Freeport Theatre
25 E. Sunrise Highway,
Freeport,
NY
11520
25 E. Sunrise Highway,
Freeport,
NY
11520
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Showing 26 - 36 of 36 comments
Very nice articles on the Freeport Warren———During the 1960s, my Wife and I went to both the Grove and Freeport theaters and they both were large spacious movie houses with Balconies——but for Splendor & Modernistic style, at that time, the Calderone in Hempstead & the Syosett on Jericho Tpke, surpassed them both——-That’s my recollection of days gone by——but the smaller ones like the Wantagh, Meadowbrook & little old Nassau, all had a certain comfy feeling about them——smaller, but comfortable———Joe From Florida
Mario Bello ran this theater for Cenury for some years
Love to see those old photos Lost Memory——-I only wish there were more of them around………I lived in the Bushwick section of Brooklyn until 1959——-then Roosevelt, LI until 1961 when I was married——a short time in Hempstead, then from 1963 to 1976 in Levittown, LI and I have lived in Florida since then———Joe From Florida
In 1963, there were only two theaters in Freeport that showed films———-The Grove & The Freeport———-Joe From Florida
My Memoies of the Freeport Theater on Sunrise Hwy, in Freeport, L.I.——The date was June 24th 1963, and my wife had given birth to our first Daughter at 5am…….She and the baby were at Hempstead General Hopital…….I had to take the day off from work and had gone home(in Roosevelt LI) to get some sleep……At 11;30 am I called the Hospital and they said the babies were feeding and not to come up until 2pm( ot was alot different back then……With a couple of hours to kill, I went to the Freeport Theater to the Matinee and sat in the Balcony——I was the only adult up there as it was a Monday——-But below in the Orchestra seats were about 500 Kids screaming and yelling as we all watched the Japanese, now classic, “King Kong Vs, Godzilla”……It is a time & day I will never forget……..Sasheegm….Joe From Florida—P.S. The kids Summer vacation began the previous Friday!
TomScott: where did you get that year from? I’m not disputing it because Freeport was a Long Island BOOM town dating back to around the turn of the 20th century. I prospered up until the late 60’s when it really fell apart.
When I knew the theater, the outside was all white brick and the marquee was very similar to the ones I saw at Roosevelt Field and Valley Stream. And the inside was not very ornate as I remember it but had the walls covered in cloth. I know this was done to a lot of older theaters including the Century’s Baldwin. It was pretty big though. I would LOVE to see some pictures of this place.
My parents moved to Long Island in 1956 and said Freeport and Hempstead were THE places to live and go for fun. Jesus…can you imagine that? Now? Forget about it.
tHIS SHOULD READ CENTURTY FREEPORT THEATER
The Freeport Theatre shows an opening date of 1935.
I remembered the name of the nightclub. It was called “On Stage” and it opened in the late 70’s and closed not soon after, around the early 80’s. Freeport attempted a semi-comeback of sorts in the late 70’s but it never took off. By the mid to late 80’s, the town was toast and the theater was demolished. It was a fairly large theater that looked a lot like the Century’s Valley Stream and Roosevelt Field. I would not be surprised if they were all designed and built around the same time.
This was another big Long Island movie house. It closed down way before the multiplexing thing started because the neighborhood went into a steep decline in the early to mid 70’s. I saw a movie called “Bednobs and Broomsticks” here around 1971. About a year or so later, it closed. Then in the late 70’s, it actually reopened as a nightclub/danceclub or sorts and was actually fairly popular. It finally closed for good in the early 80’s but I cannot remember when it was demolished.
There is a tremendous V-shaped vacant lot where this theater once stood. When I drive by I try to imagine how big is was and how it must have looked. Ah, well.