Green Lake Theater, the second, opens on August 5, 1937.

  • By Louis Fiset
  • Posted 5/01/2001
  • HistoryLink.org Essay 3242

On August 5, 1937, the Green Lake Theater opens its doors in the heart of the Green Lake business district (at 7111 Woodlawn Avenue, on the east side of Green Lake). This ends the neighborhood's nine year hiatus since closure of its predecessor. The original Green Lake Theatre, one of the first in the Pacific Northwest, operated from 1914 until the "talkies" came in 1928.

Acclaimed as one of the Northwest's finest theaters with its Mirrophonic sound, air conditioning, and a capacity of 750 patrons -- "every seat a loge chair" -- the new Green Lake Theater was one of several north end neighborhood theaters to open during the Depression, providing momentary escape from the daily drear of economic hard times.

The first feature film shown at "The Show Place of Seattle" was 3 Smart Girls, with Deanna Durbin.

The local-independent theater remained in business until 1950 when, once again, the movie screen in Green Lake neighborhood faded to darkness.

 


Sources:

Seattle Post-Intelligencer, August 5, 1937.


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