Oral History Program Van Summerill Interviewed by Sarah Langsdon 16 July 2013 Oral History Program Weber State University Stewart Library Ogden, Utah Van Summerill Interviewed by Sarah Langsdon 16 July 2013 Copyright © 2014 by Weber State University, Stewart Library Mission Statement The Oral History Program of the Stewart Library was created to preserve the institutional history of Weber State University and the Davis, Ogden and Weber County communities. By conducting carefully researched, recorded, and transcribed interviews, the Oral History Program creates archival oral histories intended for the widest possible use. Interviews are conducted with the goal of eliciting from each participant a full and accurate account of events. The interviews are transcribed, edited for accuracy and clarity, and reviewed by the interviewees (as available), who are encouraged to augment or correct their spoken words. The reviewed and corrected transcripts are indexed, printed, and bound with photographs and illustrative materials as available. The working files, original recording, and archival copies are housed in the University Archives. Project Description Business at the Crossroads - Ogden City is a project to collect oral histories related to changes in the Ogden business district since World War II. From the 1870s to World War II, Ogden was a major railroad town, with nine rail systems. With both east-west and north-south rail lines, business and commercial houses flourished as Ogden became a shipping and commerce hub. After World War II, the railroad business declined. Some government agencies and businesses related to the defense industry continued to gravitate to Ogden after the war—including the Internal Revenue Regional Center, the Marquardt Corporation, Boeing Corporation, Volvo-White Truck Corporation, Morton-Thiokol, and several other smaller operations. However, the economy became more service oriented, with small businesses developing that appealed to changing demographics, including the growing Hispanic population. ____________________________________ Oral history is a method of collecting historical information through recorded interviews between a narrator with firsthand knowledge of historically significant events and a well-informed interviewer, with the goal of preserving substantive additions to the historical record. Because it is primary material, oral history is not intended to present the final, verified, or complete narrative of events. It is a spoken account. It reflects personal opinion offered by the interviewee in response to questioning, and as such it is partisan, deeply involved, and irreplaceable. ____________________________________ Rights Management This work is the property of the Weber State University, Stewart Library Oral History Program. It may be used freely by individuals for research, teaching and personal use as long as this statement of availability is included in the text. It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows: Summerill, Van, an oral history by Sarah Langsdon, 16 July 2013 , WSU Stewart Library Oral History Program, Special Collections, Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. iii Van Summerill July 16, 2013 Abstract: The following is an oral history interview with Van Summerill. The interview was conducted on July 16, 2013, by Sarah Langsdon. Van discusses his memories of Ogden and 25th Street. SL: This is Sarah Langsdon and I’m here interviewing Van Summerill about his memories of the theaters in Ogden at his home in Ogden, Utah. It is July 16, 2013. Van, why don’t you go ahead and tell us a little bit about when and where you were born? VS: I was born in Ogden, Utah. I’ve lived here all my life except when I was in basic training for the National Guard and that was at Fort Ord, California and I don’t call that living particularly, in the old barracks and such. I was born in the old Dee hospital and lived just a block away from it all my youth on Van Buren just off of 24th Street. So, close to downtown, and close to the Hospital Drug Store that we’d go and get root beer floats and things as kids. SL: Did you have any siblings? VS: Yes, one brother, who’s four years younger than I and a sister who’s seven years younger. SL: What do you remember about going to the Egyptian Theater as a child? VS: Oh I have very vivid memories. The only thing I don’t recall is exactly when I started going. I imagine my parents would have let me go to the kids’ shows by myself maybe when I was seven or eight. That would have been about 1949 or 1950. That did two things, it kept us entertained—I’m speaking of my brother 1 when he got old enough to go with me. My sister, I don’t remember her ever going to the show with us, because she was much younger and the kids shows at The Egyptian started at 9:30 on Saturday mornings, they were called “Kiddie Shows.” Admission was 20 cents and I remember lining up in front of the Egyptian, some days in a lot of fresh, overnight snow. When you were a little kid, it seemed like it took forever to stand in line and work your way up to the box office and finally get in. Of course, we had to buy a soft drink or candy or something before the show started. Then, wow, did we ever have the entertainment. There was always a feature film and serial chapter with a weekly cliff-hanger ending. That’s where I was introduced to, “The Little Rascals,” the “Our Gang Comedies,” “Laurel and Hardy,” “The Three Stooges,” “Abbott and Costello,” to name a few. They had all kinds of short subjects and cartoons and cartoons and cartoons. I remember the big curtain would then come down momentarily and then magically rise again, and the screen had disappeared. I didn’t know at the time where it went. Out would come a tall distinguished man, Ted Kirkmeyer, who was the manager of the Egyptian and probably had more influence on my life than, in some ways, than my parents—even my own father. They had contests on the stage and they drew