Jeff Berg’s Historic Movie Theatres of New Mexico says that the Mission Theatre was built by Rod Bason in 1937. The records of architect Otto H. Thorman list an unnamed theater at Mesilla Park designed for Rod Bason that year.
The October 5, 1966 issue of Motion Picture Exhibitor had this item about the remodeling project then underway at the Cinerama Music Hall:
“The Cinerama Music Hall Theatre will undergo a $75,000 remodeling project between the closing of ‘Khartoum’ Sept. 6 and the opening of ‘Is Paris Burning?’ Nov. 17. The street-level exterior will be resurfaced with Italian travertine stone with marbled blending of light brown and cream. The marquee will be restyled, new entrance doors of anodyzed aluminum are planned. Redecoration of the lounge and lobby will include new carpeting and drapes. Architects for the work are Crane, Kiehler, and Kellogg, a firm that has been involved in the building and redesigning of more than 900 theatres.”
The September 21, 1966 issue of Motion Picture Exhibitor said that the new Trans-Lux Theatre in Harrisburg was slated to open that night with “Doctor Zhivago.”
Plans for this theater were announced in the September 14, 1966 issue of Motion Picture Exhibitor, though it appears that completion of the project was delayed long past the projected opening date.
“New Neighborhood House
“RICHMOND, VA.—Neighborhood Theatres, Inc., announced that a new, deluxe motion picture theatre will be built in Springfield, Va. The location of the theatre will be on a piece of land owned by the company on the south side of Keene Mill road across from the Springfield Plaza Shopping Center. Opening is planned for Easter, 1967.
“The architects for the project are Vosbeck and Vosbeck Associates of Alexandria. The new Springfield Theatre will be of modern design, incorporating all the new techniques of motion picture exhibition. It will be one of the largest houses in the Neighborhood chain, not only in seating capacity, which will be approximately 1000, but also in square footage. The company announced that it plans to use American Seating Company’s Stellar Chairs in the theatre and that they will be widely spaced for patron comfort. Other details of the theatre include a canopy over the drive-in lane to shelter patrons from the elements; a modern, spacious lobby; individual vanities in the ladies rest room; a gigantic 60 foot screen; 35/70 millimeter projection equipment; and a large parking lot.”
A couple of the comments above are about the first San Pedro Outdoor Theatre, opened at another location in 1948. The tentative opening date for this second location was September 1, 1966, according to The August 31 issue of Motion Picture Exhibitor. Here is the article about it:
“The Moon Also Rises At Texas Drive-In
“SAN ANTONIO, TEX.—John Santikos, owner-operator of the new San Pedro Twin D-I now under construction, said that there will be ‘year round moonlight.’
“The artificial moonlight, an added attraction at the theatre complex, will be a revolutionary lighting process to give the effect of moonlight over the entire 20 acres.
“Under completion, the new $500,000 D-I will be one of the city’s largest, boasting two screens with a 725 car capacity on one side and 525 on the other side.
“For those who desire a snack while watching the movies, architectural plans have included a cafeteria-style snack bar located between the two screens. Additionally, a 50 by 100 feet children’s playground in the same area will have a landscaped patio area with seating for those not wishing to remain in their cars.
“Tentative opening date is scheduled for Sept. 1 with live entertainment, attendance prizes and gala opening ceremonies.”
The August 24, 1966 issue of Motion Picture Exhibitor said that Mitchell Abromowitz of Roselyn, Pennsylvania, was the architect of the new Fox Enterprises theater slated to begin construction shortly at the Country Club Shopping Center in Langhorne. The single-screen house was to have 1,000 seats.
Here is an item about this theater from the August 24, 1966 issue of Motion Picture Exhibitor:
“Construction was slated on St. Petersburg’s first twin, which would occupy over five acres on the southeast edge of Central Plaza. The estimated cost of the Florida State Theatres house is $325,000. Robert Collins is the architect. FST already operates three downtown St. Petersburg theatres—the Florida, State, and Cameo.”
