A neat shot of C. Howard Crane’s Walkerville Theatre, on Wyandotte Street East, between Gladstone & Lincoln. The theatre opened in 1920, and this photo, based on the film noted on the marquee, was also taken in 1920. When built the theatre straddled the town line, with half the building in Windsor and the other half in Walkerville. The theatre was also known as the Tivoli Theatre, before closing to films, and becoming a bingo hall. Over the last few years, ideas have come and go, but sadly nothing has lasted in this old beauty. Recently a deal for the purchase of this old cinema fell through, and the theatre is back on the market.
i was just looking at this today while stuck in traffic. what a shame it looks the way it does on the outside. the interior has been restored to some degree hasn’t it?
thanks Andrew!
Yes a lot ofmoney has been spent on the interior. But the outside of it is still in relatively good shape. Yes the marquee is in a bit of a mess and the demi-lune window is bricked in but a little work could go a long way.
The problem is what to do with such a large building?
beautiful! that half window looks gorgeous. how great would it be to have a functioning theatre again in old walkerville? maybe even something like the burton theatre in detroit. film screenings, community theatre. if only.
Section it off into apartments for welfare recipients. Restoring this building to its former glory is a pipe dream.
I remember going to this theatre in 1961 to see the movie Gorgo. The main thing I remember about the experience is that I spent my bus money on popcorn and had to call my dad to come and get me. He wasn’t happy.
Us Walkerville kids always sat in the Walkerville side of the theatre. Two movies and games and stuff during intermission for 25 cents.
$325,000 and she’s yours!
The exterior definitely needs a bit of work:
I would absolutely love to see this become a community theatre… like the Burton. Hey- isn’t the WSO looking for a place to perform?
WSO probably would find a hundred and one things wrong, because they did not think of it, or it is not Downtown,no parking no million dollars spent, that the city dose not have.
The city is spending the money on roads and sewers,not the Arts.
I’m not sure why they wouldn’t want it other than no parking for 1200 people (thats how many it can seat). I would love to see them at the Capitol but that is too small at 800 so perhaps this one is too small at 1200.
Community theatres are great but they must be subsized as none of them make money on their own. Not to mention this region is horrible for supporting and funding the arts anyway (hmmm….quality of life issue folks?)
The problem with parking is always the same with these old buildings from the 20’s and earkier. Nobody had cars back then. You could walk or take the streetcar to where ever you wanted to go in your nieghbourhood which had every thing you needed. Less urban sprawl, less transportation smog. If you want to use old buildings like this theater you have to tear down some old houses to make parking. No way around it. Probably quite a few old houses for 1200 seating capacity. Each of these old little communities needs a parking garage to bring people and thier $$$ back.
More parking lots?? That’s not the solution. Efficient urban transit is the solution. Leave the car at home.
Or walk… There are more than enough households within a 15 minute walk of this theatre to support it…
Walking is good too!! For everyone outside a 15 minute walk radius, efficient mass transit works. The location of this theatre should not be an excuse not to restore it to useful purpose. Is the alternative to demolish it for yet another parking lot??
It appears the increased popularity of this site and the Windsor Star’s recent “From The Archives” project is starting to bring over some of the Great Thinkers that populate the mind-sewer that is the Windsor Star comments section. A scary day on IM.com when suggestions following a post on the Walkerville theatre include tearing down houses or more buildings to “build a parking lot” and someone making a remark about making this a welfare apartment and that this great old theatre’s future is a mere “pipe dream”. Wow, get the bananas out the baboons have arrived.
If you ever want a laugh, or spontaneously lose about 12.000 brain cells (or both) definitely visit the Star’s comments section.
This building is screaming to be re used. The problem is that you can’t really do anything to this building but make it into a theatre — which I think is really good, but it sort of limits the options, so to speak. Tearing it down, aka pulling a Windsor, will not help anything either. Just read about a theatre company in London England called the Bush Theatre that takes script submissions from around the world and trains up and coming playwrights, directors and actors in the craft, and gets their plays produced. Maybe we could have something like that for this property… Just thinking out loud here otherwise this will be another building we will regret tearing down.
At the same time we can’t just let it sit there empty either…
HA! Brendan i was just reading the star’s comments and almost threw this pc OUT THE EFFING WINDOW! i cannot stand the people on there. always bashing people on welfare for no reason. they’re not all getting high and drunk on our dime, and those people will thank the lord welfare was there the day they lose their job. i guess that’s the attitude you get growing up with a silver spoon in your mouth.
“pulling a Windsor” LOL!
hey Tim – i’m getting the feeling “from the archives” has been removed because for the douche bag trolls on there. they seriously ruined it for me. always turning it, no matter what the photo was, into a CAW/CUPE/City thing. i can’t stand it any more. why do people have to wreck everything history here?
thank god Andrew is here to share with us and has the balls to put a cap on the trolls, giving us a place to play nice most of the time and enjoy our past.