lucky ticket numbers and gave away things such as Hi-C orange juice in cans. The final giveaway was a bicycle each week. I was a shy kid and scared to death that my ticket number would be called and I’d have to go up on stage. It didn’t dawn on me at the time that I was the only one that knew what my ticket number was and I could just—if 2 they called it, just ignore it. But, I was always terrified I was going to be called on stage. I always remember Mr. Kirkmeyer would say to the 1,200 youngsters packed in the Egyptian after the drawings, “Now, boys and girls, I have a pin in my hand, it’s just a straight pin, and if it’s quiet enough in here, if you kids are quiet enough that I can hear this pin drop, we’ll have five more cartoons.” Well, the place turned into a morgue. I mean, you could hear everybody breathing except the ones holding their breath so they wouldn’t make any noise, and he’d drop this pin and then the drama would build. Finally, he would say, “I heard the pin, there’s five more cartoons.” Well, that was like hitting the jackpot, so on would come the cartoons nearly drowned out by 1,200 appreciative yells and squeals. The Saturday morning Kiddie Matinees were where I watched my favorite cartoon character, Mighty Mouse. Mighty Mouse cartoons were shown at the Egyptian because they were released by 20th Century Fox and the Egyptian was a Fox theater. They also ran RKO Radio Pictures, which meant Walt Disney’s cartoons were screened all the time too. That was before Buena Vista Releasing Corporation was formed; before RKO went out of business. The cartoon mainstays were: Pluto, Goofy, Donald, Mickey and Minnie, Mighty Mouse, and Heckle and Jeckle. I remember them well. I was also introduced to some of the great old Vaudevillians; Leon Errol, for one. He made a series of 18 minute short subjects for RKO. Also, a man by the name of Edgar Kennedy, famous for the, “Slow Burn.” He also appeared in many Laurel and Hardy movies. 3 I remember one Saturday they showed, “Mighty Joe Young,” which was made by the people who created, “King Kong.” The stop motion animation was even better than it was in, “King Kong.” They made the gorilla smaller, he wasn’t as big, but he was still larger than life. I was fascinated by that show. It was basically the same story as, “King Kong,” they captured a gorilla and brought him back to America to perform at a night club. He misbehaves, they’re after him to kill him because of the danger that he presented to the people. I was just fascinated with the night club movie set. It had a long bar and this thick glass window in back of it. There were lions roaming around back and forth behind the big window. This film sparked this young boy’s imagination more than any other. I remember there was a soft drink machine in the lobby. You’d put in, I think 20 cents, and the cup would drop down and then you’d push a flavor button. Well, I made, what I guess you would call a “suicide” because I’d push orange and then I’d push coke and then I’d push root beer and then 7-Up and then back and forth and back and forth. I thought that made the best drink. But my very favorite movie treats were ice cream bon-bons. They were the most expensive of everything the Egyptian sold. I think they were 25 cents for five ice cream bon-bons in an elongated cardboard box. And the thing I remember most about them, it didn’t bother me, but the chocolate initially kind of tasted like the cardboard So anyway, I grew up going to the kids’ shows and then I started noticing that there were all these announcements coming of Cinema Scope. That would have been in 1953. I remember one day after the kids’ show—I always waited out in front of the theater for Dad to come pick me up. He had less than a mile to 4 drive to come and get me, but I knew that the regular movie starting shortly on this particular day was in Cinema Scope, and I wanted to see what it was. So, I just sat in the auditorium and no one came by to make me leave. So, on comes this wide Cinema Scope picture and I thought, “Oh, so that’s what this is all about.” Pretty soon I was tapped on the shoulder and it was my dad, who had gone around the block, I don’t know how many times, and finally had to park the car and come in to see what had happened to me. I remember the remodeling in 1951, it was completed in December that year and it was a very nice job. By 1951, television competition was beginning to devastate attendance numbers at theaters. Fox’s solution was to spend millions of dollars on their theaters, update them and redecorate them. They generally did an excellent job on the Egyptian, in spite of painting over some of the original colors, particularly on the lobby ceiling. But I remember going to the Egyptian the first day after the grand opening. I had never paid attention to the old original doors, but I did notice that there were brand new doors. They were all glass in simple aluminum frames, which in retrospect cheapened and clashed with the Egyptian art. To this day, I remember stepping through those doors and smelling the new paint. Looking around, I could tell some areas where they had repainted. Some I wasn’t sure, but I knew it was different. The carpet felt as if it was two inches thick, very comfortable and very plush. The stage treatment was awesome. There were two new curtains installed and the front drape was what is called a Venetian curtain that rises in graceful scallops. Immediately behind the Venetian was a blue-gray curtain that opened sideways from the center, which 5 was called a traveler, or title curtain. So the audience never saw a blank screen at the movies. The studio logo would appear on that blue-gray curtain and then it would start to open sideways. At the end of the picture, the projectionist would time it so that just as the fade out on, “The End.” That curtain would close again and then the Venetian curtain, gracefully descended. It was a fantastic addition to the Egyptian. SL: Did you go