Contributed by Carl Baker April 17, 2016: I used to deliver papers to Mr. Joseph at the station for the Oregon Journal in the 1950s up until 1957 of 58. I remember those old glass cylinder pumps still there as seen in the 1930 photo when I started delivering papers there, probably around 1955. When I left town in November of 1960 I think the station was still there, but not sure about that. He seemed to be busy enough working on cars and had some customers that just came in to talk. Mr. Joseph was also the projectionist for the movie theater down next to one of the taverns along the river, or maybe next to the hotel. He had me clean the theater before and after the shows for a couple weeks when his usual help was out of town or sick. He took me upstairs before the movie and I got to watch him set up the film for the evening and then run the film. The projection room was a cramped space with bins for the reels of film to be shown, other bins for the used reels, a splicing table on rollers, two projectors, a high speed film rewinder and a large generator run by a big electric motor for running the arcs in the two projectors. When the movie was running it was quite a busy place when one reel was done and you had to switch to the second projector. The reels of film were delivered by the Greyhound bus freight across the street at Joe McKay's pharmacy and bus depot. They would arrive in the afternoon and he would pick them up and leave the ones to be shipped out. At that time, the theater only operated on Friday and Saturday nighshowed a double feature with a newsreel and a cartoon. Additional information: It has been said, but not yet verified, that the ground on which the building was standing was not stable causing structural problems. This led to the eventual closing and demolition of the building sometime in the late 1950s or early 1960s. From the "Columbia County Oregon History and Genealogy" page for "Rainier Obituaries Surname I-J": Click here to view, William F. 1897-1974 TDN (The Longview Daily News) 09-05-1974 p27 c4 William F Joseph, on "Find a Grave" page. Contact me at [email protected] for any questions � Copyright 2016 |
