Sweethearts of the Silver Screen

February 2005 Special Exhibit

During the last couple of years, many of the truly great film stars of the golden age of movies have died.  Allison-Antrim Museum’s February 2005 exhibit is based on half a century of these great leading actresses and actors of the silver screen.  The exhibit includes many of the greatest stars of our time from the 1920s through the 1970s – the "Golden Age of Hollywood and Movies." 

The memorabilia includes lobby cards, informative articles about individual stars, movie scene "stills," many photographs (some of which are original studio photographs), and other information about the major stars and movies, including a special display for early Academy Awards, which were established in the 1920s.  Special individual displays showcase major life events and summarized biographies for selected major stars. 

Informative for all ages, the exhibit includes the very early stars like Mary Pickford, Rudolph Valentino, Clara Bow and Mae West. Other favorite silver screen sweethearts like Clark Gable (King of the Silver Screen), Cary Grant, Humphrey Bogart, Spencer Tracy and Lauren Bacall, Elizabeth Taylor, Bette Davis, Judy Garland, James Dean, Jean Harlow, Montgomery Clift, and Natalie Wood, are but a “few” of the stars featured in this extensive exhibit.

Two of Greencastle’s theaters, the Gem Theater and the State Theater, are remembered through photographs of the Gem (Greencastle’s first theater) and a lobby poster from the State.  Also on exhibit are glass slide advertisements that were shown on the movie screen by using a special projector.  The glass slides, both black and white and colored, were advertisements for Charles W.  Martin, 63 North Allison Street, Greencastle, who sold concentrated food flavorings, and the others were for Carl’s Drug Store.

Circa 1912, Harry McLaughlin built the annex to the McLaughlin Hotel (currently the Antrim House) which housed the Gem Theater.  When silent movies played there, musical accompaniment was provided by pianists Helen White (mother of the late Katty White Grosh) and Charles Stouffer with Charles Myers on the drums.  Vaudeville shows, Doc Berry’s stage show, the Rescue Hose Company minstrel shows, class plays and musicals, Class Day, and commencement were held in the theater, in addition to first-run movies. 

Waynesboro’s Arcade Theatre will be featured in two pieces that are included in the exhibit. One piece is a signed and numbered Landis Whitsel print entitled “Saturday Night at the Movies – the Arcade Theatre, Circa 1938.”  The Arcade was host to the same kind of events as were held at the Gem Theater in Greencastle. 

 The Arcade Theatre opened on September 28, 1916 and the building was demolished in May 1966.  When it was built, it had the largest stage east of the Mississippi River.  The Arcade and a second theater, the Strand, showed serials on Saturdays with the Arcade hosting matinees and the Strand, evening shows.  During the silent-film era, a pipe organ provided accompaniment at the Arcade while either a pianist or a player piano provided music at the Strand.

Almost 51 years ago on February 24, 1954, Warner Bros. Theatres Inc. sold the building to Transamerica Waynesboro Realty Corp., which in turn sold the property to N.W.O. Inc. on February 30, 1966, 39 years ago.  N.W.O. Inc. demolished the Arcade Theatre and built the current building, which today houses the Waynesboro Theatre and the Rainbow Gymnastics, Inc.

At 3:50 p.m. on Sunday, February 13, a black and white photograph of Clark Gable and Vivian Leigh from “Gone with the Wind” will be given away to one lucky visitor. The name will be drawn randomly from a box containing the entries placed in it by guests during open house that day. As an added attraction, Bette Davis movies will be playing for visitors as they tour the exhibit and guests will receive a small bag of popcorn when they leave.

To test your knowledge of Hollywood sweethearts’ trivia, you will be given a list of questions, the answers of which can be found in the exhibit.  Do you know which female star is recognized by Guinness as the most beautiful star of all time?  Or, what was the first year that the Academy Awards was established and who were the winners?

Nostalgia is the word of the day.  Thank you for joining us as we re-visit the Golden Age of Hollywood and Movies.
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