Colonial Theatre
24 W. Randolph Street,
Chicago,
IL
60601
24 W. Randolph Street,
Chicago,
IL
60601
9 people
favorited this theater
Showing 1 - 25 of 49 comments
Hyde & Behman’s Music Hall actually had its Grand Opening on Monday, September 19, 1904. I originally believed it was September 26, 1904, but I was mistaken. See pre-opening Chicago Tribune ad in Photo section.
Chicagology link credit Terry Gregory.
https://chicagology.com/skyscrapers/skyscrapers023/?fbclid=IwAR2I85DmHHgAF3j10y3q1bUWQA38c3QcsyqtxhpWBr5TTZRlLXsyTtmVqYs
From the Chicago Tribune, May 18, 1924 (image added):
“The Colonial theater, which closed its doors for the last time last night on a departing crowd of theatergoers. The furnishings will be sold tomorrow and on May 26 wreckers will begin the work of demolishing it to make way for the new United Masonic temple. It was the scene of the disastrous fire of 1903, when it was named the Iroquois.”
(Closing was May 17, 1924)
It reopened as Hyde & Behman’s on September 26, 1904.
http://cinematreasures.org/photos/400334
Flickr link with a program for the Colonial Theatre. It says it was renamed in 1904 but previous evidence confirmed 1905. Also September 24, 1905 print ad proof added to gallery courtesy Tim O'Neill.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/148686664@N06/45084916615?fbclid=IwAR3npsD6UMeTi-Kgob0x4YWiQTxCSUoso3zVeuMvsqGuSQe6isdifC5cBOw
Colonial Theatre promos on the Woods Theatre Building nearing completion 1917/1918. Description in comments.
http://cinematreasures.org/theaters/983/photos/332682
Link for the show that opened circa September 1905, coincides with photo just added.
http://davecol8.tripod.com/id30.htm
Yes, more confusion. Two Masonic Temple Buildings too… The 1904 photo does say Vaudeville on the back of the Hyde & Behman’s wall. Which would have no longer been visibkle once the Oliver Typewriter Building went up in 1907/`08.
There certainly is a lot of confusion in this world. And then a good chunk of the Delaware was destroyed for construction of the new Masonic Temple Building/Oriental Theatre in 1924. Viewing it both before and after 1924, one might think it to be two different buildings. Crazy.
Correct, the year of completion of the Delaware Building was 1874. But it does not clarify that. Maybe it did in other copy that accompanied the photo in it’s original source. But it also says Northwest corner, and it is clearly the Northeast corner pictured.
I thought the date of 1874 just referred to the date the Delaware Building on the corner was completed, since the photo is really about the Delaware, not the Colonial Theatre. Perhaps if “1874” was inside the parentheses there would be no confusion.
The Hyde & Behman’s New Music Hall photo posted by Broan on February 10, 2011 is actually a 1904 photo. Not 1874 as is printed on it. It was mislabeled as 1874 years back in several publications. Hyde & Behman’s New Music Hall pictured went into the former Iroquois Theatre building after the 1903 fire. It then became the Colonial Theatre in 1905. The Masonic Temple building in the upper right hand corner of the photo was built in 1892. The Oliver Typewriter Building would be built in the vacant lot to the left of the corner building in 1907/`08.
The former Blackstone Theatre (now Merle Reskin Theatre) has been added to Cinema Treasures.
Never on a regular basis. But last I checked, cinema treasures accepted submissions of such theaters anyway.
I see that the Blackstone Theatre is mentioned above. But I can’t seem to find the Blackstone Theatre in Cinema Treasures. Didn’t it show movies?
Extensive 9 page Marquee Magazine link about the Iroquois with more photos, in pdf format. Via the Chicago Theatre Preservation Alliance Facebook page.
https://onedrive.live.com/?authkey=%21AJF9BsE1GS6VHpE&cid=5E12BC9B1120790D&id=5E12BC9B1120790D%216348&parId=root&o=OneUp
Expandable link from Calumet 412, with additional pics not in the Photo Section. Eerie that the finale of the show that night was “Then Away We Go”.
http://calumet412.com/post/155170694311/on-dec-30-1903-fire-engulfed-the-iroquois
Review of a play about the Iroquois fire
View link
View link Here is a picture from its brief tenure as Hyde & Behman’s
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The Laurier Palace Thearte in Montreal, was the theatre that a 1927 fire apparently impacted laws for over 40 years regarding children attending cinemas. If you Wikipedia “Laurier Palace Theatre Fire”, it gives the entire story. The subsequent laws seemed even more complex than just a reaction to that fire.
Expo `67 is also mentioned in the article, and that is when we were in Montreal.
CT only has a “Le Laurier” Theatre in Montreal listed. I will post about the Wiki story there as well.
Greetings Mpol. I posted my recollection to one of the Canadian theatres listed on CT. In hopes someone might also recall the ban I referred to.
Since our experience was in 1967, and the fire that drove the ban was recent as of then, it would have occurred after your above timeline of late
50's/early60’s. Also we were 7 & 11, and not teenagers.My mother also recalled our Canadian encounter when I asked. Because it reminded her of a similar experience she, her mother & small brothers had at the Gold Coast(Village Theatre) at Clark & North in Chicago, in the `40’s.
Though a fire was not the reason there or then. The Gold Coast at one time just didn’t admit children to anything.
Hopefully someone will recall the Canadian theatre where the fire took place, and the subsequent ban that followed.
For how long it remained in effect, and if it was isolated to Montreal would be helpful to know too.
Children barred from most theatres? That I didn’t know about, because I recall going to a number of movies in theatres when I was a pre-teen, in the late 1950’s and early 1960’s, accompanied by my parents, of course.
Just noticed the 105th anniversary of the fire coming up in December.
And 50th for the Queen of Angels School.
There was a theatre in Montreal Canada that had a horrific fire at a children’s matinee in the early
60's. When we visited Expo67, children were still barred from most theaters. Laws were rewritten about outward opening exit doors there too. But not sure how forbidding children in the theatres was going to change anything.