The August 10, 1966 issue of Motion Picture Exhibitor ran this item about the future Plaza Theatre:
“Norman M. Kranzdorf, vice-president and general manager of Food Fair Properties Agency, Inc., announced that a 1,000-seat first-run motion picture theatre is to be built in the Philips Highway Plaza Shopping Center in Jacksonville, to be operated by Kent Theatres, Inc. The construction of the theatre by D. O. Foshee, Inc., marks the start of an expansion project at the shopping center. Lewis C. Medlin is architect for the theatre, which is to be opened by Christmas, 1966.”
An item about the new Carousel Theatre in Cincinnati appeared in Motion Picture Exhibitor of August 10, 1966, which said that “… the theatre was designed by Pansiera, Dohme and Tilsley, architects, who also designed the plush New Salem Mall Cinema now under construction in the deluxe regional Salem Mall Shopping Center, Dayton, O.” Principals of the firm were Donald Pansiera, Arthur Dohme, and Tom Tilsley.
A Merritt Island community Facebook page says that the Causeway Drive-In was opened in 1951. Both the drive-in and the adjacent Barn Theatre were bought by Walmart in 1984 and demolished for their new store.
The December 13, 1965 issue of Boxoffice said that the new Merritt Theatre at Merritt Island had opened recently. It was the first business opened in a new shopping center still under construction. A small photo showed a boxy, curtain-wall auditorium with acoustical tile ceiling, typical of the period. No architect was credited, but the building was owned by Universal Builders and Contractors, so presumably a speculative venture leased to the theater operator.
A post on a Merritt Island community page at Facebook says that the Merritt Twin Cinemas is now the location of the East Coast Christian Center, a church founded in 1985. The Church’s web site says they bought the abandoned and vandalized Merritt Twin that year, and indicates that the current sanctuary is the old theater building, though it has been much altered. The Church is at 680 N. Courtenay Parkway.
I believe this house was also known as the Cocoa Beach Theatre. I’ve found several references to it on various web sites, but so far none in theater industry trade journals. One comment on a Brevard County history page at Facebook says that the theater is now the Cocoa Beach Public Library, which is at 550 N. Brevard Avenue. The building is fairly large, and doesn’t look like a theater, so if the theater building was not demolished it must have been greatly expanded when or after being converted for library use. A history of the library says that the current facility opened in 1998. It doesn’t mention the theater.
A comment on another Facebook page notes that in the mid-1960s there were four indoor movie theaters in the Cocoa area: the State, the Barn, the Merritt Cinema, and the Palm. The commenter adds that the Cocoa Beach theater didn’t open until the late 1960s.
The house doesn’t appear to have lasted to long as a regular cinema. An August 4, 1988 Orlando Sentinel article about brew-and-view theaters in Florida says that “[i]n Brevard, perhaps one of the oldest of its kind can be found in Cocoa Beach, where the Cocoa Beach Theatre and Draft House presides off Brevard Avenue. The establishment has been open for nine years, the last two under the leadership of the Greenwell family.” The article noted that the house had a full-sized movie screen, unlike the small multiplex houses then opening up in the state.
A movie house called the Claysville Theatre was listed at Claysville in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory, but with no address, so we can’t be sure it’s the same theatre. The building the Claysville community Center is in does look old enough to have been there by 1914.
There was a theater at Lake Nipmuc Park at least as early as 1908, when it was listed in that year’s Massachusetts Business Directory, but it might or might not have been this one. Nipmuc Park was opened on March 23, 1902 by the Milford Street Railway Company, and if it was typical of such pleasure parks from that era it was probably reconfigured and some parts of it rebuilt many times over the years.
Lake Nipmuc Park, like other such places, was a seasonal operation, and I’ve come across several entertainment trade journal notices of the Nipmuc Theatre opening or closing for the season. The venue provided a variety of entertainments, including movies from a fairly early date, confirmed by the listing of the Nipmuc Park Theatre in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory.