every weekend throughout the entire year or was it mostly summers? VS: No, I think it was generally in the winter and I honestly can’t tell you how often, but I know we didn’t go every weekend, but went enough that I saw my fill of cartoons and it seemed like I’d come home every Saturday with a headache. But what I used to like to do while I was waiting for my dad to come pick me up was stand out next to the box office. At that time, I was just tall enough to see in the box office side window. I liked to watch the cashier punch the keys on the change machine and watch the coins roll down a narrow trough and into a small dish-shaped container from which the customer could easily retrieve their change. In those days, adult tickets in the evening were 65 cents. Students got in for 50 cents if you had a student discount card and kids were 20 cents. That would have been the same for the Orpheum across the street. The Paramount was cheaper to go to and it was down on Kiesel, almost directly in back of the Egyptian. I think their price for kids was 15 cents anytime. I don’t remember exactly what the adult fare was, but it was generally a little cheaper than the Egyptian and the Orpheum because it was considered a second rate theater, as was the Ogden Theater. 6 SL: Van, what do you remember about the former manager of the Egyptian? What was his name? VS: Ted Kirkmeyer was the manager when I was a kid and going to the movies there. He was later promoted to city manager in Salt Lake for Fox. He left Ogden in 1957 and then it was Bill Souttar. But, I kept in touch with Ted right up until his death and then Nellie, his wife, right up until she passed away. They both lived well into their nineties and Nellie told the story, Ted was sitting there listening— he was a very quiet, almost a shy person, when I’d go visit them and so Nellie was doing the talking—but she said that one Saturday morning it snowed the whole time that kids show was going on. It ended and the regular afternoon matinees started at 1:00. It was well after that mid-afternoon that this very upset woman called the theater and asked to speak to the manager and so Ted came on the phone and said, “This is Mr. Kirkmeyer,” The woman said, “I’m so upset, my boy spent all his bus money on candy and then had to walk home in the snow storm and he just barely got home.” Nellie said that the incident bothered Ted so much all week that he made it a point when he was up on the stage to explain to the audience that next Saturday, which could be as many as 1,200 kids in those days, just what happened to the young man. He said, “Now, boys and girls, I never want you to be in that position and I don’t ever want this to happen again to any of you, so if you find yourself in a position where you don’t have bus money to get home, my name is Mr. Kirkmeyer, my office is out in the lobby. You come and see me and I’ll make sure you have money to ride the bus.” 7 Nellie said, “Before Ted could get down off the stage and back out into the lobby, there was a line of kids that formed across the lobby and down the aisle in the theater waiting to collect their money for the bus.” She said, “Ted didn’t say anything, he indeed passed out whatever it took to ride the bus then—ten cents or whatever it was—to every single one of those kids that was in that line.” Ted would never start a show or open the box office until he had a vase with a long-stemmed rose bud in the box office. He was just a class act. In fact, he was awarded the exhibitor of the year, but I think it was in 1938 or 1937, somewhere in there before he came to Ogden to run the Egyptian—I think he was still in Colorado. He was named motion picture exhibitor of the year by Darryl F. Zanuck himself, president of 20th Century Fox. The award was given to Ted in Paris, France. I have a picture of Ted and Zanuck and it’s funny because Ted just towers over this little Darryl Zanuck. Ted Kirkmeyer paid attention to details. He had an eye for the ladies as far as having attractive young ladies work in his theaters. I have the pictures to prove it. Theater managers could win cash prizes and even vacations with photographic proof of what they did special to promote movies in their theaters. So, from time to time they would have a photographer come in and document promotion activities. One time, Ted had his staff of young ladies in swimming suits and they were photographed demonstrating ways of fighting fires if one happened to break out in the theater. They are holding fire extinguishers and containers of this and that retardant. It ended up a cheesecake instruction poster to my mind. 8 In 1948, the Miss Ogden Pageant was held in the Egyptian at Ted’s urging. Miss Ogden went on to become Miss Utah and represented the state in the Miss America pageant. Ted was a great showman and someone that instilled in me a love of theater buildings. You want to hear about Bill Souttar too? SL: Sure. VS: Ted Kirkmeyer was promoted by Fox Intermountain Theaters to district manager over all Fox theaters in Salt Lake City. Then, out of the Midwest, came Bill Souttar, who was in so many ways, the exact opposite of Ted in management style. He could be bombastic. He seemed to be at his worst when we were the busiest at the theaters. It brought out, I don’t know, nerves or something in him, but the way he reacted sometimes to the public, I thought, was amusing. I worked as Mr. Souttar’s assistant manager for eight months at the age of 19 and I could always tell when he and Madge, his wife, had a disagreement at home before he came to work. It kind of slopped over, he kind of took it out on the staff. I saw him fire ushers on the spot for chewing gum, for having their hands in their pockets, or for the most grievous sin of all, sneaking popcorn out of the machine and eating it. So, he could be tough to work for, but after I quit as assistant manager at the Egyptian, it wasn’t long before I went back as a part-time doorman one or two shifts a week just because I wanted to be in that building and part of that industry. When I went for National Guard basic training in California, Bill Souttar wrote me several times, keeping me informed what was going on at the Egyptian. 