There are web sites listing 5306 Storer Avenue as the location of the Rolen Bros. Fence Company, and it’s also listed simply as Fence Warehouse. The company’s web site gives a different address for the business, so they might have moved since those listings went up, though this building could still be their warehouse.
This modern exterior photo shows the fence company’s sign on the building, but it isn’t there in Google Street View. As the building has been used as a warehouse the seats were undoubtedly removed long ago. The floor might even have been leveled. I’ve been unable to find any interior photos, historical or modern.
The Rialto was in operation by 1923. An item datelined Ridgefield Park, NJ, in the January 4, 1924, issue of The Film Daily said “About $20,000 will be spent in improving the Rialto.”
The Daily of January 11, 1928, reported that the Rialto had been sold to sold to Sobelson & Rosassy by the C. & V. Amusement Company.
A history of Kansas City’s neighborhood theaters published by the Jackson County Historical Society says that the Ritz Theatre was in operation by 1926 and operated until around 1962.
An item datelined Kansas City in the September 23, 1916, issue of The Moving Picture World said that Haish and Cotter had leased the Empire Theatre, with plans to remodel and redecorate, and to reopen the house.
According to a history of Kansas City’s neighborhood theaters published by the Jackson County Historical Society, the State Theatre at 15th and Prospect was in operation by November, 1918, as the Diamond Theatre. It was still called the Diamond at least as late as May, 1929, but by 1937 it had become the State.
The August 28, 1915, issue of The Moving Picture World pushes the Diamond back even earlier, saying that it had been built by C. A. Nichols and Joe Tinker “…several years ago….”
The September 23, 1916, issue of The Moving Picture World said that Kansas City exhibitor W. B. Tuteur had bought the Bonaventure Theatre on Independence Avenue and was remodeling it. Tuteur already operated the Troost, New Palace, and Kuloff Theatres, all on 15th Street.
The Admiral must have been open by 1919. In a letter published in The Reel Journal of November 21, 1925, W. O. Burkey referred to his six years as manager of the Admiral Theatre in Kansas City.
The Peerless Theatre was mentioned in the July 1, 1927, issue of Motion Picture News. The owners had just opened a second house in Kewanee:
“THE opening of T. and W. Pierce’s new 375-seat Plaza Theatre at Kewanee, gives that city one of the model small theatres of the country. The house is of a Spanish atmospheric type of architecture, with all the equipment of a modern de luxe house. Messrs. Pierce will shortly remodel their 1,000-seat Peerless Theatre, a high-class house which was erected some two years ago. They plan to put in a 30-foot stage.”
I don’t know if the Plaza is missing from our listings or if it is a missing aka for the Kee Theatre.
By 1937, the Peerless Theatre was being operated by the Great States circuit. The July 17 issue of The Film Daily reported that the Peerless was one of six Great States houses in Illinois that would soon be equipped with new cooling systems.
The autumn, 2009, issue of the Jackson County Historical Society’s quarterly had an article about Kansas City’s neighborhood theaters, and had this to say about the Roanoke:
“Little has been found about the Roanoke Theater. It was in operation as the Spillane by November 1918. By 1924, it was the Roanoke; it appears to have closed by May 1929, but was in operation again by September 1930 and was operating in 1937 as part of the Fox chain.”
This item from the November 3, 1917, issue of The Moving Picture World indicates that the house had not yet been built then:
“KANSAS CITY. MO. — Tim Spillane, 832 Reserve Bank building, has temporarily abandoned plan to erect theater at 39th and Summit streets, to cost $40,000.”
November, 1918, is the earliest mention I’ve found in the trades of the Spillane Theatre being in operation.
The Moving Picture World had this announcement about the proposed Liberty Theatre in its issue of November 17, 1917:
“KANSAS CITY, MO. — Overland Amusement Company has plans by Frederick E. McIlvain for fireproof moving picture theater, to be known as the Liberty.”
Frederick E. McIlvain was a partner in Jackson & McIlvain, who designed the Globe Theatre in 1913. Their partnership was dissolved in 1916, so McIlvain designed the Liberty on his own.
Although the address is a little bit off (I believe Chicago shifted some addresses in the late 1910s-early 1920s) an item in June 17, 1916, issue of The American Contractor could be about the theater that opened as the Irving. It was a three story hotel and theater building for A. Y. Race, at 3946-3956 N. Crawford Avenue. It was 132x175, and was designed by architect Jeremiah J. Cerny. Cerny was also the architect of the Essanay Studios, where Charlie Chaplin’s early movies were filmed, and which is now a designated Chicago landmark.
The Academy Theatre is mentioned in the July 1, 1916, issue of The Moving Picture World:
“Waukegan, Ill.—A reproduction of the old Waukegan Academy, which stood for fifty years on the site of the new photoplay house, is a feature of the lobby in George K. Spoor’s (head of the Essanay) new Academy theater here. The other side of the lobby has a beautiful painting of the local harbor with its picturesque lighthouse.”
