West Side to Get 3 New Movie Palaces
Washington Blvd. and Crawford Ave. Seen as Great Amusement Center
By Harry M. Beardsley.
|
Source: Chicago Daily News, 22 August 1925, pg. 14.
|
The world's largest ballroom, wherein
10,000 pairs of feet may trip the light fantastic without tripping over
each other, and three movie palaces of the "superdreadnaught"
type are scheduled to arise in the vicinity of Washington boulevard and
Crawford avenue to challenge the claims of
Woodlawn and
Uptown Chicago as the city's
greatest outlying amusement center. Three of these rendezvous are named
the Paradise.
Excavation for the Paradise
theater, the newest of the magic lantern Taj Mahals projected for
this locality, is now under way. It will occupy the entire block
fronting west in Crawford avenue, between Park and West End, will seat
4,000 seekers of visual entertainment, and will cost $3,000,000.
Remodel Ballroom.
Just across the street workmen are busy remodeling and enlarging J.
Louis Guyon's Paradise ballroom
for the third time since it was built, less than ten years ago.
When completed, it will accommodate more dancers than any two
temples of terpischore in the city, Mr. Guyon avers and compared to it
the largest of the trotteries of the north and south sides will shrink
into insignificance. A mezzanine floor and balcony will provide space
for serving refreshments and light luncheons to 1,000 devotees.
The Paradise theater will be built by the National Theaters
corporation, operators of the Capitol and half a dozen other picture
pavilions. Its interior will be finished after the manner of the Capitol
but will contain about 1,000 more seats. John Eberson, architect of the
Capitol, has prepared plans for the Paradise. The exterior will be in
French architecture, the Grand Opera house of Paris and the Palace of
Versailles furnishing the motif. The interior, instead of being a
Spanish garden as at the Capitol, will be a representation of the
gardens of the Tuilleries at Versailles.
These two projects, while long familiar to west siders, have not
been revealed to the public at large. Plans for two other cinema
sanctums have recently been announced, one by Marks Brothers, who also
referred to their project as "The Paradise," and the other by
Lubliner & Trinz and Balaban & Katz. Both of these galleries of
kinetic art are designed along sumptuous and stupendous lines. Their
combined seating capacity will be in the neighborhood of 9,000 which,
with the 4,000 chairs provided by the National Theaters' "Paradise"
brings the total to 13,000. Add to this the 5,000 dancers on Mr. Guyon's
floor and the aggregate number of amusement seekers which can be
accommodated is raised to 18,000.
Buys Five Square Blocks.
Mr. Guyon has purchased nearly five square blocks of property in
the immediate neighborhood of Washington and Crawford, including more
than three blocks of Crawford avenue frontage north of Washington. He
believes that this locality is destined to become the greatest outlying
amusement center in the city and this opinion is shared by many west
side business and real estate men. Street car lines, boulevards and bus
lines and the Oak Park L make it possible for thousands of people to
reach this locality by a ride of five or ten minutes. It is in the heart
of the densely populated west side and close to the city's center of
population.
The Marks Brothers' "Paradise,"
according to their announcement, will be located on the north side of
Madison street, 350 feet west on Madison. It will cost $2,500,000, will
seat 5,000 people and will be topped by a tall tower spangled with
synthetic jewels.
The Balaban & Katz, Lubliner & Trinz contribution to the
gayety of Crawford avenue is to be located on the north side of
Washington boulevard, 125 feet east of Crawford. It is unnamed as yet,
although everybody but Mr. Guyon seems to think that "Paradise"
would be appropriate. Its capacity is scheduled tentatively at 4,000 and
its cost at $4,000,000.
[End of news article]
|
|
Page compiled: 10 August 2001
|
|
|
