The brief history on the genealogy web site says “Mr. and Mrs. Bill Noyes operated a two story Hotel on the corner where Keith’s store is today [the history was written in 1968]. Next to this was a meat market owned by John Crewdson. Later there was a Harness Shop, Drug Store, and Klutts Opera House built in this section of the street.” A link at the bottom of the page once led to information about the Wallis family, but the url has been highjacked by a gambling site.
Still, a Flickr photo of the Wallis building shows it was once occupied by Keith’s Store, so it appears that the Opera House was not in the Wallis building itself, but was nearby. It might be that the Opera House building was lost sometime between 1925 and 1935.
The FAQs section of the Bohm Theatre’s web site attributes the design of the house to architect Christian W. Brandt. Brandt had been preparing plans for a thousand-seat house in Albion since as early as 1925, when the November 29 issue of Moving Picture World mentioned the project.
The Grand Photoplay Theatre of West Liberty, Iowa was mentioned in the November 9, 1918 issue of Motion Picture News. A W. H. Heath was the manager. The name of the house had shrunk a bit by the time of this item appearing in the March 3, 1923 Moving Picture World: “WEST LIBERTY, IA.—Glenn Miller, of Muscatine, has purchased and reopened Grand Photo Theatre.”
A letter from W. Glenn Miller was published in the March 29, 1924 Exhibitors Herald, but by then he was running the Strand Theatre in West Liberty.
Here is a bit or information from a thumbnail history of Mondamin found on the Iowa Genealogy web site: “In the early days on the south end of old Main street, there was a Boarding House where the Hotel is now. Then there was Ed Springer’s Jewelry Store, and a Harness Shop run by Mike Husselstine. This building later became the Lyric Theatre.”
A couple of paragraphs later the history notes that Maple Street later developed as the town’s main business area, which included a theater called Klutts Opera House. The only reference to Mondamin I’ve come across in theater industry trade journals is this item from Moving Picture World of November 7, 1925: “Charles Behm, Jr., and L. H. Johnson of Mondamin, Ia., have leased the Opera House at that place.”
This item from the April 4, 1947 Film Daily is probably about the Earl Theatre: “Newcomb Sets Earlville Stand
“Earlville, Ia.—W. J. Newcomb of Williamsburg, Ia., announced plans of building a new theater at Earlville. Newcomb said construction would start as soon as materials are available.”
I haven’t found Earlville listed in the FDYs from the late 1940s or early 1950s, so this house might have had a very short life, if it opened at all.
A book was published in 1954 commemorating the Centennial of North English. It says that “[i]n 1908 Alva Allen built the East Side Theatre. Stage shows were produced weekly and the building was also used for roller skating. Alva Allen sold the opera house to John Whitmore. Other owners were J. W. Hadley and Roy Coxe. Vance Smith and son Dean operate the Orpheum Theatre in the same remodeled building at the present time.”
Vance Smith is mentioned as operator the Orpheum in the April 13, 1929 Motion Picture News. The house had just had sound equipment installed.
Trade journals from 1913 and 1914 mention a W. C. Eddy of Marengo who was secretary of the Iowa Motion Picture Exhibitors' League, and the July 4, 1914 issue of The Billboard even devoted a large part of a page to a letter he wrote to them regarding the evils of censorship, but not once have I found the name of his theater mentioned. The only theater name connected with Marengo I’ve found in the trades is the Strand, and that never before 1940.
A 1909 opening for the Comet is confirmed by an item from the January 1, 1910 issue of The Nickelodeon: “ALBIA, IOWA.-The Comet theater, a new vaudeville and picture house, has been opened here under the management of Mr. Struber, who is also interested in a similar enterprise in Oskaloosa and other places.”
The Lyric didn’t make the American Motion Picture Directory in 1914, but it was the only picture theater listed at Albia in that year’s Gus Hill directory. It was listed there with a capacity of 388 (which, if accurate, does seem a bit large for this space) and admission prices of five and ten cents. The Lyric subscribed to the Mutual picture service, and the manager was named C. A. Hibbard.