9 Eventually, I found myself in a situation where I was a quasi-assistant manager a lot of times. Mr. Souttar went through several assistant managers, so there were occasions in between I would be asked to fill in. I remember one New Year’s Eve in particular. The lobby was filling up with people coming for the late show which was to begin about 10:00 p.m. It was timed to start so that somewhere in the movie, just minutes before midnight, the projectionist would insert a countdown to the New Year film clip. Precisely at midnight, the words to, “Auld Lang Syne,” would come on the screen for the audience to sing. But anyway, the doorman noticed these two guys coming into the lobby and they were “happy.” They were really happy, they had they’re arms around each other singing to the top of their lungs and weaving side-to-side on their way to the doorman’s stand. This particular doorman was kind of a wimpy guy anyway and didn’t want to confront these drunks, so he hurried over to the office door, “Mr. Souttar, Mr. Souttar, come out here quick.” So, Bill came out and stopped these guys and said, “Boys you’re going to have to go back and get your money refunded because we can’t let you in. You’re a little bit under the weather, shall we say, and we’ll get you a refund.” Well, they said, “No, no, we’re okay,” and started arguing to the point where Bill had to get forceful with them and physically started nudging them back to the box office. About that time, I turned and was looking inside the theater at everybody standing around the concession stand who, in turn, were looking at what was going on with Souttar and these two guys out by the box office. The first thing I knew, I see everybody in unison go, [gasp], and I turned around just in 10 time to see Mr. Souttar’s glasses go flying one way and he went flying the other. Well, those guys, I don’t know what he said to them, but one of them knocked Bill for a loop. But other than a small cut on his nose, he was okay. It broke his glasses though. The hardest part about that deal for me was trying not to laugh when he came back in the theater. Of course, the staff loved it because, like I said, he was a tough nut to work for and he sometimes tested your ability to love your fellow man, so to speak. So, we’re in the lobby kind of, “Hehehehe,” and then all of a sudden, this booming voice out of the office, “Van, come in here.” I thought, “Oh no, now I really have to control myself.” Anyway, I went in the office and Bill says, “You’re going to have to count tonight’s money because my glasses are broken and I can’t see.” By the way, Mr. Souttar opted not to press charges against the two drunks. SL: How did you start working at the Egyptian Theater? VS: When I was 19, I must looked like I was about 15. I was in college, but I was downtown for a dentist appointment. After seeing the dentist I thought, “I’ll go to a matinee movie.” So I bought a ticket to the Egyptian, as I walked in Mr. Souttar saw me. He said, “What are you doing out of school?” I said, “Oh, I had a dentist appointment and decided to come to the movie afterward. I’m out of high school anyway; I’m in college.” He’d seen me around and we chatted from time to time. He said, “I’ve got a position open if you’re interested.” I asked, “What’s that?” Bill said, “Assistant manager.” I felt that I would be in seventh heaven having that job and immediately accepted the offer. 11 VS: I was 1962. Candy girls were making 65 cents an hour; the box office girls likely were making about 15 cents more an hour than I was. I figured I was working about 50 hours a week, for 60 dollars. So, I wasn’t making a heck of a lot of money but was spending a lot of time in that theater. When you’re in the movie business, you work when everybody else plays. I recall an incident that happened at the Egyptian about this time that played out like a movie script. I was in the lobby one day and I just half-noticed a man come up to the box office—nothing unusual about that—then he walked away. Shortly, I noticed two guys at the box office and one of them looked as if he flashed a badge to the cashier. As they walked away, I approached the cashier and asked, “What’s going on there?” The cashier said, “That’s was the FBI, and they’re tailing the person who just was at the box office. I said, “Oh, that one that just walked away/” She nodded. I asked if the suspect was coming back. The cashier told me he bought a ticket to the next show. Within a few minutes, here comes four or five other agents, in the front door and they were stationed all over the theater. They had questioned the cashier, so they knew they had about a half an hour before the next show started, so they got these guys all situated, and I thought, “Woah, this could be exciting.” So then, in comes the guy, and goes in the theater and we’re just all on pins and needles. This really livened up the night, but if that weren’t enough, all of a sudden, we heard sirens coming down Washington Boulevard, and all these fire trucks stopped in front of the Egyptian. I walked out front to see what was going on. Schubach Jewelry Store occupied the north commercial space in the Egyptian building, adjacent to the lobby and the 12 box office. (On the south side was Standard Optical then). Anyway, Schubach Jewelry had this big diamond above their window that was covered with light bulbs that blinked and glittered. One of the guys that was staking out the theater in a car across the street saw that sign catch on fire, so he called the fire department. While I’m standing out front, I notice one particular man. He was just opening his wallet to buy tickets, and a couple of firemen rush by him hauling a hose into the Egyptian. The second fireman has one of