When movies flashed across the silver screen in Woodstock

By Elizabeth Ussher Groff

The Bee, Jul 7, 2010

The parking lot of the former Woodstock Hollywood Video store, once was the site of the Woodstock Theater, still attracts theatrics — demonstrated by Woodstock resident Joe McCann who rode by recently with a fun piece Astroturf atop his bike helmet.

Elizabeth Ussher Groff / THE BEE

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The Woodstock neighborhood once had three video stores; now it has none. The last, its Hollywood Video store, is closed and is being renovated into a Key Bank location, opening later this year.

Getting movies in the mail, online, or in vending machines has spun the chain video stores into a spiral seemingly headed for the graveyard. But now that several business spaces are for sale or lease on Woodstock Boulevard, some people have suggested that one amenity the neighborhood needs is a sit-down cinema.

Even in a time of ordering movies by mail, a movie theater might not be such a far-fetched idea. Contrary to dire predictions that cinema attendance would decline as a result of in-home movie viewing, many people still enjoy the experience of going out to a movie theater. The anachronistic single-screen Moreland Theater is prospering in Westmoreland.

In fact, in rainy Portland, recent statistics indicate that attendance at neighborhood theaters is steady, and these small theaters remain popular across the City. People here seem to like the cheaper admission, the chance to see friends and neighbors, and the experience of munching popcorn in a theater that is often reminiscent of years past.

What many have forgotten, or may never have known, is that the Woodstock neighborhood once did have its own movie theater. Ironically, it was located in what has recently been the parking lot of Hollywood Video.

Steve Stone, a Portland movie theater historian and co-author of the book “Theatres of Portland”, has provided THE BEE with records which show that a 175-seat theater was built in Woodstock in 1913.

A 1913 publication listing building permits states: “G. White and B. Orstad erect one-story ordinary moving-picture theater, East Forty-sixth between Sixtieth avenue and Sixty-first avenue; builder, G. White, $2500.” Early city maps show that the described location on S.E. 46th was between today’s S.E. Woodstock Boulevard and Martin Street. The address given in a later document was 6010 S.E. 46th Avenue.

This location is corroborated by 97-year-old Woodstock resident Dorothy Thompson, who says, “The theater was behind the dry goods store on 46th and Woodstock Boulevard.”

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