Garden Theater Among Theaters of San Jose

WGx is not short on stories about the historic Garden Theater on Lincoln Avenue, and so it’s fun to add one more, courtesy of this week’s Metro, where Gary Singh reviews the latest historical release in the Images of America series from Arcadia Publishing.

Theatres of San Jose (Images of America) begins with early theaters and 5-cent movie houses before moving on to the glory days of San Jose movie palaces from the 1920s to the 1940s. Back in those days, downtown San Jose was a thriving locale, filled with theaters and retail. The streets were always jammed. People flocked to places like the Mission Theatre, the Liberty Theatre and the Jose Theatre, which is now the San Jose Improv.

… the book tells a few stories of theaters that never actually happened. For example, consider the legendary southwest corner of Bascom Avenue and San Carlos Street, where one finds Time Deli, Alex’s 49er Inn and Saver’s thrift store. On page 87, Parks reveals an artist’s rendering of what was supposed to be the original Garden Theatre–right in the middle of that quarter-circle strip mall. Otto A. Deichmann designed the theatre, but eventually the plans gave way and the Garden Theatre opened in Willow Glen instead.

In his review, Singh highlights one more landmark theater that undoubtedly used to call to patrons from Willow Glen:

The last chapter, “Domes and Starlight,” depicts the last vestiges of San Jose’s drive-in era, with haunting images of such forgotten landmarks as the El Rancho Drive-In, which in 1950 opened at 1505 Almaden Road. Today, El Rancho Liquors at Almaden and Alma sits right across from where the drive-in used to be.