Inca Theatre
112 W. 7th Street,
Okmulgee,
OK
74447
112 W. 7th Street,
Okmulgee,
OK
74447
1 person
favorited this theater
Showing 26 - 50 of 51 comments
Sorry Symco, I have no idea who the webmaster is for this site. From all those Ken Mc postings I would take a wild guess that it is he.
You may find usefull the Leon Senter info recently posted on Tulsa Rialto page.
Thank you so much for your kind compliment, Seymour, you handsome devil you. Why didn’t you come backstage to say “Hello”? I would have treated you to a cocktail.
Cosmic, those are impressive names you’ve rubbed elbows with! must have been fun. I have a friend in Tulsa who goes to Hollywood and papparazzis the stars. He gets interesting photos.
Seymour, another person is doing scans of the pictures for me, and when they’re done, I’ll submit them.
On another topic, are you acquainted with the Cinema Treasures' webmaster? I suggested some corrections to him (or her) that need to be made on the Inca page, and on other pages, but didn’t receive a response. Are you in communication with them?
Where did Miss Melba perform?
Symco; looks as if Cinema Treasures will not be posting any time soon any vintage photographs of Okmulgee theatres. Suggestion-why don’t you go ahead and submit your Okmulgee theatre images to Adam Martin’s Cinema Tour? Then the rest of us theatre buffs could also enjoy seeing them.
Miss Melba; caught your drag act the other night. Your Diana Ross rendition of “Good Morning Heartache” was “Supremely” flawless! I actually wiped away a tear.
Sad to admit, in no way am I connected to any theatre folk. Nor do I know these gentlemen who post informative comments.
While living in San Francisco I met by happenstance dozens of celebraties.
Only one star I met had an air of aristrocracy. While eating at Jones Street Cafe, between Geary and O'Farrell, at the bottome of Nob Hill, in walked Ann Sothern and her daughter, Tisha Sterling. In person, Miss Sothern possessed dazzleling beauty. She wore cream linen slacks, a mint green angora sweater, a butter yellow silk scarf wrapped around her graceful neck, and sparkling emerald earrings. Everything Miss Sothern wore complimented her lovely hair, which she had let return to its natural copper penny colour. Though Miss Sothern did nothing to draw attention to herself, her presence was magnetic.
After it was discovered that this little side street cafe was quite popular with Hollywood personalities, I became a regular diner. There I also saw Lauren Becall, Yul Brenner, Jackie Gleason, Joel Grey, Betty Hutton, and Cesar Romero.
By accident I saw Farris only once, inside Beverly’s Diner across from the May Theatre. He was sitting in the next booth, telling a guest how Spectro had caused the old May to go under. Theatre history had not yet embraced me, so I did not approach Mr. Shanbour, but that was the spark that ignited my interest in theatre architecture.
Cosmic, 10-4 on what a per patron average can tell about ticket re-selling.
Were you acquainted with Maurice Ferris at Spectro? Or with Farris Shanbour? Maurice and Farris were competitors and acted like they hated each other, although they both came from Lebanese stock. Maurice once bid away a picture from Farris at an outlandish price, and had to go around town scraping up cash to pay the bid before he could get the print.
You’re correct about Video having concession merchandise priced from 1 cent to $1. And they probably succeeded in getting the last penny out of most kids' pockets!
We’re still stretching use of the Inca page. Let’s hope the soul of Inca manager Malcolm Cook will tolerate us, and perhaps give us his blessing. Bet he could contribute LOTS of interesting tidbits if he were living. By the way, as an addition to my previous post, the Inca marquee was styled like the Star’s in Morris, and used the same type of letter.
Seymour, I don’t believe I have anything on the Star. What do you know about it? But I do have an ad for the Dreamland, a 1920ish theatre in Morris. The Dreamland bragged that they played good movies, and had a fine pipe organ.
I wonder if the Star could have been in the same building as the Dreamland?
