The Stadium is wider than the old Majestic. There were one story buildings on both sides of the Majestic, so the new building was expanded to the north. Since the Majestic itself is shown as being one story, it was likely almost completely destroyed, although possibly in the first fire, before it became the Royal.
This theater was located in the eastern half of the Phoenix Block, a large 2-story brick structure constructed sometime before 1889. This had been the location of a local newspaper (the ‘Democrat’ and then the ‘Times’), and they maintained a printing operation on the second floor. The theater first appears on the June 1913 map. In 1908, the ground floor was a grocery. The depressing bank appears to be from the ‘70s.
Joe - I think this must be the Palace. This was on the west side, 2 doors north of 2nd. The date on the photo you found must be close, but this theater had not yet opened in 1906.
We have the Palace identified as the Isis. Ken often tries to help me out with an ID, which I almost never have. In this case, there’s such an absurd number of theaters coming and going within just a few blocks, so mistakes are to be expected.
The correct address for the theater would have been 52. 56 was the third storefront from the corner. Since this was not the theater at 64, I’ll add a listing for that one. This building likewise dates to sometime before 1883, and this theater must have opened later, since the 1920 map shows an ‘auto accessories’ store there. I assume some of the smaller theaters must have closed shortly after 1920, since you now have 4 theaters within two blocks on the 1920 map, and this would have made 5, for what was not all that big a town. The building is in pretty good shape, although it has an ugly shingle awning, and the corner entrance was done away with when it went back to retail use.
The address on the 1925 map is 1003, and this was not off Main St, it was on a corner off the square. Benton has one of those weird town squares where the blocks on all 4 corners are just visible from the square. This block was originally rectangular, but between 1900 and 1910, W.W. McCreery replaced his lumberyard with a large three story brick hotel building, which sat on an angled cutout of the corner, and thus faced the square.
I assume there was a fire, because the 1915 map shows one story brick buildings matching the footprint of the hotel. The theater now appears, tucked south of two stores running E-W, and east of two running N-S. The facade of the theater is a tiny diagonal section in the corner.
By 1925, the whole setup has been drastically remodeled or perhaps replaced. The theater has been greatly expanded, taking over the eastern N-S storefront, and the remaining structure is now 3 stories tall. The auditorium has also been expanded much further east, and is now taller, and has a fly tower and balcony. The diagonal section has been eliminated, and there is a large rectangular wooden marquee on the north wall of the exposed section of the theater. This is what we see in the picture.
Address on the 1925 map is 122. 120 and 124 were tiny storefronts either side of the entrance. This was constructed sometime after 1915, when the map shows a vacant lot. This looks like it was a fairly simple one story brick rectangle. It’s been gone for many years, and is now a gravel parking lot.
Correct spelling of the name is indeed Donges. There was an Opera House to the south, on the same side of the square. It is still on the 1919 map, shown as closed, and must have been replaced shortly thereafter by the liquor store now on that corner. Clay Donges seems to have operated a meat market on Center St in later years.
Correct address was 209, and this building is long gone. It was constructed sometime between 1892 and 1897. The 1904 map shows a drugstore in this portion. I’ve uploaded a picture from the 1910 map. By 1919, only the photgrapher in the second story remained. This section of the block was replaced by a large G.C. Murphy store which looks like it might be from about 1930.
If it was under Donge’s, it must have been destroyed in the 1915 fire. The 1910 map does not show a theater under Donge’s. There are two vacant spaces and a bowling alley. Address should have been on Market Sq, but Center St does run roughly N-S through the square.
The 1919 Sanborn shows this building as the Keystone Garage, which could hold 50 cars. It originally had a one story rear section shaped like an ‘L’. The lot is vacant in 1910. Now that streetview coverage is better, bricked up windows along the side wall are clearly visible, as is the line above which the brick changes color. Not sure when it was remodeled into a theater.
This is a really old theater, and the facade is very crudely formed concrete with quite evident marks where the boards were used to form it. It first appears on the 1910 map as a skating rink and ‘electric theatre’ (in 1904 the lot was mostly empty, although partially occupied by a wooden ‘hall’). The 1919 map calls it the Auditorium Skating Rink & Moving Pictures. That’s the last available online, but it’s very evident from the fading of the marquee that it spent some time as the Strand before becoming the State. The marquee mostly obscures the original entry, which was a tall arch with light bulbs set in it.