those big axes, so this guy is looking at them, then he’s looking at his wallet and he’s trying to decide whether he’s going to buy a ticket under the circumstances. I don’t remember whether he bought tickets of not. Anyway, the movie went on and we were all waiting to see what happens next, and the suspect walks out, down the street, obviously being tailed, and that was the end of that. We never found out what was going on. There are always funny stories in theaters, funny things that happen. Mr. Souttar told me this story, and I don’t know whether it happened at the Egyptian. He came to Ogden from the Midwest, out of Fox Midwest Theaters to manage the Egyptian. He said one day the custodian came in with a set of false teeth he found in the heater and Souttar told him, “Well, put them in the lost and found box,” which he did, and then a couple of days went by and finally a man came in and asked, “Did you find a pair of false teeth in the theater?” Mr. Souttar nodded, “Yes, we did, and I’ll have someone get them for you. May I ask how you happened to leave your false teeth here?” He said, “Well, I was watching the 13 movie and my teeth start hurting, so I took them out and put them on the chair next to me.” Now, can imagine, something that’s going in your mouth, resting on a theater seat next to you? SL: What other movie theaters did you end up working in? VS: The training theater for the Union, (I didn’t really have to train very long because I had near-lifetime experience with 16mm film) was The Movie, a little theater built in what had been the Ben Lomond Hotel dining room. It was off of 25th Street. It was a nice room. The Stephens, I think they were brothers, or father and son, had built one of Ogden’s first drive-ins, the Mt. Ogden, in 1948, located where the South Ogden Costco is now and K-Mart before that. I don’t think there was just one reason why it was decided to move the drive-in. One was that Sears moved in across the street and the parking lot lights were interfering with the picture at the Mt. Ogden. Anyway, the North Star Drive-In, on the old highway to Brigham replaced the Mt. Ogden in about 1960. Then, Stephens ventured into building that little theater in the hotel, but anyway, that was the Union Projectionists training theater. After I was trained in the Union and working the Wilshire in South Ogden and the Northstar Drive-In, I still filled in position there for a while. We were running, “Jeremiah Johnson,” I remember and I looked at the picture on the screen and the CinemaScope lens was a little crooked. What happens if you turn that lens just a little bit? It forms a parallelogram, where the two sides are parallel to each other, same thing for top and bottom. But the picture was running slightly uphill. I thought, “I’m going to fix that,” so I started messing with that lens and the lens fell out of the projector. Luckily, it fell in the window sill. I quickly 14 checked and it was okay, but I was so nervous and shaking I had difficulty putting it back in its slot. Luckily, there were only a handful of customers in the place. I did most of my projecting work at the Wilshire. It was on Harrison Boulevard in South Ogden and was supposed to be the cornerstone of a mall to be built by John Hinckley, who also owned Hinckley Dodge. They built the theater first, but the mall was never built. I worked Saturday nights, which is unusual for a part-time projectionist to work the busiest night; normally the head projectionist works that night. I enjoyed that shift because it was busy and there were usually a lot of people there. I also worked a little bit at the Orpheum downtown. I’m glad I was able to do that because, of course, it’s gone and has been for a long time. I happened to work opening day of Jaws, which of course was the big picture of the year. The place was packed for the first show and the rest of the say, and so I always remember that. The North Star; I didn’t much like working the drive-in. I remember coming home from a shift one night and it was getting light. I was as if the sun would come up any minute. In the middle of summer, when your days are long, you have two extra-long movies. They always run the first movie, then the second and then run the first one again. That as one of those nights, so the birds were chirping and I was just getting home. Aaron Farr, our Union’s business agent and one of the old timers, told this story: Aaron was a projectionist at the Northstar one night. He kept hearing these strange sounds and couldn’t figure out what the heck they were. He decided they were coming from outside the booth. He discovered there was a carload of young guys who were drinking beers and 15 trying to throw the empty beer bottles through the projection room portal. Had they succeeded, the projector could have been damaged. Surprisingly, the Browning Fine Art Auditorium was Union house even though they ran just 16mm rather than the standard 35mm. We used to show travel logs and all kinds of things. I even met the movie star Charleston Heston who augmented his lecture with film clips. I also met the grandson of comedian, W.C. Fields, who showed scenes from his grandfather’s films. That projector in the Fine Arts center was a German machine which threaded from the opposite side. It was somewhat confusing. I always panicked when I had to work there just because of the fact that it was such a different machine. SL: Did you ever work at the Ogden? VS: Oh yes. Besides the Egyptian, the Ogden was Peery’s other theater. They leased them both to Fox and so it was also under the jurisdiction of Bill Souttar. When you were assistant manager at the Egyptian, you were kind of the manager of the Ogden Theater, which operated mostly on weekends, especially in the summer. Just weekends because the drive-ins killed the downtown theaters in the summer. Fox booked more money on a Sunday running Spanish films than the Egyptian did running first rate, first run movies. Even back then, there were that many transient far workers who labored summers in the area. Sometimes those people would talk, we knew they must be talking about us, but we didn’t know for sure what they were saying. Hopefully it was nice. The staff was instructed to always be courteous. One time, I looked in on the screen, it was a Spanish language film of course, but it took place in India. 