A house called the Kings Theatre was the only listing for Albia in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory. Probably a typo for this house. It seems very unlikely that the listings were complete, though. I’ve come across multiple trade journal references to the Comet Theatre being in operation during this period.
An item in the March 19, 1927 Moving Picture World said that Harry Weinberg had bought the King Theatre and the Rex Theatre at Albia, Iowa. The seller was A. Frankel.
The Comet was apparently open by 1909. This item is from the September, 1911 issue of Motography: “A deal has been consummated whereby Alex Long has come into possession of the Comet theater of Albia, the leading moving picture theater in that part of the state. For the past two years the house has been conducted by the Comet Amusement Company, Red Oak. The Comet has the reputation of being first class in every way, and the new owners will maintain the same high standard.”
The Comet was also mentioned in the December 25, 1915 Moving Picture World which said that a 17-piece Orchestrion had been installed in the house. Large orchestrions were fairly costly devices, so the Comet must have still been quite prosperous at that time.
The Scenic at Albia was mentioned in the December 28, 1907 issue of Show World.
The February 1, 1913 issue of Motography had this brief notice: “J. E. Benton will now have a monopoly practically on the picture shows in Albia. He will conduct two shows, using both the Comet and the Scenic.”
This house might or might not have yet another aka. The 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory lists only two houses at Pella: the Electric Palace and a house called the Royal. However, as the Opera House is also missing from the listings, Royal could have been its aka instead. If it wasn’t an aka for one or the other then it must have been a different theater, probably short-lived as I’ve found no other references to it.
Oddly, there is supposed to be a movie house called the Royal Theatre in Pella today, as part of the Royal Amsterdam Hotel, a recently built project, but I can’t find any listings for it.
This was Leggett’s Opera House when it appeared in listings as early as 1884, managed by an E. Leggett. It had 250 seats then but later was either expanded or moved to larger quarters and was managed by a John Leggett. The 1912-1913 Cahn guide lists it as a 450-seat, ground floor house managed by L .I. Rowe. In the early 1920s, an Ida B. Rowe of the Opera House, Eddyville, was submitting capsule movie reviews to theater trade journals. A bit of digging reveals that Ida B. Leggett married Lorin I. Rowe in 1893. It looks like Mr. Rowe either became manager of the house and married the boss’s daughter or married the daughter and became manager. The Rowes and the Leggetts were both prominent families in Eddyville.
The July 7, 1947 issue of Film Daily had bad news about theaters damaged or closed by floods in Iowa, including at Eddyville: “At Eddyville, Earl McConkey who had just purchased the Eddy Theater, had his house submerged three times and he now figures it will take six months to re-open.”
The Trail’s web site is advertising classic movies, and I don’t see a single live event on its schedule. We might as well list Classic Movies in the theater’s “Functions” field.
The Gem Theatre was listed in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory. An Opera House was also listed. Higbee was misspelled as Highbee in the 1926 FDY, but in 1927 it was back to Higbee. The May 4, 1935 issue of Motion Picture Herald said that “HARLE AND ROBB have opened the Star Theatre at Higbee, Mo.” If this was a name change it was temporary, as the 1936 FDY lists the Gem again, as do editions through 1941, though in those I’ve checked the house is always listed as closed. The town of Higbee is last listed in the 1941 edition, at least through 1951, which is as late as I can go. If the long-closed Gem became the Higbee Theatre it must have been in the 1950s.
The last mention of Higbee I’ve found in the trade journals is in the August 19, 1950 issue of Boxoffice, which says that a Sterling Bagby, who had been showing movies in Higbee on Friday nights, had opened an outdoor theater in mid-July on a vacant lot behind a filling station, and provided folding chairs for patrons who wished to leave their cars. It might be that Mr. Bagby had been running his shows in the old theater, though itinerant showmen of his sort commonly used community centers, lodge halls, school auditoriums, or even friendly churches for their operations. In any case, it appears that by 1950 Higbee had no full-time movie theater. It could be that the theater was listed as closed for so long because it was used only by traveling exhibitors such as Mr. Bagby for many years.
