The First Movie in Kingsport

 

What was your first movie? I wrote that column six years ago and you can read it (or re-read it) at the end of this post.

What was Kingsport’s first movie?

I never knew until I stumbled across a 1936 newspaper story about the Strand Theatre and its history.

Before the Strand was in its familiar location on Broad it was around the corner at Main and Shelby in a building that would house the Gem Theatre after the Strand moved.

But the Strand had an even earlier home, starting in 1914, in what long-time manager W.H. Harmon called the Old Kingsport Building on Main. There weren’t very many buildings on Main in 1914. It may have been in one half of the first floor space of the Hotel Kingsport. Or in the original Strauss Building, which was on Main next to the Bank of Kingsport. (Busy Bee Restaurant was on the first floor.) Or in the Pace Building, which was next door to the Strauss. Or across Broad in the building next to Kingsport Drug

Main Street in 1914

When asked for the ’36 feature story about the first picture the theatre ran, Harmon hesitated. He couldn’t remember the title but he remembered it starred the old screen actor Bill Hart. That would have been western star William S. Hart, who was in five westerns in 1914. There was no Kingsport Times in 1914 so I checked movie ads for other East Tennessee theatres. Only one Hart western played in the area that year, “The Bargain,” with Hart as a stage coach robber who later decides he wants to go straight. (No spoilers from me. Check it out on YouTube. The robbery is perfect for these pandemic times: he wears a mask.)

When the film played Knoxville’s Queen Theatre, the Sentinel praised Hart as “the greatest rider actor in the business. His daring feat of rolling horse and rider down a steep embankment over and over a dozen times or more…it’s the marvel of the season’s ‘thrills.’” The newspaper predicted the five-reeler would be “the talk of the county all next week.”

I’m sure it was when it played Kingsport, too.

 

You can watch “The Bargain” at this link on YouTube. 

(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2GAUjS7TIU)

It’s an hour and twenty minutes and after about five you understand why silent movies had piano players.

The opening with cast introductions is worth your time. And even though it is over 100 years old, the digital transfer by the Library of Congress makes it look like it is only 80 or so years old.

The film is set in 1889 (it says 1889 on a telegram in one scene) which means the movie was made only 25 years after its setting. That would be the equivalent of watching a movie set in 1995 today.

A few contemporary reviews:

“There is variety and a keen regard for a wise placing of the camera in gaining picturesque effects. Probably no preceding picture has done such full justice to the scenic wonders of Arizona. And to keep pace with the magnitude of the production in its physical aspects the producers constructed a combination saloon, dance hall and gambling house that quite does away with the western underworld drinks and gambles and fights in cramped quarters. This remarkable set seems large enough to accommodate a townful cowboys and desperadoes, without hampering the movements of the dancing girls in soiled finery.” – New York Dramatic Mirror, Dec. 12, 1914.

“Pleasing with its action and suspense…The many scenes taken in the Grand Canyon of Arizona are among the best specimens of scenery that have ever been caught by the camera.” – Los Angeles Times, Dec. 10, 1914.

“A western drama of the greatest drama and magnificent scenery” – Buffalo Times, Dec. 6, 1914.

“Virile western.” – San Francisco Examiner, Nov. 29, 1914.

“The picture tells a thrilling story of the West when it was young and produced as it is by the dean of Western producers, Thomas H. Ince. It is a picture that the Zoe Theater management unhesitatingly recommends as being a picture that will please everybody.” – Houston Post, Dec. 20, 1914.  

“The remainder of the week will be devoted to the showing of ‘The Bargain,’ featuring Willliam S. Hart, late of ‘The Squaw Man.’ Playing at Moore’s Strand Theater, 403 Ninth St. All Seats 10c.” – Washington Post, Dec, 24, 1914.

 

 

Here’s the March 17, 1936 story about the Strand:

 

THEATER HAS KEPT STEP WITH BETTER IDEAS IN PROGRESS

Strand Theater Developed from Small Structure to Favorite Showplace East Tenn. and Va. Points

The term "flicker” is still used today in speaking of motion pictures but it is not applicable or just either to the Strand theatre or any of the thousands of others keeping abreast of modern developments.

More than 23 years ago, the Strand showed its first silent picture on Main street in the Old Kingsport building. The title of that first picture could not be recalled by W. H. Harmon, who saw it develop through years and years of improvement, service, dependability, but he does recall that the veteran screen actor, Bill Hart, starred in it.

Four years after it started on Main street in the portion of town that was then Kingsport, the Strand moved to the present location of the Gem theatre, a far larger site than the earlier 25 by 70 feet.

The Strand stayed in the Gem location until 1925 when it was moved to its present building. Later in 1924 the Strand Corporation was formed which embraced the Strand, Gem, and Rialto theatres,  affording the city three theatres while it was still expanding steadily.

The sound system was installed in April, 1929.

Six years later the Strand corporation was bought by the Crescent Amusement company. Failing health compelled Mr. Harmon to drop his duties.

