Former "Load of Fun" Building on North Avenue

Built in 1914 for Eastwick Motors, Baltimore’s first Ford dealership, 120 West North Avenue has been home to a surprising array of owners and occupants. After its days with Eastwick (a proud supporter of Amoco gasoline and its American Oil Company Baltimore roots), the building changed hands several times. Subsequent dealers sold cars from mostly forgotten manufacturers including Graham Page, Desoto, and Plymouth. By the mid 1930s, Kernan Motors owned the building and sold Nash, Willys, and Jeep vehicles.

As North Avenue transitioned from a corridor for car dealerships, the building became vacant several times before finally becoming home to the Lombard Office Furniture company in the late 1970s. The business sold well-used metal office furniture.

In 2005, the building became an arts center that included the Single Carrot theatre, a gallery, and studios. The name of the space came about by creatively deleting letters from the existing signage. So, “Lombard Office Furniture” became “Load of Fun” Gallery.

Unfortunately, 120 West North Avenue required major renovations to meet the necessary building codes. BARCO, an arts-based development group, acquired the building in 2013 and began making the necessary changes in order to reopen as a hub for the arts. In 2014, the Baltimore Sun quoted project director Amy Bonitz on the unique historic elements of the building:

"The beauty is nobody has messed up the interior. Some of the wonderful features we've uncovered include the original [auto] showroom with a mezzanine where the managers could oversee the work happening throughout the first floor, including the rooms where the sales agreements were finalized.The front facade also contains beautiful leaded-glass windows with large, pivot windows that will be fully restored. The third floor is also a wide-open space with large skylights where mechanics used to work on cars. We will be saving and preserving the old freight elevator that brought the cars up to the upper floors for servicing as well."

The Motor House held a grand reopening in January 2016 with space for performances, artists, a cafe, and gallery.

120 W. North Avenue, Baltimore, MD 21218

Built in 1930 as the Edgewood Theater

Established in 1922, Olivet Baptist Church has occupied the historic Edgewood Theatre since the late 1960s. Built in 1930, the Edgewood Theatre was designed by one of the city’s most prominent theatre architects—John J. Zink.

Born in Baltimore in 1886, Zink graduated from the Maryland Institute College of Art in 1904 and started work with architect William H. Hodges and the local architecture firm Wyatt & Nolting. He began working on theatres when he joined architect Thomas W. Lamb in designing the famous Hippodrome Theatre on Eutaw Street and the Maryland Theatre in Hagerstown, Maryland. Over the next few decades, Zink and his partners designed over 200 movie theatres in cities up and down the east coast including over thirty in the Baltimore-DC area including the Senator Theatre on York Road and the Town Theatre (now known as the Everyman).

In the Edgewood Theatre's heyday, the marquee featured a tall electric sign (a near twin of the Patterson designed by Zink on Eastern Avenue). Like many smaller neighborhood theatres, the business began to struggle in the 1950s and, after a brief second life as an art house theatre in 1962, ended its life as a movie house. That same year, Bishop Wilburn S. Watson joined the Olivet Baptist Church then located in a modest building on Riggs Avenue. In the late 1960s, Bishop Watson led the effort to purchase the former theatre on Edmondson Avenue and convert the building into a new sanctuary for the congregation.

3500 Edmondson Avenue, Baltimore, MD 21229

Constructed across from the venerable Ford's Theater in 1911, the Empire Theatre (as the Everyman was first called) was designed in the Beaux Arts style by Baltimore architects William McElfatrick and Otto Simonson. Although its advertising slogan was appealing, "Better Burlesque," and it boasted its own soda fountain and billiard parlor, the theatre never caught on with burlesque or a few years later, with vaudeville.

By 1915 it had switched to a single screen movie theatre with seats for over 1500. Movies did not fare well either, and after a brief stint back as a burlesque theatre, the building was shuttered in 1927. In 1937 it reopened, but as a parking garage. For some reason, this use also did not stick, and in 1947 the building was rebuilt back into a theatre. With architects Lucius White and John Zinc in the lead, the new theatre was fully modern, with Art Moderne styling, amoeba-shaped wall decorations, and even a concession stand selling new fangled orange-coated ice cream treats called Dreamsicles. The Town Theatre, as it was then renamed, opened with a premier showing of "It's a Wonderful Life," complete with Jimmy Stewart in the audience.