The last mention of the Nipmuc I’ve found in the trades so far is a brief notice in Boxoffice of July 3, 1954, which said simply that plans to reopen the theater at Lake Nipmuc “…have not yet materialized.” Privately owned parks such as Lake Nipmuc faded rapidly in the 1950s, and I haven’t been able to confirm when it closed or what became of the theater. The park’s former ballroom, however, has survived for quite some time, and today is operated as a venue for weddings called Grand View.
This Facebook post has a photo gallery for this theater, including a view of the Astor Theatre with two 1946 releases advertised on the marquee, so it had to have been open past 1945. In fact, the Astor was advertised in the the October 21, 1950 issue of the Vassar Chronicle, so it continued in operation quite some time after 1945.
The page also claims that the house opened as the Astor Theatre in 1944. An article in the Vassar Chronicle of October 21, 1944 said that the Astor had been opened on July 14 by a Mr. Shanley, who was operating the theater as a revival house running films likely to appeal to Vassar students, while running action movies likely to appeal to children at weekend matinees. The 1950 advertisement showed that the Astor had daily changes of programs featuring older movies, so the policy must have continued.
By the mid-1920s, the Liberty Theatre was one of three houses in Poughkeepsie operated by the Famous Players circuit, who used it as a second-run house. A comment on the Bardavon page confirms that the Liberty in later years (1950s) operated as the Midtown Theatre.
The September 6, 1919 issue of Moving Picture World said that the Stratford Theatre in Poughkeepsie had been taken over by Famous Players-Lasky. By 1926, Famous Players also had a house called the Bardavon Theatre as well as the second-run Liberty in Poughkeepsie. In 1933 the Stratford was being operated by Publix.
A notice about an 1,800-seat theater planned for Poughkeepsie by G. Cohen of the Best Theater appeared in the July 5, 1913 issue of The American Contractor. An August 9, 1913 article in Exhibitors' Times said that George Cohen’s Best Theater was located on the second and third floors of a building erected in 1872, so the project in Contractor was apparently being planned as a replacement for that aged house. So far I’ve been unable to discover how soon after this Mr. Cohen was able to finish his project. The Best Theater is listed in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory, but without an address.
This rather puzzling post at Facebook has some history of the Strand Theatre in it. As near as I can glean from the confusing text, the Strand was built in 1921, and might, or might not, have been called the State Theatre originally. In 1949 it was taken over by Paramount and was remodeled and renamed the Colonial Theatre. Another renovation took place in 1968, after which it might, or might not, have been renamed the State Theatre. The building was demolished in 1971 to make way for one of the highways which eviscerated Poughkeepsie and sent it into unremitting decline.
The article features a gallery of 20+ photos but most do not depict the Strand/Colonial. It says that the house changed hands and was opened and closed multiple times over its history. It’s clear that State Theatre was an aka at some point, but whether at the beginning or the end of its history, or both, is ambiguous. What is certain is that at the beginning of 1949 it was operating as the Strand, (and apparently had been, perhaps off and on, since at least 1927, since we have that grand opening ad from that year in our photo section) and at the end of 1949 it was operating as the Colonial.
This theater’s web site says that it was built in 1917. The fact that St. Cloud is not represented by any theater in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory tends to support the claim. In the photo section we have some vintage photos which, judging from clothing and cars, look like they could be from the late 1910s or very early 1920s, with original captions saying they depict the Conn Theatre. That must have been the opening name of the house. Other sources indicate that the Conn Building also housed Conn’s Department Store. The building might have been erected for the department store and the theater added on one side of it a year or two later. At some point the former department store space was converted to accommodate a larger theater auditorium.
It’s difficult to do Internet research on this theater, as almost all results of searches on St. Cloud are about St. Cloud, Minnesota, and so far every result from theater trade journals from searches for Conn have turned out to be only the old abbreviation for Connecticut.
The Princess actually opened in late 1916, not 1917. According to the December 30, 1916 issue of Moving Picture World, “[t]he new Princess Theater has been opened under the management of S. E. Wilhoit.”
