At that time of day the only patrons were kids off for the summer and maybe a few neighborhood winos and unemployables. I don’t think anyone ever complained. The popular name for the Graham was “the dumps”…as in, “what’s playing up at the dumps this week?” You’d have to be a major cheapskate to take a girl there for a date. Still, some of my best childhood memories revolve around this place. Artifacts of a world long gone…
Another interesting ‘grindhouse’ fact (though I don’t know it was true of other grindhouses as well)…The Graham would start the first feature of the day somewhere in the middle. The projector would be turned on around 12:30 pm and suddenly you’re in the middle of “Bonnie and Clyde” or “The Graduate” or whatever. While I can’t say for certain, I think this is because they probably timed the films and then figured out where they would have to start in order to finish up at their specific closing time. Well, what did you expect for .75 cents? Once a movie played at the Graham, it disappeared, not seen again until it turned up on TV.
This did become a church for a time. It is now a medical something-or-other. The Graham was what is known as a ‘grindhouse’, grinding out movies all day, there were no ‘showtimes'and no break to clear out the theater. They showed films on their last run, and the sign said “Always Three Features Daily.”
In the early and mid-60s I spent a good part of my childhood at the Graham, my favoriites were the Vincent Price “Poe” classics, science-fiction, and anything that had some kind of monster in it.
And after all these years, I occasionally even dream about this place…
J.Gatsby
At that time of day the only patrons were kids off for the summer and maybe a few neighborhood winos and unemployables. I don’t think anyone ever complained. The popular name for the Graham was “the dumps”…as in, “what’s playing up at the dumps this week?” You’d have to be a major cheapskate to take a girl there for a date. Still, some of my best childhood memories revolve around this place. Artifacts of a world long gone…
Another interesting ‘grindhouse’ fact (though I don’t know it was true of other grindhouses as well)…The Graham would start the first feature of the day somewhere in the middle. The projector would be turned on around 12:30 pm and suddenly you’re in the middle of “Bonnie and Clyde” or “The Graduate” or whatever. While I can’t say for certain, I think this is because they probably timed the films and then figured out where they would have to start in order to finish up at their specific closing time. Well, what did you expect for .75 cents? Once a movie played at the Graham, it disappeared, not seen again until it turned up on TV.
This did become a church for a time. It is now a medical something-or-other. The Graham was what is known as a ‘grindhouse’, grinding out movies all day, there were no ‘showtimes'and no break to clear out the theater. They showed films on their last run, and the sign said “Always Three Features Daily.”
In the early and mid-60s I spent a good part of my childhood at the Graham, my favoriites were the Vincent Price “Poe” classics, science-fiction, and anything that had some kind of monster in it.
And after all these years, I occasionally even dream about this place…
J.Gatsby