Friday Find

Today’s find is from the Emporia Gazette. I’m guessing my mother or my grandmother had saved this February 13, 1954 issue. On the front page is an article about my grandfather, E. O. Briles, leasing the Strand Theater.

Strand Theater Lease Sold to E.O. Briles
Lyric Owner Also Buys Equipment and Plans to Take Over House March 31
Ed Dorrell, Emporia Fox Theaters manager, today announced that Fox Midwest Theaters had sold the lease on the Strand theater and the theater equipment to E. O. Briles, owner and operator of the Lyric theater. The deal is effective at the close of business March 31.
In confirming the deal, Mr. Briles said that the present Lyric theater will close the night of March 30, and that he would reopen in the Strand theater Saturday, April 3. The business will continue as the Strand theater.
Mr. Briles, who owns the present location of the Lyric at 505 Commercial, said the building probably would be remodeled and rented.
The change-over to the Strand will involve the moving of 300 theater seats from the Lyric to the Strand. These seats, nearly new, Mr. Briles said, are superior to the present Strand equipment. The Lyric projection equipment also will be moved to the Strand location. This equipment too, he says, is later and better equipment than that now used at the Strand.
Tentative plans for the Strand include double features about half of the time, and matinee performances probably each Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Mr. Briles said that there would be little change in the film service and would be approximately what the Strand now has.
“When the change is made I will be on my own, as I am now,” Mr. Briles said. “In no sense will the Strand be a Fox theater.”
The same Lyric staff will move to the Strand with Mr. Briles. Included will be the operator, James Brewington, who has been with Mr. Briles ever since he came to Emporia in November, 1931. Another staff member is Ruth Mayes, who has been cashier and bookkeeper since 1938. Mr. Briles’ daughter, Barbara, will be a part time assistant.
Mr. Briles now is the oldest theater operator in years of service in Emporia. He started in the theater business 26 years ago in Neosho Falls, and came from there to Emporia 23 years ago next November. He established the Lyric theater in the building which now houses the Bratton Home and Auto Supply company, at 420 Commercial. The theater was moved to 407 Commercial in February, 1934, and to the present location in 1944. The first show in the present location was on February 7, 1944.
Mr. Briles says that each move he has made has benefited his business, and he looks forward to the change April 1. At the Strand, he intends gradually to make interior improvements.
The Strand theater, built in about 1918 by the late O. A. Kirkendall, was the first pretentious movie theater in Emporia. It was operated first by the Strand Theater Corporation of which the late Harry McClure and the late Fred Green were principal stockholders. Green sold his interest to the Midwest Theaters in the late 1920’s and Fox Midwest assumed control of the theater in about 1930. The building is still owned by Mrs. O. A. Kirkendall