These photos document the demolition celebration held shortly before actual demolition began.  I attended, but felt badly since I knew yet another single screen theater was to fall to the ground.  The furniture store next to the theater is also coming down.  Granted, these buildings are probably beyond repair, but a part of me still hates to see this happen.  The bottom photos show the demolished auditorium.  These were taken in February, 2014.

These photos, taken November 2013 with a Polaroid colorpack camera, show the theater, its entrance and the fountain.  All of these elements are to be retained and incorporated into the design of the library.

The first theater to be discussed is the Atlantic Theater which was located at 5870 Atlantic Avenue in Long Beach, CA.  It opened on May 21, 1942 and had quite a colorful history as a movie theater until it closed in 1976.  The building was then used as a church and subsequently abandoned. The City of Long Beach, after much debate over many years, finally decided to demolish the theater in 2014 and build a new library on the site.  Stay tuned for more photos and facts later!