This web page about Cape Girardeau’s movie theaters says that A. H. Haas built the Orpheum in 1917. Here is a relevant item from Moving Picture World of December 30, 1916:
“CAPE GIRARDEAU. MO.— A. H. Haas has plans by W. E. Farlow, H. H. building, for a one-story moving picture theater 45 by 112 feet, to cost 118,000.”
The Orpheum, the first house in Cape Girardeau to be wired for sound, was taken over by Fox in 1929, closed in February, 1954 and converted for retail use the following month. The building was demolished in 1993.
A house called the Majestic Theatre was listed at 320 S. Broadway in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory. There was also an Arcadia Theatre listed at 21 N. Howard Street. A somewhat confusing item appears in the “Picture Theaters Projected” column of Moving Picture World of December 30, 1916:
“BALTIMORE, MD. Blanke & Zink, 648 Equitable building, are preparing plans for remodeling the Arcadia on North avenue for a moving picture theater, to be known as Majestic Motion Picture Parlor. The improvements will cost approximately $85,000.”
The only theater on North Avenue I can find in the Directory is the Aurora, at 7 E. North. It’s possible that MPW just got the sequence of this theater’s names reversed, and got the wrong street, but I’m having a hard time reconciling that $85,000 price tag with this 250-seat house. Perhaps the plans were for an expansion that just never got done.
In any case, as 320 S. Broadway was still listed as the Majestic in 1914, maybe Anderson’s Picture Parlor was a temporary name change. Or the Directory might simply have been behind the times.
I fear that this comment is rather disappointingly useless, but I’ll post it anyway. I just spent half a hour on it.
The “Picture Theaters Projected” column in the December 30, 1916 issue of Moving Picture World had this item which must have been about the Strand: “HAYS, KAN. — Milliard Kirkman has plans by C. A. Smith, Salina, Kan., for a one-story moving picture theater, 50 by 80 feet.”
Jeff Berg’s Historic Movie Theatres of New Mexico says that the Mission Theatre was built by Rod Bason in 1937. The records of architect Otto H. Thorman list an unnamed theater at Mesilla Park designed for Rod Bason that year.
The October 5, 1966 issue of Motion Picture Exhibitor had this item about the remodeling project then underway at the Cinerama Music Hall:
The September 21, 1966 issue of Motion Picture Exhibitor said that the new Trans-Lux Theatre in Harrisburg was slated to open that night with “Doctor Zhivago.”
Plans for this theater were announced in the September 14, 1966 issue of Motion Picture Exhibitor, though it appears that completion of the project was delayed long past the projected opening date.
A couple of the comments above are about the first San Pedro Outdoor Theatre, opened at another location in 1948. The tentative opening date for this second location was September 1, 1966, according to The August 31 issue of Motion Picture Exhibitor. Here is the article about it:
The August 24, 1966 issue of Motion Picture Exhibitor said that Mitchell Abromowitz of Roselyn, Pennsylvania, was the architect of the new Fox Enterprises theater slated to begin construction shortly at the Country Club Shopping Center in Langhorne. The single-screen house was to have 1,000 seats.
Here is an item about this theater from the August 24, 1966 issue of Motion Picture Exhibitor:
The August 10, 1966 issue of Motion Picture Exhibitor ran this item about the future Plaza Theatre:
An item about the new Carousel Theatre in Cincinnati appeared in Motion Picture Exhibitor of August 10, 1966, which said that “… the theatre was designed by Pansiera, Dohme and Tilsley, architects, who also designed the plush New Salem Mall Cinema now under construction in the deluxe regional Salem Mall Shopping Center, Dayton, O.” Principals of the firm were Donald Pansiera, Arthur Dohme, and Tom Tilsley.
A Merritt Island community Facebook page says that the Causeway Drive-In was opened in 1951. Both the drive-in and the adjacent Barn Theatre were bought by Walmart in 1984 and demolished for their new store.
The December 13, 1965 issue of Boxoffice said that the new Merritt Theatre at Merritt Island had opened recently. It was the first business opened in a new shopping center still under construction. A small photo showed a boxy, curtain-wall auditorium with acoustical tile ceiling, typical of the period. No architect was credited, but the building was owned by Universal Builders and Contractors, so presumably a speculative venture leased to the theater operator.
