 7, 2014, according this article from The Randolph Leader of June 11 that year. The article has a bit about the project and about the theater’s history, and one small photo of the opening event.
In 1941 the Martin Theatre had a soft opening on August 22, with a formal grand opening on September 2, to coincide with the dedication of Roanoke’s new City Hall.
That would be Collins C. Diboll, Jr. and Jack J.H. Kessels.
The Alhambra and the Stratton were two different theaters. CinemaTour lists the Alhambra theater, with the aka Show Shop, at 94 North Street, and lists the Stratton Theatre, with the aka Casino Theatre, at James and Henry Streets. I think they must be right, as I find the Stratton listed in the 1909 Cahn Guide.
CinemaTour says the Stratton Theatre opened on February 22, 1892, closed in 1949, and was demolished in 1953. It was designed by architect James E. Mapes. Casino must have been its opening name, as I’ve found mentions of that name from 1893 and 1897. Most likely the Stratton is not listed in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory because it was still a legitimate house at that time.
CinemaTour says the Alhambra opened on September 17, 1913, and was designed by architect Edwin P Valkenburgh. The closing date is unknown, but the building is still standing, occupied by a Pentacostal church.
The Alhambra had 800 seats in 1916, according to an item in the April 8 issue of Motography that year. This web page has a small photo of the Alhambra dated October, 1913. The name change from Alhambra to Show Shop was mentioned in the September 26, 1916 issue of the Middletown Times-Press, which said the house would reopen under its new name the next week.
FDY’s listings for New York State are a pig’s breakfast all through the 1920s, and I can’t even find Middletown listed until 1930, when the only theaters listed are the State and the Stratton. Although the Show Shop is never listed in the FDY, the building was still usable as a theater at least as late as 1936, when the Times-Press noted it as the venue of a minstrel show put on by the local fire department. I don’t find any evidence that it was operating regularly as a movie house by that time, though.
The Grand’s official website has gone blank, but the house is still showing movies on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays according to thier Facebook page.
Ken: The Joy Theatre’s aka should be Acadia rather than Arcadia. Acadia Parish, Louisiana, was named for the French territory of Acadia (Acadie) situated mostly in what are now the Maritime Provinces of Canada, from which the French settlers were expelled by the British during the French and Indian War. Many of the settlers moved to Louisiana, then a Spanish possession. The modern word Cajun is an Anglo-American corruption of the word Acadian.
This theater was at 164 E. 4th Street. It opened around 1950, possibly as the Logan Theatre and possibly as the Dixie Theatre (both names were listed in the FDY in 1951.) It has been under renovation intermittently since 1999, and still has some way to go, but a few events (mostly for fund raising) have been held in the unfinished space. It is being called the Fourth Street Theatre.
There is very little about it on the Internet, just a couple of newspaper articles with rather sketchy information, and this almost empty page at the web site of Main Street Russellville, which is the group carrying out the renovation.
Russellville had a movie house called the Dixie Theatre at least as early as 1914, and the house built around 1948-49 might have been a replacement for it. I don’t know if the new theater was on the same site as the old one, though.
The Dixie Theatre was listed in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory.
The June 3, 1916 issue of Motography said that Dorbandt Brothers were expanding and remodeling their Dixie Theatre at Athens, Texas, adding a balcony. The 300-seat Dixie, operated by Dorbandt Brothers, had been listed in the “Picture Theatres” section of the 1914 edition of Gus Hill’s National Theatrical Directory, but somehow missed being included in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory.
It’s possible that the Dixie dates from 1912, when the July 18 issue of The Tradesman, a hardware industry trade journal, said that J. T. LaRue planned to erect half a block of buildings at Athens, one of which would be used as a theater. In any case, it was definitely open by 1914.
The July 4, 1912 issue of The Tradesman had this item dateline Muskogee:
This brief article from the Arizona Daily Sun of December 10, 2015, is about the Orpheum, with a slide show of five photos. The house was built by John Weatherford of the adjacent Weatherford’s Hotel in 1911, and operated as the Majestic Opera House. The house was listed as the Majestic Theatre in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory.
