Orleans Theatre

The original Orleans Opera House was built in the early-1880’s and is still in existence. If the local paper has it correct, a new Opera House was built opening in 1904. It experimented with motion pictures which prompted a new-build, full-time movie theatre - the Mystic Theatre/Rialto Theatre/Rustic Theatre/Strand Theatre which operated from 1912 likely closing at the end of a 25-year lease with declining patronage in 1937 (it has its own page on Cinema Treasures).

The Orleans Opera House was converted to a full-time movie theatre with sound in 1933 getting a Streamline Moderne style makeover with texstone walls, armotex wood paneling and the balcony was converted to a business office. R. Yockey of the Sun Theatre in Oxford, Nebraska was the operator.

On May 4, 1955, the theatre converted to widescreen to present CinemaScope films starting with Edmund Purdom in “The Student Prince”. The theatre was still in operation 1963. However, a steep population drop of almost 40% over the previous ten-year period likely made margins fairly thin thereafter and likely a second 30-year lease reached expiry.

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