Idle Hour Theatre
208 N. Main Street,
De Soto,
MO
63020
208 N. Main Street,
De Soto,
MO
63020
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The Gem Theatre opened in the 1899-built “new” Kempe Building with “high class” motion pictures on September 30, 1910. (And not to be confused with an earlier 1876-built Kempe Building on Clement Street.) The Gem Airdome was built in May of 1911 to get theater out of the stuffy theater. Later that month, Harry E. Miller, C. Earl Miller and Steven Sepp took on the theater and Airdome on May 30, 1911 changing the hardtop theater to the Idle Hour Theatre. Harry Miller was the son of C. Earl Miller who, along with Stephen Hug, had opened De Soto’s Opera House in 1890.
The 168-seat Idle Hour Theater remained in this location until 1918. The Gem Airdome was renamed as the Idle Hour Airdome and was in use until 1915. The town would get one more airdome, the Arlington in 1931.