Grand Theater
790 Broadway,
Gary,
IN
46402
790 Broadway,
Gary,
IN
46402
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A January 25, 1912, article noted that the Simon brothers had leased the Paine building at Eighth Avenue and Broadway for ten years for consideration of $50,000. This space would become the Grand Theater.
In October 1928 Peter Kalleres’s Grand Amusement Company took over the Grand, which had been in the hands of receivers since August when the Gregory-Bernasek circuit was thrown into receivership. Jim Bikos operated the theater after Grand Amusement. In December 1929 the Grand was equipped for sound and City Amusement Company was incorporated by Kalleres, George Anthoulis and Ernest Force. City Amusement acquired the Grand in February 1930 from Jim Bikos.
In August 1925, three months before the sprawling John Eberson-designed Palace would open across the street, hundreds attended the reopening of the remodeled Grand. In November 1926 Peter Kalleres offered Mary Paine $355,000 for the Paine Building. In January 1927 the Grand joined the Illinois and Indiana Theaters booking circuit, formerly Earl Johnson Theaters.
The Grand and nearby Cosmo merged under one management in September 1922 when Cosmo owner Nick Bikos sold the theater to Kalleres’s Grand Theatre Company. The two theaters were redecorated and managed by Kalleres. In January 1923 the S.J. Gregory Amusement Company was operating the Grand and Cosmo in Gary and the Parthenon in Hammond.
After My Grandfather (Popoui) died my Grandmother (Yia Yia) ran both The Grand and State for several years with two boys! Amazing Woman Tula was!!!
A history of Lake County, Indiana, published in 1915 mentions the Grand Theatre, then operated by the Simon brothers. It started as a stock and vaudeville theater, but by 1915 was devoted exclusively to movies.
A Grand Theatre was in operation in Gary at least as early as 1919. The obituary of Peter Kalleres, long time Gary theater operator, in the January 23, 1943, issue of Boxoffice said that he had acquired the Grand in 1919, the year after he arrived in Gary.