Strand Theatre
77 Wales Street,
Rutland,
VT
05701
77 Wales Street,
Rutland,
VT
05701
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The strand theatre closed in 1931 and reopened on June 21st, 1946 and closed again in 1951. Another grand opening ad posted.
Opened as Shrine on January 1913 (or before) and reopened as the Strand theatre on April 21st, 1919. Grand opening ad posted.
Strand theatre opening Sat, Apr 19, 1919 – 5 · Rutland Daily Herald (Rutland, Vermont) · Newspapers.com
The Theatre Historical Society archive has the MGM Theatre Report for the Strand; it’s Card # 589. Address is 73 Wales Street. There is an exterior photo made May 1941. The posting on the marquee makes it obvious that it was closed at the time. Condition is Good. The house was over 15 years old and was showing MGM product. There is a notation “Closed”. There were 865 seats.
The Spring, 2009 newsletter of the Rutland Food Co-op (PDF here) has a brief history of their building. It was built by the local Shriners, with construction beginning in 1909, and the house opened as the Shrine Theatre on January 9, 1913. The article says that the Strand opened in the former lobby of the Shrine Theatre in 1920, but I don’t think the part of the Wales Street building that the lobby occupied was anywhere big enough for the theater, so it must have been in the Shrine Theatre auditorium.
The auditorium, however, was quite large, with far more than the 600 seats we have listed for the Strand. The 1913-1914 Cahn-Leighton guide lists the Shrine Theatre with 1,400 seats, 900 on the main floor and 500 in the balcony. In the 1937 city directory, the Strand’s listing caries the notation “road shows”, an indication that it must have been a large house with stage facilities.
The carved “Ray Beane” over the food co-op entrance was added quite some time after the building was built, when Mr. Beane operated a tire store in the space. The theater entrance was where there is now a blank wall with some bulletin boards on it. The auditorium is now the winter home of the Rutland farmers market.
But you can see much more than that. I was there on a cycling trip. The business that occupies this former theatre is the Rutland Food Co-op and Market since 1995 with a 2 floor lobby. The carved stone etching on the front says, “Day Beane, Inc.”
Around the back on the left (accessed by going around the block) was a garage for a glove-making company using a portion of the audtorium. The auditorium’s back abuts a nice cobblestone and sitting area pedestrian plaza and the Paramount’s auditorium abuts the same plaza. The back of the Strand’s auditorium has a cool outdoorsy mural on it for a small segment.
I entered and shopped and asked if I could see the auditorium. An annoyed worker said yes but I took the high road. It was huge in there and I could see all the remnants and small ceiling lights, pilasters and turquoise blue octagonal shape in the center ceiling.
In the 1942-43 edition of the Motion Picture Almanac, the Strand in Rutland is listed under M&P Theatres of Boston (Mullin & Pinanski, a Paramount affiliate). M&P also ran the Paramount and Grand theaters in Rutland.