{"id":716,"date":"2024-04-26T20:11:54","date_gmt":"2024-04-26T20:11:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kevinforsyth.net\/ELMAC\/?p=716"},"modified":"2026-04-02T20:27:15","modified_gmt":"2026-04-02T20:27:15","slug":"state-theatre","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kevinforsyth.net\/ELMAC\/state-theatre\/","title":{"rendered":"The State Theatre (1927\u20131984)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"
\u201cThe Abbott\u201d circa 1929. The State Theatre marquee is at right, advertising the silent film Someone to Love<\/em> starring Charles \u201cBuddy\u201d Rogers. Image source: City of East Lansing, reprinted in Miller<\/a>, p. 53.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/a><\/strong>East Lansing\u2019s first movie theatre was called the Elmac\u2014an acronym of East Lansing Michigan Agricultural College. It was built around 1915 on the east side of Abbot Road, about a half block north of Grand River Avenue. The theatre only survived for a few years before closing its doors. Its building remains standing at 210 Abbot Road and now houses P. T. O\u2019Malley\u2019s bar and grill.1<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In late 1926, the East Lansing Development Corporation<\/a> began construction of a large, multi-use commercial block on the northwest corner of Abbot Road and Grand River. Known as \u201cThe Abbott,\u201d†<\/a><\/sup> the building included a theatre in its design by Bowd and Munson<\/a>. This seemingly innocuous addition to the business district caused a major controversy and one of the earliest instances of political conflict within the young city.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As construction on the Abbott proceeded, a group of concerned women \u201cbegan to wonder what effect a \u2018motion picture theatre\u2019\u2014seen in those days of silent films as an opportunity for immorality or at least dissipation\u2014might have on the community.\u201d They formed a committee in March 1927 chaired by May P. Chamberlain, a member of the board of education and wife of Frank W. Chamberlain, Professor of Anantomy. The committee declared their opposition to the theatre and produced a list of reasons why, on both moral and economic grounds, it would be detrimental to the citizenry. (Oddly, no one at the time appears to have recalled the Elmac, only a few years gone, which had failed to turn East Lansing into the den of turpitude the committee feared.)2<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In response the Abbott\u2019s developers accelerated their construction efforts, endeavoring to make the theatre a fait accompli<\/em>. Meanwhile, a compromise was floated by the women\u2019s commmittee: ban movies on Sunday. The city council agreed to put a \u201cstraw vote\u201d on a special election ballot in May to test voter opinion. \u201cThe lone dissenter on the council was O. J. Ayrs<\/a>,\u201d who was \u201ca prime figure in the corporation which built the Abbott building.\u201d3<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Along with the developers, and other local business owners who felt the theatre was being unfairly singled out, M.S.C. students were opponents of the Sunday ban. A State News editorial claimed that as much as half of the student body visited Lansing theatres on Sunday afternoons, and posited that a local theatre would benefit the community, as it would be \u201cunder the supervision and censorship of East Lansing businessmen.\u201d As the pro-theatre side gained momentum, the women\u2019s committee countered by convincing the city council to change the impending vote from an informal opinion poll into a binding charter amendment.4<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

On May 24, 1927, with a voter turnout that was \u201cnearly half again as large\u201d as the preceding month\u2019s regular city council election, the Sunday movie ban was soundly defeated by a vote of 520 to 398. The Abbott Building saw its grand opening in November, and the State Theatre screened its first picture, The Fair Co-Ed<\/em>, a silent comedy with Marion Davies in the title role.5<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The State Theatre presented vaudeville acts and plays, in addition to its regular movie screenings. It was operated by the Michigan-based Butterfield theatre chain, which also ran the\u00a0Campus Theatre<\/a>\u00a0(on Grand River between Charles and Division Streets) from 1962 onward. Over the years it was well used by both the residents of East Lansing and the students of the College. It even served as a church, hosting Sunday masses in the earliest years of the St. Thomas Aquinas parish (1940\u20131942), and standing in for\u00a0Peoples Church<\/a>\u00a0following a fire in 1965.6<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
The State Theatre in 1974. The marquee is advertising The Groove Tube<\/em>. Image source: Joey Harrison, reprinted in Miller<\/a>, p. 122.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