The Illinois Theatre was mentioned in many issue of the The Chicago Heights Star after 1922, and placed more than a few ads, but most of the notices and ads were not for movies. There were political meetings, school plays, boxing matches, club meetings, and other live events, but the only movies I’ve found were advertised on March 27, 1924, and one of those films had been released in 1923 and the other in 1922. I’ve seen only a few issues of the paper from this period, so there could have occasionally been other movies shown.
The Esquire Theatre opened on December 12, 1937. This web page has the transcript of an oral history interview with Bond Tarr (opens in an embedded PDF format) who worked at the Esquire in the early to mid-1970s, and several passages deal with events at the theater during that period.
The December 18, 1937, issue of Boxoffice said that owners A. L. Cowart and J. E. Singler were rebuilding their recently-burned Buena Vista Theatre at Buena Vista, Georgia. The item didn’t say how old the theater was when it burned.
The December 18, 1937, issue of Boxoffice said that C. W. Kaake planned to open his new West Theatre on Christmas Day. The house had been designed by architect Perry Crosier. Kaake also operated the Doric Theatre.
The January 1, 1914, issue of The Tyrone Daily Herald said that the Wilson Theatre had opened the previous Monday evening, which would have been December 29, 1913. The French Renaissance style theater was designed by a local firm, the W. F. Wise Co., who advertised their services as “Scenic Artists, Decorators, and Theatrical Architects.”
The house was equipped for both live theater and movies. Mr. Wilson brought some pretty impressive fare to Tyrone. For example, the October 21, 1914, issue of the Altoona Tribune said that a concert would be given at the Wilson Theatre by the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Walter Damrosch, on October 29.
Despite these initial ambitions, by the 1920s the Wilson was primarily a movie house. Geroge Wilson died in 1937, and the December 18 issue of Boxoffice said that operation of the Wilson and El Patio Theatres in Tyrone would be transferred to the Warner Bros. circuit on January 2. Warner Bros. operated the theaters until 1954.
An April 6, 2000, article in the Herald said that the Wilson Theatre had been built on the site of an earlier theater, the Bijou, and that the Wilson had been demolished on December 16, 1976, as part of an urban renewal project. As renewed, the theater’s site hosts part of the parking lot for a Burger King fast food outlet.
The 1914 Herald article about the theater’s opening has been transcribed to this page at Ancestry.com.
An item in the June 24, 1927, issue of the Altoona Tribune said that George Wilson’s new El Patio Theatre at Tyrone would open on Tuesday, June 28. A later article in the same paper described the El Patio’s auditorium as having a blue sky with twinkling stars, so, given the name, it must have been an atmospheric house with a Spanish theme.
The El Patio Theatre was damaged by a fire in 1942. The auditorium suffered mostly smoke and water damage, but the entrance was completely destroyed and had to be rebuilt. Warner Bros. gave up the theater in 1954, but the house continued in operation for a number of years under new management. The Wilson Family leased the property to an adjacent appliance store in late 1964, according to the February 4, 1965, issue of The Tyrone Daily Herald. The article did not say when the theater had closed permanently.
The El Patio Theatre was demolished in 1971 to make way for a highway construction project, according to the July 16 issue of the Daily Herald.
KenRoe: I think we’ve got the seating capacities reversed. From satellite view it can be seen that the 1954 Ritz on the south side of the street is a much larger building than the first Ritz/Britton on the north side. The Ritz must have been the house with 586 seats and the Britton must have had the 280.
The Levon Theatre burned just a few weeks after being bought by Statesville Theatres. The November 18, 1947, issue of the Statesville Record and Landmark reported that A. F. Sams, Jr. and C. H. Trotter had just returned from Weldon where they had attended to the details of taking over the recently-purchased house. The company already operated the Center Theatre in Weldon.
The January 3, 1948, issue of Boxoffice (which misspelled the theater’s name as Leven) reported on the fire, saying it had started on the stage about 2:00 PM, and that the building and contents were both a total loss.
A January 3, 1948, Boxoffice article about the recently opened Hugo Theatre in Belle Glade, built by Hugo Gold’s sons and son-in-law and named for him, said that with the opening of the new house the Everglades Theatre would remain dark until complete renovations could be arranged, after which it would be reopened for second-run pictures.
Joe Vogel
commented about
Fox 4on
Dec 11, 2014 at 9:03 pm
The March 24, 1968, issue of the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal said that construction on the new Fox Theatre was proceeding rapidly and that the house could open by July 4. The article noted that a Fox Theatre under construction in Amarillo was almost a twin of the Lubbock house. Both were designed by the Los Angeles architectural firm Pearson & Wuesthoff.
