Glenwood Theatre

202 Minnesota Avenue E,
Glenwood, MN 56334

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Joe Vogel
Joe Vogel on June 28, 2014 at 10:30 pm

There is a tantalizing item in the “Building Operations” column of the July 15, 1905, issue of The Minneapolis Journal:

Charles S. Sedgwick, architect, is preparing plans for a two-story store and office building at Glenwood, Minn for J. H. McCauley. It will be 68x115, with pressed brick front operahouse.“
Type for the item was obviously badly set, and the McCauley Opera House as built was three stories, not two, but the timing, six months before the theater opened, the mention of McCauley, and the appearance, oddly placed though it is, of the word operahouse, suggests that Sedgwick might have been the architect of the McCauley Opera House.

The only other connection between Sedgwick and Glenwood I’ve found is a 1902 item inviting bids for construction of a two-story brick commercial and office building at Glenwood that was designed by Sedgwick. That project might have been the McCauley Block, another building McCauley owned in Glenwood.

Joe Vogel
Joe Vogel on June 28, 2014 at 9:25 pm

Here is a 1987 photo of the McCauley Opera House/Glenwood Theatre at Glenwood, Minnesota. The 1935 FDY lists the Opera House in Glenwood as part of the small regional theater circuit operated by B. J. Benfield (spelled Benefield in the book) which was headquartered in the Strand Theatre at Morris, Minnesota.

The McCauley Opera House was built by James H. McCauley, who was, among other things, vice president and cashier of the Glenwood State Bank. The Opera House was opened in 1906, an event that was noted in the February 6 edition of The Minneapolis Journal.

McCauley also built another Glennwood landmark, the Lakeside Ballroom, which opened in 1909 and operated until being destroyed by a fire in 2003.

Chris1982
Chris1982 on June 21, 2014 at 6:04 am

The Glenwood Theatre opened in 1936. Prior to 1936 there was an Opera House listed with 750 dseats. Not sure if the Opera House became the Glenwood Theatre but it was no longer listed in 1936.