In its last years, the Star was used by a church, but all the trappings of a movie theatre were still there. Pentecostals love theatres! The preacher wanted letters for the marquee, which were not a standard Wagner or Adler letter, and I gave him a set I had stored away that were the right style. But mine were 10", and he needed 8", so he never did get to use the marquee.
Its final chapter was written when a tornado went through Morris in the 1980s. The Star/church building was seriously damaged, and it was demolished. I walked through it before it was taken down, and the marquee was still on it, the tattered screen was still there, and the projection room was OK, but most of the roof was missing.
Symco, please look at the Morris Star Theatre listing. Do you have any material on this?
I’m with you Symco, how did all this interesting information wind up on the Inca Page? Your comments usually jog my memory as to something I once overheard.
Not so long ago a former Spectro employee explained that most theatre chains devided daily number of tickets sold into the daily concession sales to obtain an per patron average. If this average were too high it could indicated that tickets were being resold.
One reason for Miss Wesson’s strict drinks per gallon calculation method was to prevent managers from picking up used drink cups off the floor to “recycle” them. She also required that only cheap paper popcorn bags be used for matinee hours. The more expensive cardboard boxes were used during evening showings.
I’ve alos been told that Video concession prices ranged from a penny up to a dollar. They believed if children had money they would spend it, and no child should ever leave a Video theatre with money left in his/her pocket.
Video’s pay scale was not overly generous.
Managers did earn a bonus based on concession sales, providing concession shortages were below a low threshold. Video’s head of concessions for many years was Miss Louise Wesson, a Cadillac-driving, chain-smoking lady who was a genius at long-distance concessions management. Her accounting system recorded every cup, bag, and candy bar that went to each theatre, and “confidential observers” would visit theatres to see that unofficial merchandise wasn’t being sold. Inventories were taken once a month, and cash sales were compared with the value of merchandise that had been dispensed.
In another area of her monitoring, if the popping volume or drink pour got out of line, she sent a letter to the manager notifying him or her that either the equipment was out of order, or there was an employee problem, and that they needed to do whatever was necessary to correct the problem.
Some of us thought Video’s concession prices were too high, and their drinks too watery, but Miss Wesson is given credit for saving the company in the early days of television, because of her large concession profits.
Just a minor correction…Video didn’t actually have an interest in CBS, but did have a 1/8-interest in Oklahoma City’s CBS affiliate, KWTV, channel 9.
Let’s see, Video Theatre’s yearly payroll would average out to $13,846.15 per theatre, and $1,396.43 per employee. Not so impressive, even for those days.
Funny thing, Video Theatres owned an interest in CBS, then was bought out by Capital Cities Com. who later controlled ABC.
Other than what I wrote, don’t have much background about Fred or his grandaddy, but will find out more next time I see him.
Miss Melba and I are in the same theatre troupe and he recently got me interested in this cinema history stuff. Melba is acquainted with Seymour, but I’ve never met him. Don’t have a clue about that Okie fella.
Oklahoma Cowboy,
How’d you happen to get on this Inca thread? It’s getting interesting. As is the Chieftain thread. Are you in theatre business? How about Seemour Coks, and Cosmic Ray, and Okie Medley?
When the 1971 article about Video was printed, I wondered what the motivation for it was, and asked one of the Video executives, who told me it was to discourage an anticipated competitor. Would your friend mind if you gave the name of his grandfather who was the projectionist, and what towns he worked in? Is he living?
This is the first I’ve heard of scrip stock being used by Griffith to pay wages in the depression.
As to the Gay Mile, one of Carmike’s district managers was a daddy-type who regularly hung his pants at the Habana.
And when one of the retired Video presidents was in his dotage, he’d rent a room there, where he’d drink a little and fantasize about diddling a lady of the night, I suspect. But it could have been a man of the night.
Thank you so much for this information. Very interesting and well written!
There is an older gentleman who is a regular at Gay Mile bars. He was the one who showed me a copy of the above news article, and says that his grandaddy was a former Griffith/Video projectionist. This fella tells that during The Great Depression years of the 1930’s Griffith Theatres payed their employees in script stock instead of cash money.