16 It just struck me so funny; here are all these Indians with turbans on their heads and they’re speaking Spanish. The Ogden was a poor stepsister to the Egyptian. The screen had long since ceased to fly in the loft, so it was on wheels. Promoters tried everything in there to make a profit and they’d book either boxing matches or wrestling matches. To tell you the truth, I don’t know which. They’d push that screen to the back of the stage and set the mats and ropes in place. Then afterwards, bring the screen back into position. But in moving it back and forth, all the black masking across the bottom became frayed and torn. It was a mess. The old gentleman— Chris—who was a projectionist had come out of retirement to run these Spanish movies. That’s all he did. He’d lock himself in that projection booth for the one o’clock show and stay in there all day and run movies. I looked in the auditorium, it was intermission one day. Out of ten or so lights that shined on the stage curtains, four had light bulbs that were working. I remember the curtain motor was out of adjustment, so the curtains stopped about two feet short of closing. You could see the frayed black masking on the bottom, and to top things off, Christ, was playing 45 rpm Spanish records on a 78 rpm record player, resulting in the singer sounding like a Hispanic Minnie Mouse. I remember thinking, “So this is show business, huh?” But I loved that old theater. The Ogden had quite the history. It opened in December of 1909 as a legitimate theater. It wasn’t a vaudeville house. It was for traveling plays that came through town. There was a trunk up in one of the dressing rooms there. It was just like you see in the movies—these theatrical trunks with the stickers from all over the 17 country and perhaps the world posted on it. I had half a notion to just go in and take it. I never did. They tore the theater down and I was lamenting to Mr. Souttar one day about that trunk. He says, “Well, why didn’t you ask? You could have taken it.” Those old theaters have an odor to them, not necessarily a bad one, and a patina to them, unlike new ones and restored ones. I learned to love that smell. The Paramount smelled that way, the Ogden had carpet in front of the concession stand that had been there since probably the forties that had so much soda pop and God knows what else spilled on it, it was glazed over. I mean, you could see the pile and the pattern, but you couldn’t move it. It wouldn’t move, it was just that solid—like a rock. SL: Where was The Ogden located? VS: The Ogden was located across 25th Street from the Ben Lomond. Well, not quite directly. East of the Ben Lomond where a motel sits now was an old hotel, the Ogden Hotel. It was five or six stories high and it looked like it had a lot of indigent people living there because whenever I glanced that way, there were always older men sitting in chairs in the lobby. When I was in high school, I went to the Ogden every week. They were running American International Pictures, a studio specializing in Schlocky, cheap horror movies and they were always double features. In my film collection, I have an American International Picture called, “Invasion of the Saucerman.” It’s these little green men, although you don’t know they’re green because the picture is black and white. When they got agitated, needle-like tubes would come out from 18 under their fingernails and they’d shoot the victim full of alcohol and they’d be drunk—sometimes to the point that they’d die. I remember they even stabbed a cow. Anyway, that was the cheap and silly second feature to go with, “I Was a Teenage Werewolf,” which starred Michael Landon. I saw more crap, but at the time, enjoyed it at the Ogden Theater every Saturday afternoon. The Ogden was what they called a move over theater for the Egyptian. For instance, if a certain movie was held over at the Egyptian and there was commitment to bring in a new picture to the Egyptian on a certain date, the old picture—if still profitable—would be moved to the Ogden. The Orpheum did the same with the Paramount. A lot of times you’d open the Friday night paper, the day films often changed, and it’d say, “Held over, moved over.” I remember they did that with, “Gypsy,” with Natalie Wood. It was playing at the Orpheum for weeks. It moved down to the Paramount and had a successful run there. I remember the year, “The Apartment,” won several Academy Awards, as did, “Elmer Gantry.” Those pictures hadn’t played in theaters for a while; they’d come out earlier that year. The two pictures were so honored, the studio rushed them back out as a double feature. It was the longest double feature I’ve ever been to in my life, both shows were well over two hours each. But, they looked into the Paramount and mobs of customers showed up. The staff was dumbfounded. They were not prepared to handle that many people. There hadn’t been that size crowd in there for years. They had to hurry ushers up to the balcony to dust seats off that hadn’t been used for a decade or so. That was an exciting night. I loved seeing all those people in the Paramount. 