This excerpt from a 2015 article in the Columbia Tribune says that the Grand Theatre building was incorporated into the adjacent bank rather than demolished: “…the Alamo Theatre, eventually became the Dickinson Theatre, then the Fayette Theatre and finally the Grand Theater. Today it is part of the Commercial Bank, though you can still see the outline of the Alamo façade on the building.”
A current Google street view does show what looks like two buildings joined by matching façades. Satellite view also shows two buildings.
The Bijou was one of five theaters listed at Danville in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory. Its listing in the 1926 FDY gave it 400 seats, so it was considerably smaller than the Rialto which replaced it the following year.
The architect field on this page needs to be updated to Oliver William Stiegemeyer, as it is orphaned from the other listings for the architect, but then those other listings also need to be updated as the surname is misspelled on all of them. The correct spelling is Stiegemeyer, which is how it appears in the 1952 and 1956 editions of the AIA’s American Architects Directory. The information in the directories was submitted to the AIA by the architect’s own office, so can safely be assumed to be correct.
.
A 2015 article in the Columbia Daily Tribune says that the Fayette Opera House was designed by architect H. D. Hunter of Mexico, Missouri. Hunter also designed the Ferris Opera House in Mexico.
This web page says that the Ferris Grand Opera House was at 213 W. Monroe Street, and was designed by local architect H. D. Hunter. The opening event was Gilbert & Sullivan’s 1885 operetta “The Mikado.” The 1907-1908 Cahn guide lists the Grand Opera House as a ground floor theater seating 1,000 and a stage 38 feet from footlights to back wall and 56 feet between the sidewalls.
The brief history on the genealogy web site says “Mr. and Mrs. Bill Noyes operated a two story Hotel on the corner where Keith’s store is today [the history was written in 1968]. Next to this was a meat market owned by John Crewdson. Later there was a Harness Shop, Drug Store, and Klutts Opera House built in this section of the street.” A link at the bottom of the page once led to information about the Wallis family, but the url has been highjacked by a gambling site.
Still, a Flickr photo of the Wallis building shows it was once occupied by Keith’s Store, so it appears that the Opera House was not in the Wallis building itself, but was nearby. It might be that the Opera House building was lost sometime between 1925 and 1935.
The FAQs section of the Bohm Theatre’s web site attributes the design of the house to architect Christian W. Brandt. Brandt had been preparing plans for a thousand-seat house in Albion since as early as 1925, when the November 29 issue of Moving Picture World mentioned the project.
The Grand Photoplay Theatre of West Liberty, Iowa was mentioned in the November 9, 1918 issue of Motion Picture News. A W. H. Heath was the manager. The name of the house had shrunk a bit by the time of this item appearing in the March 3, 1923 Moving Picture World: “WEST LIBERTY, IA.—Glenn Miller, of Muscatine, has purchased and reopened Grand Photo Theatre.”
A letter from W. Glenn Miller was published in the March 29, 1924 Exhibitors Herald, but by then he was running the Strand Theatre in West Liberty.
Here is a bit or information from a thumbnail history of Mondamin found on the Iowa Genealogy web site: “In the early days on the south end of old Main street, there was a Boarding House where the Hotel is now. Then there was Ed Springer’s Jewelry Store, and a Harness Shop run by Mike Husselstine. This building later became the Lyric Theatre.”
A couple of paragraphs later the history notes that Maple Street later developed as the town’s main business area, which included a theater called Klutts Opera House. The only reference to Mondamin I’ve come across in theater industry trade journals is this item from Moving Picture World of November 7, 1925: “Charles Behm, Jr., and L. H. Johnson of Mondamin, Ia., have leased the Opera House at that place.”