Interestingly, shortly before these theaters were designed, L. Perry Pearson and Paul Wuesthoff were briefly involved in a partnership with Drew Eberson. The firm of Eberson, Pearson & Wuesthoff designed or renovated several theaters in Southern California in the mid-1960s.
There is an architectural rendering of the Drake Theatre at lower right on this page of Boxoffice, January 3, 1948. The caption says that the house was to be opened sometime the next month. It also says that the Drake’s older house, the Ritz, would be kept dark once the new theater opened, but would be retained under their ownership. Their original plan had been to remodel the Ritz and keep it open.
The article about the Drakes in the December 15, 1945, issue of Boxoffice now begins at this link and continues here.
There are web sites listing 5306 Storer Avenue as the location of the Rolen Bros. Fence Company, and it’s also listed simply as Fence Warehouse. The company’s web site gives a different address for the business, so they might have moved since those listings went up, though this building could still be their warehouse.
This modern exterior photo shows the fence company’s sign on the building, but it isn’t there in Google Street View. As the building has been used as a warehouse the seats were undoubtedly removed long ago. The floor might even have been leveled. I’ve been unable to find any interior photos, historical or modern.
The Rialto was in operation by 1923. An item datelined Ridgefield Park, NJ, in the January 4, 1924, issue of The Film Daily said “About $20,000 will be spent in improving the Rialto.”
The Daily of January 11, 1928, reported that the Rialto had been sold to sold to Sobelson & Rosassy by the C. & V. Amusement Company.
A history of Kansas City’s neighborhood theaters published by the Jackson County Historical Society says that the Ritz Theatre was in operation by 1926 and operated until around 1962.
An item datelined Kansas City in the September 23, 1916, issue of The Moving Picture World said that Haish and Cotter had leased the Empire Theatre, with plans to remodel and redecorate, and to reopen the house.
According to a history of Kansas City’s neighborhood theaters published by the Jackson County Historical Society, the State Theatre at 15th and Prospect was in operation by November, 1918, as the Diamond Theatre. It was still called the Diamond at least as late as May, 1929, but by 1937 it had become the State.
The August 28, 1915, issue of The Moving Picture World pushes the Diamond back even earlier, saying that it had been built by C. A. Nichols and Joe Tinker “…several years ago….”
The September 23, 1916, issue of The Moving Picture World said that Kansas City exhibitor W. B. Tuteur had bought the Bonaventure Theatre on Independence Avenue and was remodeling it. Tuteur already operated the Troost, New Palace, and Kuloff Theatres, all on 15th Street.
The Admiral must have been open by 1919. In a letter published in The Reel Journal of November 21, 1925, W. O. Burkey referred to his six years as manager of the Admiral Theatre in Kansas City.
The Peerless Theatre was mentioned in the July 1, 1927, issue of Motion Picture News. The owners had just opened a second house in Kewanee:
I don’t know if the Plaza is missing from our listings or if it is a missing aka for the Kee Theatre.By 1937, the Peerless Theatre was being operated by the Great States circuit. The July 17 issue of The Film Daily reported that the Peerless was one of six Great States houses in Illinois that would soon be equipped with new cooling systems.
The autumn, 2009, issue of the Jackson County Historical Society’s quarterly had an article about Kansas City’s neighborhood theaters, and had this to say about the Roanoke:
This item from the November 3, 1917, issue of The Moving Picture World indicates that the house had not yet been built then:November, 1918, is the earliest mention I’ve found in the trades of the Spillane Theatre being in operation.The architects' names were Frank J. Jackson and Frederick E. McIlvain.
The Moving Picture World had this announcement about the proposed Liberty Theatre in its issue of November 17, 1917:
Frederick E. McIlvain was a partner in Jackson & McIlvain, who designed the Globe Theatre in 1913. Their partnership was dissolved in 1916, so McIlvain designed the Liberty on his own.The Westport Theatre became the Glen, according to our Glen page.
Although the address is a little bit off (I believe Chicago shifted some addresses in the late 1910s-early 1920s) an item in June 17, 1916, issue of The American Contractor could be about the theater that opened as the Irving. It was a three story hotel and theater building for A. Y. Race, at 3946-3956 N. Crawford Avenue. It was 132x175, and was designed by architect Jeremiah J. Cerny. Cerny was also the architect of the Essanay Studios, where Charlie Chaplin’s early movies were filmed, and which is now a designated Chicago landmark.
The Academy Theatre is mentioned in the July 1, 1916, issue of The Moving Picture World:
The Illinois Theatre was mentioned in many issue of the The Chicago Heights Star after 1922, and placed more than a few ads, but most of the notices and ads were not for movies. There were political meetings, school plays, boxing matches, club meetings, and other live events, but the only movies I’ve found were advertised on March 27, 1924, and one of those films had been released in 1923 and the other in 1922. I’ve seen only a few issues of the paper from this period, so there could have occasionally been other movies shown.