In late December, 1915, a storm dropped some sixty inches of snow on Flagstaff. A maintenance man, thinking to melt away some of the snow and reduce the weight on the theater’s roof, sprayed it with water, precipitating its collapse on New Year’s Eve. The house was eventually rebuilt and reopened as the Orpheum Theatre.
The Orpheum was listed in the FDY through 1929, but in 1930 began being listed as the College Theatre. In 1933 the name Orpheum was restored.
The old official web site link is dead. The restoration of the Grand has been taken on by a new organization, Border Arts Corridor, which has this page about the project on their web site. What remains of the building is in rough shape. The roof is still off the auditorium, and Google’s street view of the 12th street side shows what look to me like some serious cracks in the wall. Unless somebody drops a load of money on this project I doubt it will be finished anytime soon.
This web page has a few photos of the Pantages, including two of the interior, which displayed many of the design characteristics that Priteca called the “Pantages Greek” style which he would use on later Pantages houses well into the 1920s.
No, no deer ticks, just dear tickets, like most theaters these days.
I thought I’d saved the rather long comment I tried to post which was rejected as spam, but the application lost it. I won’t try to reconstruct it. The bare bones version is that the Coosa Theatre was built in 1941 by Martin Theatres, and Martin operated it until 1963. Here is a photo of the Coosa under construction.
The FDY always listed this house at 20 N. 17th Avenue, not 17th Street, but that address doesn’t exist today (nor does 17th Avenue, as far as I can tell— 16th is as high as the avenues go now, which is probably why Google Maps defaults to residential 17th Street.) I’ve checked Google street views of Childersburg but can’t find any building that would likely be the one in the 1941 photo. Wherever it actually was, the Coosa has either been demolished or remodeled beyond recognition.
I believe the correct name of this house is not Greenville Theatre (which wouldn’t make sense in a town called Greensboro) but Greenland Theatre. The building was probably built in 1940-41, replacing an earlier house of the same name, and is at 124 S. Main Street, currently occupied by a Chinese restaurant called (rather unimaginatively) the China Restaurant.
This web page gives a sketchy bit of history up to 1935, when the theater was rebuilt, burned down a short time later, then was rebuilt again. The 1940 rebuild must have been at least the third, and it was larger than the earlier iterations. Charles S. Aiken’s book The Cotton Plantation South Since the Civil War has a couple of paragraphs about the opening of the house in January, 1941, saying that there were 500 seats for whites on the main floor and 160 additional seats in the segregated balcony.
This 1941 photo from the Library of Congress shows the Streamline Modern theater before the building got the fake Colonial front and mansard it now sports.
The name Greenland Theatre goes back at least as early as 1917 in Greensboro, when it was mentioned in the October 20 issue of Motography. The planning of the 1940 rebuild was noted in this item from the October 11 issue of The Film Daily:
The Roxy is mentioned in this 2010 article from The Tifton Gazette. The article says the Roxy was located on 17th Street West just off of South Park Avenue, in an American Legion hall.
No, the comment I’m trying to post is not spam. This is getting annoying.
The Gem is one of five Gadsden movie houses listed in Eric Ledell Smith’s African American Theater Buildings: An Illustrated Historical Directory. A footnote in the book cites a mention of the Gem in the July 15, 1939 issue of Motion Picture Herald. I can’t find that issue online so I don’t know what the item said, but 1939 was also the first year the Gem was listed in the FDY. The Gem still appeared in the FDY as late as 1955, when it was one of twentyfive houses being operated by Bailey Theaters of Atlanta.
A house called simply the Royal Theatre was listed at the northeast corner of Broad and Cort [sic] Streets in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory. My guess would be that the New Royal, a few doors west of Court Street, was its replacement. I haven’t found out when that happened, though.
An Amusu Theatre is listed at Gadsden in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory, so if it burned in 1911 it might have been rebuilt, or just moved to another location.