Viking Theatre
1218 Commercial Street,
Astoria,
OR
97103
1218 Commercial Street,
Astoria,
OR
97103
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Originally opened in 1925 to replace an earlier Astoria Theatre that burned down in 1922. The Astoria Theatre was equipped with a Wurlitzer 2 manual 4 ranks organ. It was renamed the Viking Theatre on November 6, 1931 with May Robson in “Mother’s Millions” (aka The She-Wolf). Later, after it closed as a movie theater, the building became home to the Viking Roller Rink from October 23, 1959. Today, the former theatre building houses a bank.
Contributed by
Bryan Krefft
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Recent comments (view all 5 comments)
Some information on the theater and its 2/4 Wurlitzer installed in 1925 can be found at this link:
View link
I’m not too sure if the bank actually WAS the theatre?
If the theatre really was turned into a rink, I’m not sure the building is still standing…?
http://www.pstos.org/instruments/or/astoria/viking-rink_entrance-1960s-l.jpg
It looks like Fox West Coast dropped the Astoria Theatre. D.C. Stewart took the equipment in 1931 to the Astoria Theatre in Medford, Oregon. That left an opening for the Viking Theater’s entry into the marketplace which occurred on November 6, 1931 with “Mother’s Millions.” In 1933, Fox Liberty took over the Viking so it wouldn’t compete with the local theaters. It was used for a seemingly unending group of sporadic events and one-off screenings until conversion to the Viking Roller Rink on October 23, 1959.
During its final years of operation, the Viking ran a mix of films and special events, but the Viking leaned more towards special events than films.
Once known as Fox Astoria Theatre while being operated by Fox West Coast Theatres during the early sound era.