This building is now abandoned. One of the front apartment doors looked like it had been kicked in. I’m surprised at the low capacity, because the building is really huge. The correct address seems to be 234.
I assume Box 280 was a PO box where they got their mail. I’d assume that like all of these ‘opera’ houses, once movies took hold, there was less of a market for travelling shows, and having a school graduation or political meeting a few times a year wouldn’t pay the bills. Most seem to have closed right around World War I. Fire codes also got a lot less friendly to upstairs auditoriums, although you do see second story theaters hang on until the ‘50s occasionally.
The only Sanborn map I can find any evidence of is from 1929, and is not available online. The building looks like it was constructed sometime around 1920. It was probably not meant to be a theater, since it’s very deep and narrow. Sometime maybe around 1960, the ground floor was remodeled with a rock veneer and plate glass windows.
By the way, the cars in the photo are all wrong for 1932. Movie appears to be ‘The Strange Mr. Gregory’ from 1945. What looks like a date at bottom right must be a stock number.
Address is 703. The building is still there. Everything else in the photo except the nearest building is long gone. It’s in pretty shabby condition, and looked like it was home to a dance studio.
I can’t find any insurance maps of Bethel, but the thing to the north was a very small store that looked a lot like the remaining building with the ice cream ad on the wall. It’s visible on streetview in 2008. At that point, the lot to the south was bare dirt, so the buildings to the south had probably just been demolished.
I think the ‘2 screens’ comes from listing an auditorium as one screen, and the ceremonial room as another. From photos on the web, that room has Egyptian details, and a balcony either side of the floor. Not sure which stage the huge fly tower belongs to.
We’ll need a time machine to answer that, I fear.
The Stadium is wider than the old Majestic. There were one story buildings on both sides of the Majestic, so the new building was expanded to the north. Since the Majestic itself is shown as being one story, it was likely almost completely destroyed, although possibly in the first fire, before it became the Royal.
This theater was located in the eastern half of the Phoenix Block, a large 2-story brick structure constructed sometime before 1889. This had been the location of a local newspaper (the ‘Democrat’ and then the ‘Times’), and they maintained a printing operation on the second floor. The theater first appears on the June 1913 map. In 1908, the ground floor was a grocery. The depressing bank appears to be from the ‘70s.
Joe - I think this must be the Palace. This was on the west side, 2 doors north of 2nd. The date on the photo you found must be close, but this theater had not yet opened in 1906.
We have the Palace identified as the Isis. Ken often tries to help me out with an ID, which I almost never have. In this case, there’s such an absurd number of theaters coming and going within just a few blocks, so mistakes are to be expected.
The correct address for the theater would have been 52. 56 was the third storefront from the corner. Since this was not the theater at 64, I’ll add a listing for that one. This building likewise dates to sometime before 1883, and this theater must have opened later, since the 1920 map shows an ‘auto accessories’ store there. I assume some of the smaller theaters must have closed shortly after 1920, since you now have 4 theaters within two blocks on the 1920 map, and this would have made 5, for what was not all that big a town. The building is in pretty good shape, although it has an ugly shingle awning, and the corner entrance was done away with when it went back to retail use.
The address on the 1925 map is 1003, and this was not off Main St, it was on a corner off the square. Benton has one of those weird town squares where the blocks on all 4 corners are just visible from the square. This block was originally rectangular, but between 1900 and 1910, W.W. McCreery replaced his lumberyard with a large three story brick hotel building, which sat on an angled cutout of the corner, and thus faced the square.
I assume there was a fire, because the 1915 map shows one story brick buildings matching the footprint of the hotel. The theater now appears, tucked south of two stores running E-W, and east of two running N-S. The facade of the theater is a tiny diagonal section in the corner.
By 1925, the whole setup has been drastically remodeled or perhaps replaced. The theater has been greatly expanded, taking over the eastern N-S storefront, and the remaining structure is now 3 stories tall. The auditorium has also been expanded much further east, and is now taller, and has a fly tower and balcony. The diagonal section has been eliminated, and there is a large rectangular wooden marquee on the north wall of the exposed section of the theater. This is what we see in the picture.
