Opened: The Camera Phone Theatre opened in 1908. It was a talking film venue. The location was on the west side of the street between Ellis and Eddy. Ed Ackerman was the manager.
Seating: 500
A May 1908 photo from the Jack Tillmany collection of the Camera Phone taken during Fleet Week. We're looking south toward Eddy St. In 1915 the New Fillmore would open just to the left of the Camera Phone.
"Pictures that talk like Living People!" Jack comments: "So how did they achieve talking pictures in 1908? Simple. Hire a company live people to read the words in synch (more or less) with the players on the screen in films which they accompanied around the country!
"No microphones yet, so they used megaphones! Impractical? Just a bit, from a number of points of view; for instance, how much did they pay the speakers, and how and where did the cost of their travel & boarding come from? Even if they raised the admission from 5 cents to 10 cents, a capacity audience would only yield $50. But there was actually a circuit of such sites across the country, for a short time! And the films only ran one reel (about 15 minutes)."
Status: Jack Tillmany notes "It was closed by December 1909, probably long before that. It was never listed in any city or telephone directory!" The building was later used for retail. It's been demolished.
After closing -- the Camera Phone building is on the far right. We're looking down the block toward Eddy St. with the arched
entrance of the Premium / Quality Theatre on the corner at 1305 Fillmore. Thanks to Jack Tillmany for sharing the image.
Ellis St. is behind
us. If you could back up the street to Ellis and look west, you would see the Orpheum/Garrick and the Princess Theatre there.
Here's the full shot the detail above was taken from. On the left, the second building down is the Electric Theatre, 1326 Fillmore St. It's a photo by John Henry Mentz for United Railroads (URR). Art Siegel notes that it's from the SFMTA Photo Archive.
More information: See Woody La Bounty's article on the Camera Phone Theatre on the Open SF History Project site.
Jack Tillmany's Arcadia Publishing book "Theatres of San Francisco" can be previewed on Google Books. It's available from Amazon or your local bookseller.
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