Phelps Theatre
334 Main Street,
Southbridge,
MA
01550
334 Main Street,
Southbridge,
MA
01550
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The Phelps Theatre was mentioned in the December 30, 1916 issue of Moving Picture World. The new manager was James W. Carrol, formerly of the General Film Company, Boston.
An April, 1919 ad for the Phelps Theatre can be seen on this page.
A listing in the 1920 New England Business Directory puts the Phelps Theatre at 128 Main Street, but I fear that the address is obsolete. The Directory lists the Blanchard Theatre at 91 Main Street, and the modern address of the storefront Blanchard’s entrance was in is most likely 293 Main Street. All we can glean from the obsolete directory address is that the Phelps was on the opposite side of Main Street from Blanchard’s, and several doors up (or down, depending on whether or not the old numbers ascended and descended the same direction the modern numbers do) the way.
An item datelined Southbridge in the “Picture Theaters Projected” column of Moving Picture World, July 24, 1915, said that “A. Boyer has been awarded the contract to erect a three-story theater building, 110 by 52 feet, for T. F. Murphy.” It’s possible that this was the project that became the Phelps.
The Phelps in Southbridge is listed in the 1927 Film Daily Yearbook as having 725 seats. The FDY also lists a Plaza Theatre in Southbridge with 600 seats, and a Blanchard’s Theatre with 876 seats, open daily.