When walking by the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ of The Apostolic Faith at the northeast corner of 116th Street and 5th Avenue, it is all too obvious that the building was a theater at some point. An old New York Times article points out that the building was designed by Hoppin & Koen back in 1913 and that that it became a Spanish-language cinema called The Hispano by 1930:
LINK. There's not much else out there on the theater but it seems like the church has kept it in great shape in recent years. Photo by Ulysses
When walking by the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ of The Apostolic Faith at the northeast corner of 116th Street and 5th Avenue, it is all too obvious that the building was a theater at some point. An old New York Times article points out that the building was designed by Hoppin & Koen back in 1913 and that that it became a Spanish-language cinema called The Hispano by 1930: LINK. There's not much else out there on the theater but it seems like the church has kept it in great shape in recent years. Photo by Ulysses
Here's some more on the old Mount Morris Theatre, drawn from my forthcoming history of Harlem.
ReplyDeleteThe first Mount Morris Theatre was actually built around 1880 by the Third Avenue Railroad Company between East 129th and East 130th streets. It is unclear when it went under, but it seems that by 1899 there was a new Mount Morris Theatre at 1421 Fifth Avenue, at East 116th Street, a location controlled until just before the Great Depression by the Ancient Order of the Hibernians, an Irish-Catholic fraternal organization. This building was designed by the architectural firm of Hoppin and Koen, veterans of McKim, Mead, and White who also built Teddy Roosevelt’s Police Building downtown. By 1914 some of the employees looking to earn some extra money were arrested as part of an uptown ring of thieves who would store stolen goods at the theater. It was also there that Milton Berle (born Mendel Berlinger)got his first steady gig as a child singer--because of laws regulating performances by minors, he actually had to sing from a box in the audience. In the early 1930s the theater was owned by the Yiddish theater actor, director and writer Max Wilner, who was targeted by New York City License Commissioner Paul Moss’s crusade against vaudeville. It was then the Hispano, a Spanish-language movie theater.
Jonathan Gill
Fascinating. Thank you. I look forward to your book.
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