It was during this period that a real life drama took place in 1953 when the FBI received a tip that a wanted criminal, John Elgin Johnson, was at the theatre. He was in a phone booth when the FBI approached and he opened fire, wounding agents J. Brady Murphy and Raymond J. Fox. Additional agents returned fire, killing Mr. Johnson. Agent Murphy later died from his wounds.

From the 1960s into the 1970s, the Town was Baltimore's only "Cinerama," a film technique where multiple film strips are shown on a single projector. This run didn't last either, and the theatre closed again in 1990, about a week before the Hippodrome a block away also went dark.

The building was given to the Everyman Theatre in 2006, which was then in search of a new home. After raising considerable capital for a major renovation, the restoration included both the historic exterior and a wholly new interior to accommodate modern performance requirements. The theatre now has 250 seats and a host of other spaces: a scene shop, dressing rooms, a green room, a rehearsal hall, classrooms, offices, costume shop, and a prop shop. The company's first performance in the new space was in January 2013.

315 W. Fayette Street, Baltimore, MD 21201

The Harlem Park Theatre was originally built as a church for a congregation that had outgrown the size of their existing building. Construction on this Romanesque-style building on Gilmore Street began in the summer of 1902. The building had a Port Deposit granite edifice and was considered aesthetically modern at the time of construction, designed to be an ornament in the neighborhood.

The new Methodist Episcopal Church was a short-lived venture marred by two destructive fires that led to its eventual abandonment. On December 22, 1908, the building was almost destroyed in a fire. Repairs were completed to the point where the congregation could continue to use the building until a more severe fire in 1924. On April 3, a fire destroyed the church, and the building was abandoned. This was also the period when the demographics of the neighborhood were shifting from predominately white to predominately African American. The Methodist Episcopal Church was a predominately white congregation, so the change in demographics may have influenced the decision to abandon the church.

In 1928, the title for the church was officially transferred to Emanuel M. Davidove and Harry H. Goldberg, who resold the property to their company the Fidelity Amusement Corporation, formed for the purpose of building "a 1,500 seat motion picture theatre for Negroes to be known as Harlem Theatre." The company hired architect Theodore Wells Pietsch, a notable Baltimore architect who also designed Eastern High School and the Broadway Pier. Pietsch took the property's history into consideration when designing the new building: the theatre was made fireproof through the use of steel and concrete, and a fire extinguishing system was also included in the building's design.

Like the church it replaced, the theater was designed as an ornament and a spectacle. The building's decorative theme, inspired by Spanish architecture, was considered the most elaborate on the East Coast, and the theatre was promoted as "the best illuminated building in Baltimore." The bright, decorative facade included a 65-foot marquee with 900 50-watt light bulbs to illuminate the sidewalk underneath, as well as "tremendous electric signs" around the marquee and a forty-foot high sign that could be seen from two miles away.

The opening weekend for the theatre in October 1932, is notable because of the significant celebratory events planned to mark the grand opening. The theatre was introduced "in a blaze of glory," in a grand opening that drew crowds of 5,000 to 8,000 people. The jubilant scene was described by a journalist:

"The blazing marquee studded with a thousand lights made the entire square take a semblance of Broadway glamour. The marquees illuminated the entire Harlem Square which was crowded with those who lined the sidewalk unable to gain admittance."

A parade was held in tribute to Theodore Wells Pietsch and the construction of the theatre. The parade was both photographed and filmed, and the resulting film was shown at the theatre the next week.

After a successful opening, the theatre remained open for nearly forty years. Baltimore citizens remember the theatre with "cavernous three-story high ceiling, a balcony, carpeted floors and thick cushioned seats" and "Ĺ“celestial ceiling with twinkling electrical stars and projected clouds that floated over movie-goers' heads." There are also records of community events, such as a free "Movie Jamboree" in 1968 for the children of Baltimore workers donated by the theatre's then-manager Edward Grot, and midnight shows to raise money for the local YMCA. However, the theatre remained segregated throughout is existence and went into decline by the late 1960s.

By the mid-1970s, the Harlem Theatre was closed. In 1975, it was purchased by Reverend Raymond Kelley, Jr. with the intention of turning it into the Harlem Park Community Baptist Church. Refurbishment included replacement of theatre seats with pews, and removal of the marquee. On July 6, 1975, the new church was dedicated. The building continues to be used by the congregation of the Harlem Park Community Baptist Church today.

614 N. Gilmor Street, Baltimore, MD 21217