This item from the April 4, 1947 Film Daily is probably about the Earl Theatre: “Newcomb Sets Earlville Stand
“Earlville, Ia.—W. J. Newcomb of Williamsburg, Ia., announced plans of building a new theater at Earlville. Newcomb said construction would start as soon as materials are available.”
I haven’t found Earlville listed in the FDYs from the late 1940s or early 1950s, so this house might have had a very short life, if it opened at all.
A book was published in 1954 commemorating the Centennial of North English. It says that “[i]n 1908 Alva Allen built the East Side Theatre. Stage shows were produced weekly and the building was also used for roller skating. Alva Allen sold the opera house to John Whitmore. Other owners were J. W. Hadley and Roy Coxe. Vance Smith and son Dean operate the Orpheum Theatre in the same remodeled building at the present time.”
Vance Smith is mentioned as operator the Orpheum in the April 13, 1929 Motion Picture News. The house had just had sound equipment installed.
Trade journals from 1913 and 1914 mention a W. C. Eddy of Marengo who was secretary of the Iowa Motion Picture Exhibitors' League, and the July 4, 1914 issue of The Billboard even devoted a large part of a page to a letter he wrote to them regarding the evils of censorship, but not once have I found the name of his theater mentioned. The only theater name connected with Marengo I’ve found in the trades is the Strand, and that never before 1940.
Good grief!
A 1909 opening for the Comet is confirmed by an item from the January 1, 1910 issue of The Nickelodeon: “ALBIA, IOWA.-The Comet theater, a new vaudeville and picture house, has been opened here under the management of Mr. Struber, who is also interested in a similar enterprise in Oskaloosa and other places.”
The Lyric didn’t make the American Motion Picture Directory in 1914, but it was the only picture theater listed at Albia in that year’s Gus Hill directory. It was listed there with a capacity of 388 (which, if accurate, does seem a bit large for this space) and admission prices of five and ten cents. The Lyric subscribed to the Mutual picture service, and the manager was named C. A. Hibbard.
A house called the Kings Theatre was the only listing for Albia in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory. Probably a typo for this house. It seems very unlikely that the listings were complete, though. I’ve come across multiple trade journal references to the Comet Theatre being in operation during this period.
An item in the March 19, 1927 Moving Picture World said that Harry Weinberg had bought the King Theatre and the Rex Theatre at Albia, Iowa. The seller was A. Frankel.
The Comet was apparently open by 1909. This item is from the September, 1911 issue of Motography: “A deal has been consummated whereby Alex Long has come into possession of the Comet theater of Albia, the leading moving picture theater in that part of the state. For the past two years the house has been conducted by the Comet Amusement Company, Red Oak. The Comet has the reputation of being first class in every way, and the new owners will maintain the same high standard.”
The Comet was also mentioned in the December 25, 1915 Moving Picture World which said that a 17-piece Orchestrion had been installed in the house. Large orchestrions were fairly costly devices, so the Comet must have still been quite prosperous at that time.
The Scenic at Albia was mentioned in the December 28, 1907 issue of Show World.
The February 1, 1913 issue of Motography had this brief notice: “J. E. Benton will now have a monopoly practically on the picture shows in Albia. He will conduct two shows, using both the Comet and the Scenic.”
This house might or might not have yet another aka. The 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory lists only two houses at Pella: the Electric Palace and a house called the Royal. However, as the Opera House is also missing from the listings, Royal could have been its aka instead. If it wasn’t an aka for one or the other then it must have been a different theater, probably short-lived as I’ve found no other references to it.
Oddly, there is supposed to be a movie house called the Royal Theatre in Pella today, as part of the Royal Amsterdam Hotel, a recently built project, but I can’t find any listings for it.