By the 1980s however, the State was battered, faded, and barely surviving. Competition from multiplexes at the outlying shopping malls spelled the end of single-screen theatres in the area. The State Theatre was torn down in 1984 and replaced with a parking lot. Four years later the Campus Theatre met the same fate for a parking ramp and expansion to the Student Book Store, and the last movie house in East Lansing was gone.7<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The main Abbott building, after standing vacant for about a decade, was demolished in October 2017.<\/p>\n\n\n

  1. Kestenbaum<\/a>, p.\u00a0140.\u00a0Miller<\/a>, p.\u00a025. \u21a9\ufe0e<\/a><\/li>
  2. Kestenbaum<\/a>, p.\u00a026. LSJ<\/a>, 29 Mar 1927, p.\u00a01.\u00a0Miller<\/a>, p.\u00a054. \u21a9\ufe0e<\/a><\/li>
  3. Kestenbaum<\/a>, p.\u00a027. \u21a9\ufe0e<\/a><\/li>
  4. Kestenbaum<\/a>, pp. 27\u201328. \u21a9\ufe0e<\/a><\/li>
  5. Kestenbaum<\/a>, p.\u00a028. \u21a9\ufe0e<\/a><\/li>
  6. LSJ<\/a>, 8\u00a0July\u00a01926, p.\u00a02; 4\u00a0Oct\u00a01940, p.\u00a011.\u00a0Miller<\/a>, p.\u00a054. \u21a9\ufe0e<\/a><\/li>
  7. Miller<\/a>, p.\u00a0122. \u21a9\ufe0e<\/a><\/li><\/ol>
    1. † Abbot Road is named for Theophilus C. Abbot, the college\u2019s third President, but a 1910 ordinance affirming the name spelled it as Abbott \u2014 with two \u201ct\u201ds. This resulted in decades of confusion. To commemorate the city\u2019s centennial, on 2 October 2007 the East Lansing City Council enacted Ordinance No. 1179, reestablishing the Abbot Road name.\u21a9\ufe0e<\/a><\/span><\/li><\/ol>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      East Lansing\u2019s first movie theatre was called the Elmac\u2014an acronym of East Lansing Michigan Agricultural College. It was built around 1915 on the east side of Abbot Road, about a half block north of Grand River Avenue. The theatre only survived for a few years before closing its doors. Its building remains standing at 210 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"[{\"content\":\"Kestenbaum<\/a>, p.\u00a0140.\u00a0Miller<\/a>, p.\u00a025.\",\"id\":\"289e6e0e-2bdb-44b7-a661-c7edab173e7f\"},{\"content\":\"Kestenbaum<\/a>, p.\u00a026. LSJ<\/a>, 29 Mar 1927, p.\u00a01.\u00a0Miller<\/a>, p.\u00a054.\",\"id\":\"781af324-676a-4c8a-be38-fad7bf63f14c\"},{\"content\":\"Kestenbaum<\/a>, p.\u00a027.\",\"id\":\"05e10396-0977-45d1-b88f-95ba2bd1deb3\"},{\"content\":\"Kestenbaum<\/a>, pp. 27\u201328.\",\"id\":\"67e56598-bc84-4bf5-81c0-159db0a1c39c\"},{\"content\":\"Kestenbaum<\/a>, p.\u00a028.\",\"id\":\"3f1ade66-1ccb-49d5-9c97-df7c3b376ad9\"},{\"content\":\"LSJ<\/a>, 8\u00a0July\u00a01926, p.\u00a02; 4\u00a0Oct\u00a01940, p.\u00a011.\u00a0Miller<\/a>, p.\u00a054.\",\"id\":\"51a0baee-837e-4a5a-82e0-1d2693e8aa1d\"},{\"content\":\"Miller<\/a>, p.\u00a0122.\",\"id\":\"bf6a1137-9cbc-4daf-8c8a-1a3485552267\"}]"},"categories":[10,31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-716","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-losteastlansing","category-east-lansing-history"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kevinforsyth.net\/ELMAC\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/716","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kevinforsyth.net\/ELMAC\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kevinforsyth.net\/ELMAC\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kevinforsyth.net\/ELMAC\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kevinforsyth.net\/ELMAC\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=716"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/kevinforsyth.net\/ELMAC\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/716\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5620,"href":"https:\/\/kevinforsyth.net\/ELMAC\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/716\/revisions\/5620"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kevinforsyth.net\/ELMAC\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=716"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kevinforsyth.net\/ELMAC\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=716"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kevinforsyth.net\/ELMAC\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=716"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}