19 SL: Did you ever meet Harm Peery, when you were working? VS: No, I didn’t. I remember that he died; I think I was in junior high maybe. I’ve got a copy of his obituary in my files, but I can’t remember exactly when he died. SL: What would you say your favorite theater was that you worked? VS: Well, no question, for many reasons, the Egyptian, of course, has always been my favorite. As far as working, I so enjoyed the Wilshire. When I first started there it was a single theater, same size as the Egyptian, about 850 seats. Eventually, two two smaller 350 seat theaters were added off the lobby, so they were like spokes off the lobby. There were three separate projection booths all accessed in the lobby, so I got to do a lot of people watching and walking around constantly looking in on each booth. That was when the film platter system came into prominence where the films were all spliced together and laid flat on a great big platter. Sometimes those things didn’t work the way they were supposed to. I recall one time, obviously you could only be in one of the booths at any time, in each booth a third of the time, technically, there’s no other way about it. The Wilshire had run Barbara Streisand’s version of, “A Star is Born,” for months. For some reason, that picture was bigger in Utah than anywhere else. I was making my rounds and I walked in the booth where that film was running, and a loose splice, had gone down through the projector and was on its way back to go up on the platter when it split in half. It split the film in half, so when I walked in, instead of a film 35 millimeters wide, there was a little strip about the size of the 16 millimeter winding on the platter and the other half was piling up on the floor 20 about two feet deep. So, with the platter system, all I could do was stop it, discard the split segment, then splice the two halves together, missing about ten minutes of the movie. The Wilshire had just hired a new manager. I don’t know why they hired this kid. He was likeable enough, but for whatever reason, he was a lousy manager. He didn’t order a replacement reel for several days, if not a week or more. So, people, every show would come out and say, “There’s part of this movie missing.” The incident that finally got him fired was this: There was a protocol that management had to follow taking the days deposit in the zipper money bag to the bank. You always were accompanied by another staff person. Well, this manager never followed that. At that time there was a temporary bank set up in a mobile home at the edge of the Wilshire property. Somebody obviously had been staking the place out. The manager—alone—was walking over to the bank when a car starts up across the parking lot, and the wheels screech and this car is heading right for him. As the car zoomed up to him, the manager up and threw the bag of money into the open car window. That was the last seen of the money and the last day the young man was employed at the Wilshire. SL: Van, do you have any memories about 25th Street or downtown Ogden, other than the theaters? Any stores you remember going to? VS: Well, the story went like this, and I don’t know whether it was true or not. I tend to believe it was true, that Ogden, in the late fifties, was, I don’t know what you’d call it, whether it was a test city for fashion, for teenager’s fashions, or what, but 21 we had some great clothing stores here. Individual, local stores. I loved the old Penney’s building, which sat where that unsightly new Wells Fargo building is at Washington Blvd and 24th Street. That old Penney’s building was originally a ZCMI most of its early life, then it was Wright’s Department Store and finally Penney’s. It was an old, old building and I remember the elevator was operated by a Penney’s employee. When first in college, Irene White, a coed of mine, was one of the elevator girls there. I remember looking at the tiny little seat that she had to sit on that ever so slightly protruded from the wall. It was just kind of like a little shelf that must not have been very comfortable. I remember the pneumatic tubes, through which they’d send the cash for change and things, through those pipes all through that place. Then, of course, the code for the telephone. Each station had so many bell rings, “Bing, bing, bing,” or whatever. So I remember that. The men’s stores, Buehler-Bingham, occupied street-level space of what was then the Eccles Building. There was Block’s, Levin’s and Fred M. Nye’s. I don’t know why they tore the Nye’s building down, kitty-corner across the street from the Egyptian. That was the nicest store. The downtown mall killed that and the local clothing stores. 25th Street; my dad had stories about 25th Street. Lear Summerill worked for the gas company for 43 years. He started in the Mountain Fuel Supply Company office and retired as District Manager. They would not let the gas men go down 25th Street alone. They’d have to go in pairs. All the stories about 22 underground tunnels everywhere; I have seen no proof whatsoever. Individual basements, were sometimes connected side-by-side with doorways. I have heard there is or was a tunnel that ran under Washington Boulevard between the old First Security Bank building and the Eccles Building, but know of no 25th Street tunnels. I remember one New Year’s Eve, when we were kids, two neighbors, and I were playing on the phone and got the crazy idea to call a 25th Street bar. We dialed up the Porters and Waiters Club. My neighbor was on the phone and this woman answered. My neighbor asked, “Could ya’ll check to see if my husband’s in there?” She said, “Well, honey, what’s your husband’s name?” “Charles.” “Just a minute…Is there a Charles in here?” Luckily, no one named Charles came to the phone. We thought that was the funniest thing that ever was. Now, having learned about the Porters and Waiters Club, and the important role it played in the world of Jazz and all the great musicians and singers who stayed and performed there, I only wish I could have witnessed some of it firsthand. During the 1940’s, my parents would park on lower 25th Street to watch the characters who would go up and down that infamous street. My memories are mainly of Washington and “dragging that boulevard” and the drive in restaurants, we would make a turn-around to do it all over again. There was A&W and Mason’s, to name a couple. There were other who’s names escape me, but I remember