A post on a Merritt Island community page at Facebook says that the Merritt Twin Cinemas is now the location of the East Coast Christian Center, a church founded in 1985. The Church’s web site says they bought the abandoned and vandalized Merritt Twin that year, and indicates that the current sanctuary is the old theater building, though it has been much altered. The Church is at 680 N. Courtenay Parkway.
I believe this house was also known as the Cocoa Beach Theatre. I’ve found several references to it on various web sites, but so far none in theater industry trade journals. One comment on a Brevard County history page at Facebook says that the theater is now the Cocoa Beach Public Library, which is at 550 N. Brevard Avenue. The building is fairly large, and doesn’t look like a theater, so if the theater building was not demolished it must have been greatly expanded when or after being converted for library use. A history of the library says that the current facility opened in 1998. It doesn’t mention the theater.
A comment on another Facebook page notes that in the mid-1960s there were four indoor movie theaters in the Cocoa area: the State, the Barn, the Merritt Cinema, and the Palm. The commenter adds that the Cocoa Beach theater didn’t open until the late 1960s.
The house doesn’t appear to have lasted to long as a regular cinema. An August 4, 1988 Orlando Sentinel article about brew-and-view theaters in Florida says that “[i]n Brevard, perhaps one of the oldest of its kind can be found in Cocoa Beach, where the Cocoa Beach Theatre and Draft House presides off Brevard Avenue. The establishment has been open for nine years, the last two under the leadership of the Greenwell family.” The article noted that the house had a full-sized movie screen, unlike the small multiplex houses then opening up in the state.
A movie house called the Claysville Theatre was listed at Claysville in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory, but with no address, so we can’t be sure it’s the same theatre. The building the Claysville community Center is in does look old enough to have been there by 1914.
There was a theater at Lake Nipmuc Park at least as early as 1908, when it was listed in that year’s Massachusetts Business Directory, but it might or might not have been this one. Nipmuc Park was opened on March 23, 1902 by the Milford Street Railway Company, and if it was typical of such pleasure parks from that era it was probably reconfigured and some parts of it rebuilt many times over the years.
Lake Nipmuc Park, like other such places, was a seasonal operation, and I’ve come across several entertainment trade journal notices of the Nipmuc Theatre opening or closing for the season. The venue provided a variety of entertainments, including movies from a fairly early date, confirmed by the listing of the Nipmuc Park Theatre in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory.
The last mention of the Nipmuc I’ve found in the trades so far is a brief notice in Boxoffice of July 3, 1954, which said simply that plans to reopen the theater at Lake Nipmuc “…have not yet materialized.” Privately owned parks such as Lake Nipmuc faded rapidly in the 1950s, and I haven’t been able to confirm when it closed or what became of the theater. The park’s former ballroom, however, has survived for quite some time, and today is operated as a venue for weddings called Grand View.
This Facebook post has a photo gallery for this theater, including a view of the Astor Theatre with two 1946 releases advertised on the marquee, so it had to have been open past 1945. In fact, the Astor was advertised in the the October 21, 1950 issue of the Vassar Chronicle, so it continued in operation quite some time after 1945.
The page also claims that the house opened as the Astor Theatre in 1944. An article in the Vassar Chronicle of October 21, 1944 said that the Astor had been opened on July 14 by a Mr. Shanley, who was operating the theater as a revival house running films likely to appeal to Vassar students, while running action movies likely to appeal to children at weekend matinees. The 1950 advertisement showed that the Astor had daily changes of programs featuring older movies, so the policy must have continued.
By the mid-1920s, the Liberty Theatre was one of three houses in Poughkeepsie operated by the Famous Players circuit, who used it as a second-run house. A comment on the Bardavon page confirms that the Liberty in later years (1950s) operated as the Midtown Theatre.
