A 1968 photo of the Letterman General Hospital Theatre by Tom Gray. It's from the Jack Tillmany collection. Thanks, Jack!
Status: It's been demolished.
Well, perhaps it wasn't the most deluxe theatre on the base. That title goes to the other one, the Presidio Theatre.
Jack Tillmany comments: "A favorite subject of mine: Military Theatres. Of course, the Presidio is in the news again. Nice little site. I saw a few movies there when I got back home from my Army duty, before my ID expired.
"The Presidio of SF also operated a SECOND theatre, at Letterman General Hospital, for the less mobile. It was still in operation in 1968 when Tom took photo. As you can see, the architecture is strictly G.I., but at least it has a name: L.G.H. Theatre. Betcha NOBODY knows about THAT one!"
"I never had a street address. Just assumed it was part of the sprawling Letterman General Hospital complex and grounds. This is a pretty well detailed 1939 map of the Presidio showing Letterman on Lincoln Blvd. You can also see the route of Muni's D & E lines which had their own right of way into the Presidio to their own terminal near Letterman Hospital.
"I had been stationed at Ft. Dix (New Jersey), with an Army
population of 40,000+, and we had FIVE Post Theatres. #1 had 2000 seats
all on one floor, terrific CinemaScope & 4-track magnetic stereo! Nothing like a capacity G.I. audience watching something like 'Hercules
& the Captive Women' in one of those venues. Or 'Psycho'! I saw every
movie that was released at those sites, at 25 cents admission, at the
same time they were playing in Philadelphia or NYC for $2. Which left my
weekends in NYC open for social activities.
"The only ones we didn't get were the hard ticket roadshows. Each site changed 5 times a week, and each title would rotate from one to the other, since most G.I.'s who attended them didn't have wheels. They even published a little calendar! As you can see, I marked off the films once I saw them in order to keep track and not miss anything. I had a car, so could drive to whichever was my destination of choice.
"The only ones we didn't get were the hard ticket roadshows. Each site changed 5 times a week, and each title would rotate from one to the other, since most G.I.'s who attended them didn't have wheels. They even published a little calendar! As you can see, I marked off the films once I saw them in order to keep track and not miss anything. I had a car, so could drive to whichever was my destination of choice.
A November 1959 Fort Dix film calendar from Jack's collection.
"I never took any pictures of any of them, but before I hit Fort Dix, I was stationed at Ft. Lee VA for a few months. They had a very modern Post Theatre, which they even put on a postcard! Theatre #1 at Fort Dix looked very much like this one. Probably a master plan for all of their post-WWII venues." Thanks, Jack!
A postcard of the Fort Lee Post Theatre from Jack's collection.
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