The Esquire Theatre opened on December 12, 1937. This web page has the transcript of an oral history interview with Bond Tarr (opens in an embedded PDF format) who worked at the Esquire in the early to mid-1970s, and several passages deal with events at the theater during that period.
The December 18, 1937, issue of Boxoffice said that owners A. L. Cowart and J. E. Singler were rebuilding their recently-burned Buena Vista Theatre at Buena Vista, Georgia. The item didn’t say how old the theater was when it burned.
The December 18, 1937, issue of Boxoffice said that C. W. Kaake planned to open his new West Theatre on Christmas Day. The house had been designed by architect Perry Crosier. Kaake also operated the Doric Theatre.
The January 1, 1914, issue of The Tyrone Daily Herald said that the Wilson Theatre had opened the previous Monday evening, which would have been December 29, 1913. The French Renaissance style theater was designed by a local firm, the W. F. Wise Co., who advertised their services as “Scenic Artists, Decorators, and Theatrical Architects.”
The house was equipped for both live theater and movies. Mr. Wilson brought some pretty impressive fare to Tyrone. For example, the October 21, 1914, issue of the Altoona Tribune said that a concert would be given at the Wilson Theatre by the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Walter Damrosch, on October 29.
Despite these initial ambitions, by the 1920s the Wilson was primarily a movie house. Geroge Wilson died in 1937, and the December 18 issue of Boxoffice said that operation of the Wilson and El Patio Theatres in Tyrone would be transferred to the Warner Bros. circuit on January 2. Warner Bros. operated the theaters until 1954.
An April 6, 2000, article in the Herald said that the Wilson Theatre had been built on the site of an earlier theater, the Bijou, and that the Wilson had been demolished on December 16, 1976, as part of an urban renewal project. As renewed, the theater’s site hosts part of the parking lot for a Burger King fast food outlet.
The 1914 Herald article about the theater’s opening has been transcribed to this page at Ancestry.com.
An item in the June 24, 1927, issue of the Altoona Tribune said that George Wilson’s new El Patio Theatre at Tyrone would open on Tuesday, June 28. A later article in the same paper described the El Patio’s auditorium as having a blue sky with twinkling stars, so, given the name, it must have been an atmospheric house with a Spanish theme.
The El Patio Theatre was damaged by a fire in 1942. The auditorium suffered mostly smoke and water damage, but the entrance was completely destroyed and had to be rebuilt. Warner Bros. gave up the theater in 1954, but the house continued in operation for a number of years under new management. The Wilson Family leased the property to an adjacent appliance store in late 1964, according to the February 4, 1965, issue of The Tyrone Daily Herald. The article did not say when the theater had closed permanently.
The El Patio Theatre was demolished in 1971 to make way for a highway construction project, according to the July 16 issue of the Daily Herald.
KenRoe: I think we’ve got the seating capacities reversed. From satellite view it can be seen that the 1954 Ritz on the south side of the street is a much larger building than the first Ritz/Britton on the north side. The Ritz must have been the house with 586 seats and the Britton must have had the 280.
The Levon Theatre burned just a few weeks after being bought by Statesville Theatres. The November 18, 1947, issue of the Statesville Record and Landmark reported that A. F. Sams, Jr. and C. H. Trotter had just returned from Weldon where they had attended to the details of taking over the recently-purchased house. The company already operated the Center Theatre in Weldon.
The January 3, 1948, issue of Boxoffice (which misspelled the theater’s name as Leven) reported on the fire, saying it had started on the stage about 2:00 PM, and that the building and contents were both a total loss.
A January 3, 1948, Boxoffice article about the recently opened Hugo Theatre in Belle Glade, built by Hugo Gold’s sons and son-in-law and named for him, said that with the opening of the new house the Everglades Theatre would remain dark until complete renovations could be arranged, after which it would be reopened for second-run pictures.
The March 24, 1968, issue of the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal said that construction on the new Fox Theatre was proceeding rapidly and that the house could open by July 4. The article noted that a Fox Theatre under construction in Amarillo was almost a twin of the Lubbock house. Both were designed by the Los Angeles architectural firm Pearson & Wuesthoff.
Interestingly, shortly before these theaters were designed, L. Perry Pearson and Paul Wuesthoff were briefly involved in a partnership with Drew Eberson. The firm of Eberson, Pearson & Wuesthoff designed or renovated several theaters in Southern California in the mid-1960s.
There is an architectural rendering of the Drake Theatre at lower right on this page of Boxoffice, January 3, 1948. The caption says that the house was to be opened sometime the next month. It also says that the Drake’s older house, the Ritz, would be kept dark once the new theater opened, but would be retained under their ownership. Their original plan had been to remodel the Ritz and keep it open.
The article about the Drakes in the December 15, 1945, issue of Boxoffice now begins at this link and continues here.