Address on the 1925 map is 122. 120 and 124 were tiny storefronts either side of the entrance. This was constructed sometime after 1915, when the map shows a vacant lot. This looks like it was a fairly simple one story brick rectangle. It’s been gone for many years, and is now a gravel parking lot.
Oh, so the upstairs was originally a hotel? It was right on US 219.
Not positive that Mr. Cramblett operated the theater, but the only mention I found of him was a 1950 sale of carnival equipment.
Correct spelling of the name is indeed Donges. There was an Opera House to the south, on the same side of the square. It is still on the 1919 map, shown as closed, and must have been replaced shortly thereafter by the liquor store now on that corner. Clay Donges seems to have operated a meat market on Center St in later years.
Correct address was 209, and this building is long gone. It was constructed sometime between 1892 and 1897. The 1904 map shows a drugstore in this portion. I’ve uploaded a picture from the 1910 map. By 1919, only the photgrapher in the second story remained. This section of the block was replaced by a large G.C. Murphy store which looks like it might be from about 1930.
If it was under Donge’s, it must have been destroyed in the 1915 fire. The 1910 map does not show a theater under Donge’s. There are two vacant spaces and a bowling alley. Address should have been on Market Sq, but Center St does run roughly N-S through the square.
The 1919 Sanborn shows this building as the Keystone Garage, which could hold 50 cars. It originally had a one story rear section shaped like an ‘L’. The lot is vacant in 1910. Now that streetview coverage is better, bricked up windows along the side wall are clearly visible, as is the line above which the brick changes color. Not sure when it was remodeled into a theater.
This is a really old theater, and the facade is very crudely formed concrete with quite evident marks where the boards were used to form it. It first appears on the 1910 map as a skating rink and ‘electric theatre’ (in 1904 the lot was mostly empty, although partially occupied by a wooden ‘hall’). The 1919 map calls it the Auditorium Skating Rink & Moving Pictures. That’s the last available online, but it’s very evident from the fading of the marquee that it spent some time as the Strand before becoming the State. The marquee mostly obscures the original entry, which was a tall arch with light bulbs set in it.
This building is now abandoned. One of the front apartment doors looked like it had been kicked in. I’m surprised at the low capacity, because the building is really huge. The correct address seems to be 234.
Both the 1916 and 1932 maps call this the Broadway.
At some point after the mid 1950s, the top story was hacked off. The auditorium, or much of it, was demolished in 1974.
I assume Box 280 was a PO box where they got their mail. I’d assume that like all of these ‘opera’ houses, once movies took hold, there was less of a market for travelling shows, and having a school graduation or political meeting a few times a year wouldn’t pay the bills. Most seem to have closed right around World War I. Fire codes also got a lot less friendly to upstairs auditoriums, although you do see second story theaters hang on until the ‘50s occasionally.
The text should be adjusted to show that this opened as the Photoplay Palace. By Feb 1913, it’s shown as the Princess.
The only Sanborn map I can find any evidence of is from 1929, and is not available online. The building looks like it was constructed sometime around 1920. It was probably not meant to be a theater, since it’s very deep and narrow. Sometime maybe around 1960, the ground floor was remodeled with a rock veneer and plate glass windows.
By the way, the cars in the photo are all wrong for 1932. Movie appears to be ‘The Strange Mr. Gregory’ from 1945. What looks like a date at bottom right must be a stock number.
Address is 703. The building is still there. Everything else in the photo except the nearest building is long gone. It’s in pretty shabby condition, and looked like it was home to a dance studio.
I can’t find any insurance maps of Bethel, but the thing to the north was a very small store that looked a lot like the remaining building with the ice cream ad on the wall. It’s visible on streetview in 2008. At that point, the lot to the south was bare dirt, so the buildings to the south had probably just been demolished.
Thanks for finding the draft. Took a quick look for NRHP listings and didn’t see one.
I think the ‘2 screens’ comes from listing an auditorium as one screen, and the ceremonial room as another. From photos on the web, that room has Egyptian details, and a balcony either side of the floor. Not sure which stage the huge fly tower belongs to.