Orpheum Theatre
611 Northern Pacific Avenue,
Fargo,
ND
58102
611 Northern Pacific Avenue,
Fargo,
ND
58102
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Opened in 1896 as the Fargo Mercantile Company Building, this three-story structure was purchased in 1909 by a group of local businessmen who converted the building into the Orpheum Theatre, which had about 1,000-seats and opened on April 4, 1911.
It was a vaudeville house (with an occasional film being shown, like 1915’s "Birth of a Nation", which played to a packed house) until 1921 when it was sold to the McCarthy Brothers, who began showing movies on a regular basis. Four years later, the Minneapolis-based American Amusement Company took over the theater. It was closed at the end of 1935, and not long after, a shoe repair shop took over the lobby space.
The former Orpheum Theatre was used on and off for retail space until 1960, when it was razed to make way for a parking lot.
Contributed by
Bryan Krefft
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Here is a link:
http://www.fargo-history.com/downtown/orpheum.htm
An item in Boxoffice of February 3, 1940, sheds light on the fate of the Orpheum. Minnie Hector Smith, who had until 1936 operated the Orpheum under a lease, had filed suit against the Minnesota Amusement Company, charging that the firm, operator of rival theaters in Fargo, had in 1936 leased two-foot strips on either side of her theater and denied her access to the space, thus blocking the Orpheum’s emergency exits, and the theater was forced to close as a result. I’ve been unable to find anything about the outcome of Mrs. Smith’s lawsuit.
The Orpheum Circuit vaudeville shows played at the Fargo Playhouse in the 1900s and the Savoy in 1910. The Circuit decided to invest funds to convert the Fargo Mercantile building to the Orpheum Theatre adding Fargo to the traveling show’s list following Minneapolis and St. Paul. Just 14 months later, the Orpheum Theatre launched on April 4, 1911. The Milch Sisters, the Gee-Jays, Jotta Gladstone and many other vaudevillians were there for the sold-out first night. But the first act of the Orpheum on opening night was Kinodrome short films.
Films were worked into the off-season parts of the Orpheum' s schedule when no acts were touring or available. American Amusement took on the venue in 1923 with Paramount / Publix actually renewing the lease in 1925. Under Minnesota Amusement and Paramount/Publix, lawsuits were raised with the theater largely going dark as sound film theaters took hold and vaudeville’s popularity and profitability subsided.
The Orpheum actually launched its 1935 season with a single play, “Petticoat Fever,” in November of 1935. But Publix / American Amusement/ Minnesota Amusement went into receivership and the lease was allowed to lapse or broken effectively January 31, 1936 with Minnesota Amusement removing anything of value including lighting, seats, and projection. That seems to have ended the Orpheum’s run officially ending with a V.F.W. speech on November 29, 1935. Likely with new 25-year lessees using the multipurpose building, the property was bulldozed at the end of that cycle in 1960.
Grand opening ad posted.