Let me take the long route to comment on your 1971 question about payroll, with quite a bit of history…
Griffith Bros. Theatres began in 1915, and evolved into Griffith Amusement Co. in the late 1920s when they partnered with Universal Studios. But the Griffiths didn’t like Universal, and in a skillfully planned maneuver in 1934, they bought Univeral’s interest back. In 1949, the chain evolved into Video Independent Theatres, Inc., with former Griffith executives as stockholders. Actually, not too much changed except the name and ownership of real estate. Most of the buildings went to Griffith Realty Co., which Video then leased back.
Griffith had started opening drive-ins, and Video continued opening drive-ins, as fast as they could build them, and good days were ahead.
Video was the dominant theatre circuit in Oklahoma, as Griffith had been. They were tough operators, and there was no competition in most of the towns. Griffith and Video did their best to see that it stayed that way. They didn’t even like second-run competition, and would keep a secondary house operating that would butt heads with a second-run competitor, and then close the secondary house as soon as the competitor left. They also kept closed houses in operating condition, which could quickly be opened if a competitor threatened them. But if the competitor were black, he wasn’t disturbed, and could even count on help from Video in the event of a breakdown.
In the 1930s in Okmulgee, Griffith butted heads with the Paramount-financed Inca Theatre, and couldn’t stand the competition. But they had a difficult time driving them out, and had to buy the building out from under them in 1939 to get rid of them as a competitor. Getting rid of “upstart” competition went on all over the state, but usually it didn’t take such drastic measures as buying buildings to get rid of them.
In 1953, Video provided seed money for KWTV, the CBS affiliate in Oklahoma City, taking a 12 ½% interest.
In 1957, Video’s Vumore, a community antenna TV company, developed Telemovie, the first pay-TV system that offered first-run movies.
Because of the death of Video president Henry Griffing in an airplane crash in 1960, Video was offered for sale. A subsidiary of General Tire, RKO General, bought the stock in Video in 1961, at an unannounced purchase price, but stockholders were well rewarded for their shares. What RKO General really wanted was the Vumore Company, to add to their cable TV business.
Although Vumore was to be the prize baby, General Tire was a good steward of Video, and operated the theatres well. In addition, they made their stock available to all Video employees, by way of a payroll withholding plan. General tires were offered to employees at bargain prices.
In 1964, there were 130 operating theatres, 71 of which were indoors, and 59 were drive-ins. There were 1,289 employees,and annual payroll exceeded $1.8 million.
In a series of maneuvers in 1968, the Vumore subsidiary was moved from Oklahoma City to Colorado, and its name was changed to Cablecom General. Then, Video Independent Theatres was sold to Cablecom General, effectively making the theatre division a subsidiary of its re-named former cable TV subsidiary.
There were ownership changes that I can’t remember offhand.
Some of Video’s towns began drawing competition, and the 1971 article you mentioned served as chest-beating to publicize Video’s dominance and strength to try to ward off competitors. But competitors nevertheless began moving into their good towns, and built new facilities, and took the towns. As to the number of screens, 150 in 1971 is probably about right. As to the correctness of the 1971 yearly payroll at $1 million, I don’t know why it would have been so much lower than the 1964 payroll of $1.8 million. But Video’s pay scale wasn’t high.
Things had gone downhill in Video’s theatre business because theatre earnings, which were good, were siphoned off to upgrade cable TV systems. And, the theatre business was moving to new multi-screen theatres that Video needed to be investing in. Video executives knew what they needed to be doing, and were frustrated that they couldn’t use their earnings to do it.
In 1981, Cablecom General and its now-debilitated Video Independent Theatres subsidiary, was sold to Capital Cities Communications for a reported $139 million. Video was suffering. In 1983, when the theatre circuit was down to 85 operating screens, it was sold to Martin Theatres for approximately $2 million. Martin Theatres was renamed Carmike Cinemas, for the father-son pair, Carl and Mike Patrick. The Martin/Carmike takeover was not deftly handled, and left many Video employees feeling battered.
Video’s drive-ins had been upgraded and were in good condition, but Martin/Carmike closed all of them in one fell swoop, except perhaps for one, and is reported to have sold off enough drive-in land to pay for the acquisition of the circuit. Then Carmike began building new facilities in many of Video’s towns. Carmike likes mid-market towns, and like Video, likes them without competition. They’ve lost a few Oklahoma towns to competition, and have competitors in a small number of towns, but have been successful keeping the other towns free of competitors.
Mike Patrick, who was a little cocky in his younger days, once bragged, in his southern drawl, that he paid more for his home office building in Columbus, Georgia, than he paid for the entire Video Circuit.
Symco:
When did General Tire buy out Griffith Bros. Theatres, how many theatres were involved, and what was the purchase price?
Not so long ago I ran across a 1971 Daily Oklahoman Newspaper article written about Video Theatres. It reported that there were one-hundred-fifty screens, and the yearly payroll total was one million dollars. Doesn’t that sound like a low dollar amount for so many theatres?
Bob Cook, when was the date of your father, Malcolm Cook’s, death, and where is he buried? Would you have an obituary? Were you old enough to know the goings-on in Okmulgee show business during the 1934 to 1940 period that the Inca and the Orpheum were battling it out? To get rid of the Inca as a competitor, they had to buy the building out from under them, and then it took a year to get Paramount and Joe Cooper out.
As to SCREENO, locals give your father credit for inventing it, but no one has knowledge of how it was marketed, or how the rights were transferred after his death. Do you have any old records pertaining to this? Do you have a SCREENO system? I have a SCREENO 1-sheet that came out of the attic of the Inca.
Seymour, I have several, how did you know, and will be happy to share them. I’ll have to find out the photo requirements for Cinema Treasures, and then send them.
There are two Okmulgee theatres I don’t have pictures of that would be particularly nice to have. One is the Dreamland, and the other is the Love (Drew). Both were Black-owned houses. The Dreamland would be ca. 1920s, and the Love (Drew) ca. 1946-1954. So if anyone has them, and is willing to share, would they let me know?
Symco, I’ve heard over the backyard fence that you have many interior photos of all Okmulgee movie houses. Won’t you please share them with us?
My father was Malcolm Cook and it has always been my understanding that he invented Screeno which upon his death in 1939 was sold to Griffif.
Actually, the Inca wasn’t built until 1934, a few months after the Hippodrome was destroyed by arson, on Dec. 31, 1933. Joe Cooper of Cooper Foundation Theatres is reported to have used money from Paramount Pictures to build it. There is no evidence that John Eberson was architect, although Eberson was architect of the Hippodrome. The Inca was put in an existing building about 100 ft. west of the Hippodrome location. Pictures show the auditorium was plain, with a small amount of painted ornamentation. There is no evidence that the projection room was on the alley. There is evidence of an air washer having been on the alley, however. The floor was flattened when the building was converted to retail occupancy in the 1950s, and old timers say that the marquee is buried in sand underneath the new floor. Townspeople give the first manager of the Inca, Malcolm Cook, credit for inventing SCREENO. There was a “David vs. Goliath” battle with Griffith Bros. Theatres, who didn’t like competition, and the Inca was a tough competitor. Griffith bought the Inca building, and an adjoining building. But Joe Cooper didn’t just turn out the lights and walk out. It took Griffith a year to get him out.
Also see El Caro Theatre in El Reno, OK, that was sister theatre to the Inca. Although exterior treatments were slightly different, the two interiors were identical. Myrna Louise wrote good descriptive passage that would apply to both movie houses.
Mr. Miller; I’m sure you ment to write that the Hippodrome fire occurred in early morning hours of January 1, 1934, caused when New Years Eve ballroom decorations mysteriously ignited.