most had car-hops. Where Warren’s Drive-In is, at Wall Avenue and Riverdale Road, that was Rusty’s. KLO was a top 20 station then and a pretty popular station. They set up, 23 right on that corner a broadcast booth. It had big windows all the way around and the big DJ on the weekends was named, “Big Pete.” He used to broadcast from that booth out there at Warren’s. I always thought he was kind of silly. KLO studios were up in the Ben Lomond Hotel on the seventh floor, I think it was. They’d been there since the forties and a friend of mine knew all these radio personalities there, so we were up there on a Saturday night and I remember going in a room that was the record library with hundreds of 78 rpm from the forties. I know that KLO in the forties had studios both in Salt Lake and Ogden. I was told that when KLO moved out of the hotel, no attempt was made to save that library. There were probably some valuable old records there. SL: How did you get involved in the restoration of the Egyptian Theater? VS: I wrote a “call to arms” letter published in the Standard-Examiner in March of 1985 that resulted in the formation of the Friends of the Egyptian, Inc., which would later become known as the Egyptian Theatre Foundation. This is my 40th year as a member of the Theatre Historical Society of America. Attending their national yearly conventions, I have visited between 800 and 900 theaters across the country and Canada. I had seen many times what would happen to the Egyptian if no attempt was made to save the Ogden’s movie palace. It would be destroyed. In 1973, my first year I was a member of the Theatre Historical Society, I was asked to write an article about Peery’s Egyptian for publication in their quarterly, “Marquee.” And so I did. I had been researching the Egyptian since my high school days. 24 It is amazing how many theaters across the land end up parking lots, here in Ogden too. I knew we were about to get another parking lot. As a long time Theatre Historical Society member, over time, I discovered there usually are predictable signs to the probably fate of these theaters. An ugly fate was becoming a real possibility for the Egyptian. So, I was compelled to write the letter to the editor. The organizing meeting was held in special collections at Weber State in March of 1985. So, it took twelve years to save, raise the necessary funds and restore the Egyptian Theater. The Theatre Historical Society folks approached me about having the convention in Utah. Past conventions had been in Toronto, even London, not to mention, Chicago, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Boston, New York, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Seattle, and now they’re coming to Utah. The only way we could line up enough theaters was to tour the northern Utah theaters and then bus through eastern Idaho and western Montana, and end up in Missoula. That’s the most busing the society had ever done. I worried about that, but, you know, the scenery was so spectacular the members loved it. Our convention was originally scheduled for 1995, but was postponed twice in order for the Egyptian to be completed. The Utah convention finally took place in 1997. We made it so the Egyptian was the last theater that we visited in Utah before heading north. Our volunteer staff got a standing ovation when all was said and done. SL: What do you remember about some of the other theaters being torn down, since the Egyptian is the only one that’s still standing? 25 VS: I remember three of them being torn down. I have some pictures of the Ogden Theater as a pile of rubble. Workers knocked a hole through the side of the Paramount. I took a couple of friends down there one really cold, gloomy February day. I took several minutes of movies in there. That the Orpheum collapsed was no surprise to me. Actually, it was the Orpheum apartments that collapsed which were in front of the Orpheum. The person who owned and was remodeling the Ben Lomond Hotel insisted he had to have an entrance and parking where the apartments and theater were located. It was controversial at the time, debris shoots jutting out from south-side hotel windows. That debris had nowhere to go but on the roof of the five-story high Orpheum Apartments. You pile enough demolition debris on the roof, of course the building is going to collapse. I got a phone call, somebody called me and said, “You’ve got to get downtown, the Orpheum apartments have collapsed. Upon arriving, the first thing I did was look up at those windows. All those chutes had disappeared inside. I had real mixed feelings about the Orpheum. Everything historic had long been lost and forgotten. There was no record of what that building originally looked like inside. On the other hand, if they saved the Orpheum, I thought, the bigger nightmare would be tearing down that hotel. I really would have liked to have seen the Paramount stay, but I’ve often asked myself if the Paramount and the Egyptian were both standing, which one would you pick to save? That would have been a tough decision. Ogden couldn’t support two historic theaters. SL: How has Ogden changed since you were young? 26 VS: Well, there’s no more drinking fountains on the downtown sidewalks as there used to be. It’s changed, it has changed so much. When I was in high school, it was a vibrant downtown. It took me a long time to figure out what happened to this town. A major factor was the coming of the freeway. It is my understanding that Eisenhower’s main reason for building the freeways was to facilitate moving troops and military equipment around during the Cold War. But what happened when you put the freeway in? Salt Lake City all of a sudden is a half hour closer to Ogden. It killed the railroads and this was a railroad town. All of the businesses that are connected to the railroad, the stock yard and everything else. SL: Well, thank you, Van. I appreciate you taking the time out. VS: Well, you’re welcome. 27