Gateway Theatre
348 N. Marion Avenue,
Lake City,
FL
32055
348 N. Marion Avenue,
Lake City,
FL
32055
2 people
favorited this theater
Additional Info
Functions: Movies (Classic), Performing Arts
Previous Names: Columbia Theatre
Nearby Theaters
The Columbia Theatre was opened in 1946 and operated by the Robert Cannon Theatres chain. It was rebuilt in late-1966. It was renamed Gateway Theatre and reopened on January 5, 1967 screening Dick Van Dyke in “Lt. Robinson Crusoe”. It was closed in 1980. By 2009 it had become a church name the Faith Temple and was still in this use in 2014. By 2021 it was operating as a performing arts theatre and also screening classic movies.
Contributed by
Andy
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Recent comments (view all 13 comments)
Move the gold guy down the street a bit and you get a much better view of the theater.
April 2010.
Nice photos of the theatre/church.
I worked at this theatre back in 1976 to 1979. The separate box office,balcony and restrooms upstairs were still there from the segregation times and you could still hear a gun shot from the balcony at 10:30pm everynight when that guy was shot. Did not like being up there working alone AT ALL.
Everytime we heard the shot, I thought a xenon bulb had exploded but to no avail. You could smell fresh burnt gun powder though.
Interesting story Troy,I worked at the Loews Melrose in Nashville Tennessee,we had a ghost there too.Many people do not believe it though.
Does anyone have a clue about condition of interior??
The actual address is 348 N. Marion Av., for anyone who’s trying to look it up on Google Street View.
I can verify what the previous poster said about the address. It is indeed 348 N. Marion Avenue. I took some pictures today and will try to upload them. It is now the Henry Wilson Performing Arts Building. I have not had a chance to go inside yet, but plan to do so soon. Aside from plays, they also show movies, but nothing new. It appears that Gone with the Wind and Home Alone will both be shown soon.
CORRECTION: I was 100% wrong. After a few months of investigating its history, I finally found out that the Gateway Theatre was first known as the Columbia Theatre, and definitely not the Lake Theatre.
This is the exact Columbia Theatre that opened in 1946 as part of the Robert Cannon Theatres chain, the same chain that owned the Lake Theatre nearby, before being rebuilt for four to six weeks after Thanksgiving 1966. The Columbia Theatre officially reopened as the Gateway Theatre on January 5, 1967 with Walt Disney’s “LT. Robin Crusoe, U.S.N.” and the Gateway operated as a 500-seat first-run theater until its closure in 1980. The Gateway then sat abandoned for more than a decade.
This was NEVER known as the Lake Theatre, and this did NOT open in 1930. There are two theaters in Lake City during the 1920s, 1930s, and early 1940s, which were the Desoto Theatre (opened in Spring 1927) and the Grand Theatre (opened in the 1910s), and both theaters were operated by Martin Theatres during its later years.