The September 6, 1919 issue of Moving Picture World said that the Stratford Theatre in Poughkeepsie had been taken over by Famous Players-Lasky. By 1926, Famous Players also had a house called the Bardavon Theatre as well as the second-run Liberty in Poughkeepsie. In 1933 the Stratford was being operated by Publix.
A notice about an 1,800-seat theater planned for Poughkeepsie by G. Cohen of the Best Theater appeared in the July 5, 1913 issue of The American Contractor. An August 9, 1913 article in Exhibitors' Times said that George Cohen’s Best Theater was located on the second and third floors of a building erected in 1872, so the project in Contractor was apparently being planned as a replacement for that aged house. So far I’ve been unable to discover how soon after this Mr. Cohen was able to finish his project. The Best Theater is listed in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory, but without an address.
This rather puzzling post at Facebook has some history of the Strand Theatre in it. As near as I can glean from the confusing text, the Strand was built in 1921, and might, or might not, have been called the State Theatre originally. In 1949 it was taken over by Paramount and was remodeled and renamed the Colonial Theatre. Another renovation took place in 1968, after which it might, or might not, have been renamed the State Theatre. The building was demolished in 1971 to make way for one of the highways which eviscerated Poughkeepsie and sent it into unremitting decline.
The article features a gallery of 20+ photos but most do not depict the Strand/Colonial. It says that the house changed hands and was opened and closed multiple times over its history. It’s clear that State Theatre was an aka at some point, but whether at the beginning or the end of its history, or both, is ambiguous. What is certain is that at the beginning of 1949 it was operating as the Strand, (and apparently had been, perhaps off and on, since at least 1927, since we have that grand opening ad from that year in our photo section) and at the end of 1949 it was operating as the Colonial.
This theater’s web site says that it was built in 1917. The fact that St. Cloud is not represented by any theater in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory tends to support the claim. In the photo section we have some vintage photos which, judging from clothing and cars, look like they could be from the late 1910s or very early 1920s, with original captions saying they depict the Conn Theatre. That must have been the opening name of the house. Other sources indicate that the Conn Building also housed Conn’s Department Store. The building might have been erected for the department store and the theater added on one side of it a year or two later. At some point the former department store space was converted to accommodate a larger theater auditorium.
It’s difficult to do Internet research on this theater, as almost all results of searches on St. Cloud are about St. Cloud, Minnesota, and so far every result from theater trade journals from searches for Conn have turned out to be only the old abbreviation for Connecticut.
The Princess actually opened in late 1916, not 1917. According to the December 30, 1916 issue of Moving Picture World, “[t]he new Princess Theater has been opened under the management of S. E. Wilhoit.”
This web page about Cape Girardeau’s movie theaters says that A. H. Haas built the Orpheum in 1917. Here is a relevant item from Moving Picture World of December 30, 1916:
The Orpheum, the first house in Cape Girardeau to be wired for sound, was taken over by Fox in 1929, closed in February, 1954 and converted for retail use the following month. The building was demolished in 1993.A house called the Majestic Theatre was listed at 320 S. Broadway in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory. There was also an Arcadia Theatre listed at 21 N. Howard Street. A somewhat confusing item appears in the “Picture Theaters Projected” column of Moving Picture World of December 30, 1916:
The only theater on North Avenue I can find in the Directory is the Aurora, at 7 E. North. It’s possible that MPW just got the sequence of this theater’s names reversed, and got the wrong street, but I’m having a hard time reconciling that $85,000 price tag with this 250-seat house. Perhaps the plans were for an expansion that just never got done.In any case, as 320 S. Broadway was still listed as the Majestic in 1914, maybe Anderson’s Picture Parlor was a temporary name change. Or the Directory might simply have been behind the times.
I fear that this comment is rather disappointingly useless, but I’ll post it anyway. I just spent half a hour on it.
The “Picture Theaters Projected” column in the December 30, 1916 issue of Moving Picture World had this item which must have been about the Strand: “HAYS, KAN. — Milliard Kirkman has plans by C. A. Smith, Salina, Kan., for a one-story moving picture theater, 50 by 80 feet.”
This house was still listed as the Theatorium in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory.