Fox Dome Theatre
3014 Ocean Front Walk,
Santa Monica,
CA
90405
3014 Ocean Front Walk,
Santa Monica,
CA
90405
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Johnny V: You are mostly correct. Web references to the theatre-based Mickey Mouse Clubs of the 1930’s do usually name the Fox Dome Theatre in Ocean Park the home of the first chapter. However, your date of 1939 is off. The date most commonly given for the inauguration of the club is January 11, 1930 (though some websites give dates as early as 1929). What is certain is that the Disney Company published a bi-monthly newsletter called “The Official Bulletin of the Mickey Mouse Club” for distribution to club members, and the first issue was dated April 30, 1930.
Just a little bit of trivia. It’s my understanding that the very first Mickey Mouse Club was created at the Dome Theater in 1939! I saw many a movie and Saturday morning cartoons at the Dome. I lived in Ocean Park at the time. Very fond period of my life.
Here are some more photos of the Dome, from the LA Library:
http://jpg2.lapl.org/theater3/00015667.jpg
http://jpg2.lapl.org/theater3/00015668.jpg
http://jpg2.lapl.org/theater3/00015670.jpg
http://jpg2.lapl.org/theater3/00015669.jpg
Spent many afternoons and evenings at the Dome – what a great theater it was. My grandparents lived at the Hotel St. Regis, which was located on the opposite side of the boardwalk (literally across the street from what would become the entrance to POP). Great pix above!
En fuego:
http://jpg1.lapl.org/pics49/00044402.jpg
From the LA Library:
http://jpg3.lapl.org/pics06/00022596.jpg
http://jpg3.lapl.org/pics06/00022660.jpg
The address of the Dome Theatre as listed in telephone directories of the early ‘30s was 3014 Ocean Front Promenade.
An aerial view of the spectacular 1924 conflagration which destroyed both the original Dome theatre and the adjacent amusement piers can be seen at this page.
The Dome Theater building at Ocean Park was used for the Magic Carpet Ride at Pacific Ocean Park when it opened in 1959. There is a good photo of the back side of the Dome Theater as the Magic Carpet Ride in Jeffrey Stanton’s book Venice of America, ‘Coney Island of the Pacific’ on page 216. Pacific Ocean Park closed in after the summer season in 1967 and now there is now trace of the park or the Dome Theater left.
There were two Dome Theaters at this location. The first was mentioned in Southwest Builder and Contractor, issue of 9/16/1921, on the occasion of the construction of a pier near the theater. Then the SB&C issue of 2/1/1924 tells that: “ Venice Improvement Company and West Coast Theaters… propose to expend immediately more than $1,000,000 for a 2000 seat theater to replace the Dome Theatre destroyed by the recent conflagration….”
The Los Angeles Times of 4/9/1924 ran an article about the new theater, saying “Work will be started tomorrow.” Then, an article in the Santa Monica Outlook of 6/30/1924 says “Thousands welcome new Dome Theater at Ocean Park.” That must be a record construction time. They were probably anxious to get the place open before the height of the summer season, and start making back that huge sum they spent on it.
There are also mentions of the Dome in SB&C issue 2/21/1936, saying that Clifford Balch had made plans for alterations to this theater.
In the 1950 Universal-International feature, Woman on the Run,
the amusement park finale is supposedly taking place
in San Francisco, where the rest of the film was lensed,
but it was actually filmed at Ocean Park, in Santa Monica,
and the Dome Theatre is quite visible in several shots.
You can even read what’s playing: Montgomery Clift in
The Big Lift, a 20th Century-Fox release.