(sorry…i ain’t all good with words like y’all) LOL
The Star posted a picture of some strikers picketing a dock in ’47 and the comments section went bananas with the usual knuckle draggers going on about CUPE/CAW and all that. It’s not only poisonous for the Star but it’s also horrible for the city in ways no one could have ever foreseen. But they keep the comments open (and anonymous for that matter) because of the traffic it generates – even if the people making up most of the traffic are moron trolls. Traffic sells ads, therefore the lowest common denominator rules the day, regardless of the non-monetary costs involved. And Windsor is really paying those costs these days.
oh i know that one made me mad. it didn’t even have anything to do with ford, it was about the thomas inn being anti union. then they start going on about the picture being photoshopped to make the signs pro union and for the star to give it a rest and shoe some “real” pictures! that old pictures can’t be crisp and they didn’t want to hear about how old pictures would be touched up if a guy was wearing a white shirt with a bright background, that they would draw the outline of his shirt to it didn’t fade into the background. NOPE…IT’S FAKE! NOPE! NOPE! there was one of horses racing at devonshire the day before Andrew did his recently, and someone was like “this could be any city, show some pictures of windsor already” or something to that effect! GRRRRRRRRR!
oh well, it was nice while it lasted and i got some good pix out of it. now on to the infinitly more resourceful, internationalmetropolis. binding it up talking about complete idiots is a waste of time because they never go away. what ever happened to civility and common sense?
The Walkerville Theater should absolutely be saved and turned into something good, no doubt, BUT,there must be parking. If there was a demand for a nieghbourhood theater in Walkerville were everybody would walk to get there, there would already be such a place.(Walk-erville?)No intelligent human being would invest $1000’s of $$$ in any attraction that draws a crowd without parking. To open the theater back up and demand everybody walk or take the bus is ridiculous. What about those who can’t take a bus such as the large population of aging baby boomers or those who have money to spend but don’t want to spend it to get all dressed up for the evening and ride a stinking City of Windsor bus with all the drunks and people pissing thier pants on the seats. What about the American crowd? There’s not even any room for the busses to unload. Any new school,theater, or community centre has parking and a bus loading zone. Not all old houses are good. Especially the ones next to the alley on Wyandotte. Some big sacrifice will have to be made to get that theater going again. Some people love to complain but can’t offer a reasonable or realistic solution. BEAUTIFUL HISTORIC THEATER PLUS NO PARKING = EMPTY RUN DOWN AND EVENTUALLY DEMOLISHED NOT SO BEAUTIFUL HISTORIC THEATER.
It appears the Star’s From The Archives is back – it only disappears on weekends due the Windsor Star’s absolutely horrendous website layout whereby once something isn’t on the front page (which there are less articles to choose from now since their awful redesign), it is absolutely inaccessible. Try finding the most recent Entertainment Listings on their site once it’s no longer on the main page. But if you’re going to be the Windsor newspaper, you might as well apply some “Windsor logic” to the situation and make it incredibly frustrating, ridiculously and absurdly thought out and have no accountability.
Anyways, the Archives is back online. They really could use someone who knows a thing or two about how to research more info about it though. Perhaps they can hire Andrew to do some freelancing for them.
And to David H. and his parking lot dreams – car-centric ideas is what has all but destroyed the city’s facade and heritage. Numerous cities all over the world have managed to develop healthy alternatives to knocking down neighbourhoods to build parking lots. Try visiting one to know.
Maybe, tho I know a longshot, use the old Classic Bingo lot at George and Wyandotte for parking, and set up a bus/shuttle service strictly for the theather. Vehicles could be more modern/green internally, but do the exteriors,etc, like the old streetcars or trolly’s? I think anyone today could enjoy the experience, as long as it’s not costing you $70 for a night out at the show, like any other place in town. That’s ridiculous. Just a thought…….which I’m sure someone will shoot down. Just over the last few years I’ve actually taken a huge interest in the history of this city. People are right, Windsor is getting notorious for allowing historical buildings to be turned into parking lots.
Sean, thats a really good idea. Somewhere to park,(especially for out of towners) the theater patrons stay dry in the rain,no long bus rides with multiply transfers and no demolition around the theater. Windsor needs more problem solvers not more complainers and winers.
My vote is to keep it and get creative! Let’s not also forget about supporting the Capitol and other places like Palace Cinemas keeping these venues open and running depends on public attendance!
The only problem is we don’t have effiecient transit transit windsor is anything but effiecient
Film Poster for “The Daughter Pays”. You can see the poster on the front of the building… I noticed it as I was looking at the December page from the current (2011) IM calendar. Good stuff.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/26073312@N08/4491493276/
Sharp eye. Good find.
Sheesh, isn’t it considered a historical site? Can’t the city buy it? When will administrators look ahead (as well as behind) for a change and realise that the mowed down old features of our cities erase so much more than brick? Will our predecessors look upon us as a people who only valued parking lots?
If the city bought every old building even if it had historical value, who would choose whitc is true hiistorical or an old building nobody wants to buy.
The city does not have the financal ability, or mandate to do this. The taxes would go skyhigh and nobody will buy property in Windsor.
Stucco haters rejoice, the Star/Palace Theater is losingits going all glass.