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rickdias
rickdias commented about Capitol Theatre on Sep 16, 2009 at 5:21 pm

Pleasant memories…

I used to go to the Capitol Theater in New Bedford’s North End in the 50’s and early 60’s.

Then the Capitol featured two continuous movies and five Looney Tunes cartoons. The admission was 12 cents on Saturday and 25 cents on Sunday. It was a very popular pastime for the kids.

Candy Bars were 5 cents and Popcorn was 10 cents. We had a 5 cent bottle Coke machine until someone threw an empty bottle. The kids from our neighborhood pretty much “owned” the right front theater seating and everyone just knew that. Our friends always hung out together.

Butch was the ticket man. He dressed in the sharp red traditional theater uniform and hat. But Harold was the usher and he never failed to annoy us with his flashlight. One day he annoyed someone a little too much and the customer just happened to know the theater owners. There was a complaint made. Harold was more than likely given a “talking to” by the owners. After that, Harold was a little more courteous with us during his patrols. But some said he had taken ill.

Around the 1970’s a New Bedford Standard Times Newspaper writer featured a story in which he colorfully depicted how “I Was A Saturday Afternoon Cowboy at the Capitol Theater.”

He captured the moment and how he enjoyed the double continuous feature Western movies and bonus five cartoons. Then he colorfully depicted how on the way home he and his friends rode stick horses and galloped in and out of the New Bedford, Acushnet Avenue’s store front doorways.

He colorfully depicted his Capitol Movie Theater childhood days and now mine.