The Roxy was a destination as much as a place to see films. Part of the experience was the building when patrons were treated as kings. When did humanity decide beauty was no longer needed? When did we start to accept the soulless public buildings we face? Going to a modern multiplex is like a rat skulking into a box rather than being treated like you are special truly our ancestors were lucky to experience theatre, railway stations, shops, work places that were things of beauty that enhanced life and raised spirits- the architecture we now settle for says so much about our world now

Second comment. Just caught the fact that this theater actually had a functioning "hospital," complete with operating room, within its walls. (Along with gymnasium, showers, club and meeting rooms, etc., etc.) Incredible.

How truly sad this magnificent theater and so many others in once-vibrant downtowns were so carelessly destroyed!! Great video!

I would love to see these theater pic's colorized! I can only imagine how Grand they'd be in color

Joni Mitchell once said 'you don't know what you got till it's gone'.

Thank you for that particular segment. I really appreciate all of your segments but this one in particular really touched me as my late father used to go to the Roxy back in the 1930’s and up to early 1942 before he joined the Navy. It truly was a magnificent building and it gives me an insight into what my Dad saw and enjoyed. Thank you very very much for that glimpse into the past of my father.

I just love this. Thanks so much for posting! It's so consummately Twenties. (By the way, I loved your preservation of so much of your great-grandmother's diaries and photos. What treasures you have there.)

Thank you.

It’s the same in my country we had some stunning cinemas built before WW2. They took the queue from America and had some incredible cinemas so many now gone.

There exists a fantastic foto of Gloria Swanson standing in the rumble of the theater after the Wrecking Ball did its destruction. She had premiered some of most famous films in the Roxy.

Seattle's Crystal Pool Natatorium was quite the place here in 1916!

What’s playin’ at the Roxy? I’ll tell ya what’s playin’ at the Roxy: picture about a Minnesota man so in love with a Mississippi girl that he sacrifices everything and moves all the way to Biloxi… Dat’s what’s playin’ at the Roxy!

And when I heard it mentioned in "Annie" I just thought of it as a normal theater. The Roxy was so elaborate it might as well have been developed by Warbucks himself in their universe! Leapin' Lizards! :-)

This is truly a beautiful work of architecture. I would guess the amount of elevators for various purposes and the latest technology. The Roxy theater then would have been the equivalent of a Las Vegas, Cirque de Soleil theater today. I was wondering if the theater was used solely for motion pictures or did they have live stage theater as well?

Roxy ran out of money during the construction. William Fox supplied the cash necessary to complete the building but that cost Roxy control of his masterpiece.

It will forever cause me pain to know that monumental, gorgeous theater was razed. What a sin. My parents went there to see Johhny Ray and Louis Prima/Keely Smith in the early '50's and rave about it. Well, they gutted the Paramount and were actually days away from razing Radio City Music Hall in the '70's, so I guess it's not a shock. So sad.

The1920sChannel, will you do anything on the Royal Family during the 1920s? RIP Queen Elizabeth II

How did he honestly think he was going to recoup his investment on this?

Must have cost an absolute fortune!

Wow 6000 seat theater they must have had plays, music ect as well as movies. It seem 1920s design was over the top in the best way.

A truly sad loss.

wow thats huge, so that is what the roxy looked like, grander then even the ornamentation of some of the pictures of european theaters I have seen, grand is the only world that suites it, a shame it was torn down without reguard all in the name of progress, at least though we have radio city, the music box and the new amsterdam still, and people have learned to look and say wait this is grand, this is part of our ethos and soul of the city, we need to save this. another historic loss was penn station that was torn down without reguard and some say the main force to prompt saving the grand old buildings I have heard said, from a time when we used to build things with form and theme, and something that had meaning, not the cement boxes of the post modern era, and at least they started putting some ornaments and at least nice brickwork or printed facodes back into buildings though not all of them, some are still glass monsters, but at least some style is starting to come back, or old buildings repurposed or old elements reincorporated into the new buildings that replaced what was torn down or rennovated. but hardly a photo could be found about the old roxy theater.

I'd love to know what happened to the theater's music library after the Roxy was sold and demolished. Anybody?

The atmosphere was, like 3d film, If the movie was bad, then at least the surroundings were pleasant. But guess what happened out of this palace of a theater? A small little screen was used to show the movies.

Why is every picture of it's construction devoid of people? Something so massive built in a world shatteringly short space of time would not ever have a day with no people working on it. It's clearly an old building. Had to be removed.

Didn't you have this before? Next time talk about the famous Market girls later known as the Rockettes.

Didn't even last 35 years.

So typically American........ *OBSCENE OSTENTATION!* The cinema theatre here tries to be the feature itself when it is the movie currently screening that people come to see. This is not to say that a cinema theatre should appear reasonable in its aesthetics but theatre itself is not, and never was the "star of the show".

What an ugly building! I hope it was demolished.