Garden Theatre
907 E. 20th Avenue,
Tampa,
FL
33605
907 E. 20th Avenue,
Tampa,
FL
33605
2 people
favorited this theater
Additional Info
Previously operated by: Florida State Theaters Inc., Paramount Pictures Inc.
Previous Names: Lisbon Garden Theatre
Nearby Theaters
The Garden Theatre dates back to at least 1935. By the early-1940’s it was operated by Paramount Pictures Inc. through their subsidiary E.J. Sparks. It was still listed as operating in 1950, but by Florida State Theaters Inc.
Contributed by
Lost Memory
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Recent comments (view all 16 comments)
Nice photos, I,ll check out the tribute page also.
TLsloews, I figured you Too to be a FAMOUS MONSTER of Filmland fan.
This one may have stuck around until ~1995, but was gone by the end of the decade.
thanks Chuck,hope Nick sees it.
Chuck1231 and Nick, I notice an “Nobody’s Baby” poster. It came out in 1937.
Love that ticket kios!
Thanks for the nice photo Chuck. The house to the left of the theatre still stands today. The theatre was demolished years ago and the property sat vacant for several years. A building was constructed on the site just within the past few years. A friend tells me the Garden Theatre was originally a church. When the church closed the theatre opened with the church pews still in place and were used as seating for theatre patrons. They were eventually removed and replaced with theatre seating.
Based on the movies advertised outside, this photo appears to be from the mid-1940s. When I went to it in the early and mid-1950s, there was a large banner hanging across the front that said “Cool Inside,” a reference to air conditioning…something that was still a novelty to most of us. I was 12 or 13 at the time, but it was still a thrill to go to the Saturday matinee.
I took the liberty to “clean up” one of the photos of the Garden Theatre front and you can clearly see that they were showing “Drums Along the Mohawk,” with Claudette Colbert and Henry Fonda (1939) and “Main Street Lawyer” (1939). Since the Garden did not show first run movies, I would imagine that this picture was probably taken in 1940. It looks like they put up a façade of old rough-hewn lumber. You can almost peer inside through the door to what may have been the snack bar.
AKA the Lisbon Garden Theatre