Under the management of W. J. Roesch, the Strand became the favorite showplace of nearby Southwest Virginia and East Tennessee towns through its presentation of the cream of pictures at popular prices.

It was Mr. Roesch's suggestion that resulted in the installation early this year of the RCA High Fidelity sound system, the last word in sound perfection and transmission known to sound engineers. It was also his suggestion that resulted in a complete renovation of the interior of the Strand and improved sound systems in the Rialto and Gem, the latter two now under the management of W. S. Gleaves.

It's  far step from the old Strand theatre in its 25 by 70 building and machinery that earned motion pictures the title of “flicker” because the picture jumped so.

 

 

And here is a column I wrote about the first movie you ever saw:

 

When I moved back here in 2002 to take care of my mother, I decided to get as much family history from her as I could.

I remember asking her about the first movie she ever saw. She couldn’t remember the title but she remembered she took a group of younger relatives, riding the bus from Chuckey into Greeneville.

Years later I found out the name of the movie. My Aunt Nola, my mother’s younger sister, was part of the group. Aunt Nola couldn’t remember the title either but she remembered that it starred Shirley Temple and that it was about the Civil War.

Bingo! “The Little Colonel.” 1935. Shirley Temple, Bill “Bojangles” Robinson, Lionel Barrymore, Hattie McDaniel. It was at Greeneville’s Princess Theatre at 118 Main Street which had opened as a silent film palace in 1915. (The opening was delayed until the movie house piano was delivered.) It was hardly a palace. When the theatre closed in 1938 the For Lease ad noted it was 28 feet wide and 120 feet deep.

I suspect a Shirley Temple movie was the first film that a lot of girls of that era saw. (My mother would have been 15.)

My Aunt Nola remembered being especially impressed by the size of the screen – huge - and by Shirley Temple’s curls. Temple had a lot of them, 56 according to Fox’s publicity department at the time.

Shirley Temple’s death earlier this week reminded me of that bit of family history and sent me on a mission to see if my friends remembered their first film.

Dan Pomeroy said his first film was “Snow White.” “My Aunt Helen took me to the Strand. The film was obviously making another round, but it was brand new to me. And the evil witch scared the devil out of me; and for years to come, too. Of course, a few years later, Walt Disney made up for it, when I went downtown to see ‘Davy Crockett, King of the Wild Frontier.’ My cousin Clay Petrie and I sat in the floor playing the record over and over and over. It must have driven his mother nuts.”

Jo Zimmerman says the first movie she can remember is Walt Disney’s “White Wilderness “ at the State Theatre on July 4th, 1958. “The reason I recall the day...our family celebration of the Fourth included the parade, then the American Legion Carnival. We wrapped up the day with a movie. And we didn’t care what time it began! We just marched in and sat down and started watching. If it happened to be the end, then we stayed for the beginning. I vividly remember the glaciers breaking apart and sliding into the waters. It was a big day when the Fordtown kids got to see a movie! “

Jim Bennett was born in Kingsport but grew up in Maryville. “My parents took me to see ‘On the Waterfront’ at the Capital Theatre in Maryville. Those were the days when kids watched what their parents watched, not the other way around. I bet I could still pick out within a few seats and a row or two exactly where we sat in the theatre. I remember my first smell of theatre-popped popcorn and that I didn’t get a bag or a drink or any Junior Mints. We’re talking family values now. In that same theatre a few years later I watched my first double feature alone. It was something like ‘The Assassin’ and ‘The Werewolf.’ After the shows, I walked home in broad daylight, scared out of my wits. “

I used to review movies on a Louisville TV station with Jayne McClew so I asked her. (She still lives there.) “I have a very vivid memory of my first movie experience. It was ‘The Sound of Music.’ I have a memory of the theater’s marble steps and my parents carrying me and my little brother, with my older brother and sister walking alongside. Among my two other memories of the event: my Mom bribing her four children’s silence during the film with lemon drops; and my Dad trying to explain who the Nazis were during our 50-minute car ride home.”

Tom Jester grew up in Alabama. “My first movie was ‘Song of the South’ at the Strand Theater in Fort Payne, Alabama, I think around 1948. I cried like a baby when I thought the bull was going to kill Uncle Remus because, well, I really was a baby (or close to it, anyway, being only three at the time). The last time I was in Fort Payne, 11 years ago, what was the Strand Theater had become an antique store.”

Paula Bennett-Paddick told me, “My first memory is in Chattanooga when I was 7 or 8 and my mother dropped me off at a theatre in downtown Chattanooga by myself to see ‘Red Shoes.’ My, my, how times have changed.”

My first movie was “The Greatest Show on Earth.” It was at the State Theater in September 1952 (I have the movie ad from the newspaper). My five-year-old self fell in love with Angel (Gloria Grahame) and I was near tears when I thought an elephant was going to crush her. It didn’t and I’ve loved movies – and happy endings - ever since.