This was Leggett’s Opera House when it appeared in listings as early as 1884, managed by an E. Leggett. It had 250 seats then but later was either expanded or moved to larger quarters and was managed by a John Leggett. The 1912-1913 Cahn guide lists it as a 450-seat, ground floor house managed by L .I. Rowe. In the early 1920s, an Ida B. Rowe of the Opera House, Eddyville, was submitting capsule movie reviews to theater trade journals. A bit of digging reveals that Ida B. Leggett married Lorin I. Rowe in 1893. It looks like Mr. Rowe either became manager of the house and married the boss’s daughter or married the daughter and became manager. The Rowes and the Leggetts were both prominent families in Eddyville.
The July 7, 1947 issue of Film Daily had bad news about theaters damaged or closed by floods in Iowa, including at Eddyville: “At Eddyville, Earl McConkey who had just purchased the Eddy Theater, had his house submerged three times and he now figures it will take six months to re-open.”
The Trail’s web site is advertising classic movies, and I don’t see a single live event on its schedule. We might as well list Classic Movies in the theater’s “Functions” field.
The Gem Theatre was listed in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory. An Opera House was also listed. Higbee was misspelled as Highbee in the 1926 FDY, but in 1927 it was back to Higbee. The May 4, 1935 issue of Motion Picture Herald said that “HARLE AND ROBB have opened the Star Theatre at Higbee, Mo.” If this was a name change it was temporary, as the 1936 FDY lists the Gem again, as do editions through 1941, though in those I’ve checked the house is always listed as closed. The town of Higbee is last listed in the 1941 edition, at least through 1951, which is as late as I can go. If the long-closed Gem became the Higbee Theatre it must have been in the 1950s.
The last mention of Higbee I’ve found in the trade journals is in the August 19, 1950 issue of Boxoffice, which says that a Sterling Bagby, who had been showing movies in Higbee on Friday nights, had opened an outdoor theater in mid-July on a vacant lot behind a filling station, and provided folding chairs for patrons who wished to leave their cars. It might be that Mr. Bagby had been running his shows in the old theater, though itinerant showmen of his sort commonly used community centers, lodge halls, school auditoriums, or even friendly churches for their operations. In any case, it appears that by 1950 Higbee had no full-time movie theater. It could be that the theater was listed as closed for so long because it was used only by traveling exhibitors such as Mr. Bagby for many years.
This excerpt from a 2015 article in the Columbia Tribune says that the Grand Theatre building was incorporated into the adjacent bank rather than demolished: “…the Alamo Theatre, eventually became the Dickinson Theatre, then the Fayette Theatre and finally the Grand Theater. Today it is part of the Commercial Bank, though you can still see the outline of the Alamo façade on the building.”
A current Google street view does show what looks like two buildings joined by matching façades. Satellite view also shows two buildings.
The Bijou was one of five theaters listed at Danville in the 1914-1915 American Motion Picture Directory. Its listing in the 1926 FDY gave it 400 seats, so it was considerably smaller than the Rialto which replaced it the following year.
The architect field on this page needs to be updated to Oliver William Stiegemeyer, as it is orphaned from the other listings for the architect, but then those other listings also need to be updated as the surname is misspelled on all of them. The correct spelling is Stiegemeyer, which is how it appears in the 1952 and 1956 editions of the AIA’s American Architects Directory. The information in the directories was submitted to the AIA by the architect’s own office, so can safely be assumed to be correct. .
The history page of this theater’s official web site (now working fine) says that the house was designed by St. Louis architect Oliver W. Stiegemeyer.
A 2015 article in the Columbia Daily Tribune says that the Fayette Opera House was designed by architect H. D. Hunter of Mexico, Missouri. Hunter also designed the Ferris Opera House in Mexico.
This web page says that the Ferris Grand Opera House was at 213 W. Monroe Street, and was designed by local architect H. D. Hunter. The opening event was Gilbert & Sullivan’s 1885 operetta “The Mikado.” The 1907-1908 Cahn guide lists the Grand Opera House as a ground floor theater seating 1,000 and a stage 38 feet from footlights to back wall and 56 feet between the sidewalls.