Dakota Theater
1416 N. 3rd Street,
Grand Forks,
ND
58201
1416 N. 3rd Street,
Grand Forks,
ND
58201
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Opened November 11th, 1907 as Empire.
Empire Theatre opening 03 Nov 1907, Sun Grand Forks Herald (Grand Forks, North Dakota) Newspapers.com
more to come for this theatre.
The last year this theatre was listed as the OIrpheum was in 1932. By 1933 it was listed as the Dakota Theatre.
The first Empire Theatre goes back to at least 1908, when it is mentioned in several issues of The Billboard as a vaudeville house.
This web page with an extensive history of the Empire Theatre in Grand Forks also has information about the Dakota Theatre. The Dakota itself was originally called the Empire Theatre, but had been renamed the Grand Theatre sometime before 1918, in which year it was damaged by a fire. After the fire, the house was rebuilt and reopened as the Orpheum Theatre. The page doesn’t say when it became the Dakota Theatre, but Chuck’s earlier comments suggest that it was probably renamed in 1935.
The August 6, 1931, issue of The Film Daily had a brief item about the house: “Grand Forks, N. D. — Work has been started on rebuilding the Publix Orpheum.”
According to the official web site of the Heights Theatre in Columbia Heights, Minnesota, the bottom section of that restored theatre’s stage curtain is from the Orpheum in Grand Forks.
I remember seeing Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory here.