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The Albion Theatre was first owned by the Interstate Theatre Corporation and was managed by O. J. Lambionette. It seated 500 persons. The first movie shown here was "Boys of the Streets" starring Jackie Cooper and Maureen O’Conner. Through some clever maneuvering, the owner of the Bohm Theatre, George Bohm, was able to acquire the Albion Theatre in 1939 only a year after it opened. He then operated it concurrently the Bohm Theatre. After George’s death in 1951, the operation of the theatres passed to his brother Albert and then to his nephews Jack and George Ryser. The Rysers opened the Albion Drive-In Theatre in the early 1950s, and would close the Albion Theatre during the summer months when the Drive-In was in operation.
A decline in business led the Rysers to close the Albion Theatre in the spring of 1959 "the victim of increasingly popular television," they stated in a 1976 interview. From our Historical Notebook this week we present a 1950s era photograph of the Albion Theatre. Next to it on the right is the Vandenberg Photographic Studios, later the site of Austin Studios.