My parents and grandparents owned a grocery store on the Venice side of the boardwalk, without hearing distance of Welk’s band playing int he Aragon Ballroom on Lick Pier. What was the entrance to the Ocean Park Pier, later became the exit to Pacific Ocean Park (POP). I remember seeing Mighty Joe Young in sepia tone at the Dome, and Commando Cody serials. I saw the original Invasion of the Body Snatchers there and had the nightmares that went along with the film. The manager of the theater was a huge man, very “portly” who always wore a tuxedo. When the Dome closed, I was surprised to see him working in the lobby of the Bundy (Pico and Bundy…now the Bundy offramp from the Santa Monica Freeway).
I was a hospital corpsman, stationed at the nearby San Diego Naval Training Center when I first discovered the Unicorn Theater. Part of the bookstore was devoted to record albums. I purchased a couple of Nonesuch releases….Bulgarian woman’s choir and Renaissance lute music from their stacks. I had my first Italian orzata at the Unicorn…a sweet almond flavored drink that they mixed up for you at the snack bar. I saw Children of Paradise, Marat Sade and King of Hearts there. The place had an evocotive odor of popcorn, incense and strong coffee….a heady aroma that filled me with an ebullient sense that there was a more perfect place than the US Navy for an 18 year old in 1966.
My parents and grandparents owned a grocery store on the Venice side of the boardwalk, without hearing distance of Welk’s band playing int he Aragon Ballroom on Lick Pier. What was the entrance to the Ocean Park Pier, later became the exit to Pacific Ocean Park (POP). I remember seeing Mighty Joe Young in sepia tone at the Dome, and Commando Cody serials. I saw the original Invasion of the Body Snatchers there and had the nightmares that went along with the film. The manager of the theater was a huge man, very “portly” who always wore a tuxedo. When the Dome closed, I was surprised to see him working in the lobby of the Bundy (Pico and Bundy…now the Bundy offramp from the Santa Monica Freeway).
I was a hospital corpsman, stationed at the nearby San Diego Naval Training Center when I first discovered the Unicorn Theater. Part of the bookstore was devoted to record albums. I purchased a couple of Nonesuch releases….Bulgarian woman’s choir and Renaissance lute music from their stacks. I had my first Italian orzata at the Unicorn…a sweet almond flavored drink that they mixed up for you at the snack bar. I saw Children of Paradise, Marat Sade and King of Hearts there. The place had an evocotive odor of popcorn, incense and strong coffee….a heady aroma that filled me with an ebullient sense that there was a more perfect place than the US Navy for an 18 year old in 1966.