Wednesday, February 2, 2011

The Stovall


Beckham County Courthouse
Sayre, Oklahoma


There weren’t that many institutions for a kid when I was young, the early part of a transition stage when society was moving from adult-centric to one being focused on youth. We were moving from a culture that honored adults to one that worshipped youth and set kids up as the beneficiaries of our largesse. By being on the wrong side of history and time, I essentially missed both eras. Few things were provided for us as kids but we did have two experiences, dragging Main Street and the Stovall Theater.

“Dragging Main” was something we could do for hours. In Sayre, Main Street was four or five blocks long, depending on where you started counting the west end. The County Courthouse sat at the east end and you could either go to the left, out of town east on State Highway 152, or make an approved U-turn and go back west on the same street. Dragging main had a set pattern. Beginning at the Courthouse, we drove west two blocks to where Main intersected U.S. 66, turned right and drove north on 4th Street (U.S. 66) nearly to the end of town where the highway veered toward the east. A block or so east we circled the Dairy Mart Drive In. Sometimes we stopped there for a drink or fries or their best offering, the Chili Cheese Burger. As we circled we got back on U.S. 66, drove south on 4th Street and back to Main. Turning right on Main, one could drive either one or two blocks west, shoot a “U” and then drive east on Main. At the courthouse, we made another U-turn and started the drive all over again.

If we saw friends afoot, we would stop and give them a ride. Sometimes we would ride together and leave a car sitting for a few rounds. Some nights we had a girl friend with us and others it was just a carload of boys or girls. It was a constant flow of traffic on and around Main Street for hours on end. We could do it because gas was less than a quarter a gallon and we did it because there wasn’t much else to do. An alternative was to stop and go to the movies at the Stovall Theater.


The Stovall was an institution which was born, grew and thrived, and then declined and died before my very eyes. Built, owned and operated by George Stovall, it opened for business June 22, 1950, and provided just about the only entertainment available to young people, and even families, for more than two decades. Of course there were ball games and a few other activities available through the schools but that was about it. The theater was the dominate gathering in town. There were many churches and social groups but there was only one theater. There were surrounding towns and settlements, each with their own schools, social organizations and churches, but there was only one theater. George held sway over the community bringing the world to our little town, thereby laying claim to at least a portion of most of the entertainment dollars, few as they were, which were then available.

He hadn’t always been a theater operator. He became a jobber, involved in the wholesale delivery of gasoline, when he purchased the local Magnolia Oil Company in 1925, along with the Mobil station on South 4th Street. But he moved into the new industry shortly after that. Hollywood was cranking out movies as never before. The industry was converting from silent movies to “talkies” and the public, longing for both entertainment and escapism, was taking to the movies with alacrity. In 1934he built the Rio and claimed his place in the business of theater.

The country was deep in the Great Depression during the 1930s and Sayre and the surrounding area was hit hard, perhaps as hard as or harder than the rest of the country. Not only was there an economic depression, there was also a crippling Dust Bowl over a large area of the Great Plains which included Sayre and most of Western Oklahoma. People were suffering, trying in vain to squeeze productivity out of a land without water. People were jobless, sometimes dying of the most rudimentary problem, starvation. Many people fled the area but many more stayed and tried to cope with the elements, tried to play the hand which they had been dealt.

Those people suffering the depression had to have something to draw their minds off their everyday suffering. They went to the movies, watched Hollywood’s fantasies and imagined themselves in those grand places and glorious costumes doing those exciting things while living those exciting lives. It was in this setting that George built the Rio. In 1936 he bought the Ute Theater from his competitor and from then on he had a monopoly on this type entertainment in Sayre.

I remember the Ute and I think I remember the Rio. We lived on a farm in the Hext community, located between Erick and Sayre. Closer to Erick, it was our town for most purposes. As a small child in the late 1940s, there were three small theaters in Erick, a town of about 1500 people. My family enjoyed going to the movies. The Depression was over, having ended with the public works provided by the Roosevelt Administration and the successful involvement in World War II. But there was still the need for escapism and there was more money available for entertainment than there had been in the 1930s. There were a few times we would go see a movie in every available theater in Erick during a week or weekend and then go see whatever was available in Sayre. This was during the 1940s and on into the 50s for a brief while. Then there were other things that became important to our family and took up our time, thus restricting time we had available to go to the movies. We became involved with church and its activities which took up more of our time and there were, beginning in 1950, four children in elementary school which placed demands on our time as well. These things, together with the introduction of television locally in the mid-1950s, meant our own reduced involvement in the movies.

We attended the Ute Theater often in the latter 1940s. Mainly western fare, the Ute was an enjoyable theater, about the same quality as the ones in Erick. I have many memories of seeing old black and white movies of the 1930s there, along with many westerns of the same era. There was always the standard fare of morality plays, good guys and bad guys. Good guys always won. They rode the fastest horses, shot the fastest and straightest guns, won the fights and gained the hearts of the prettiest girls. Bad men lost. Indians were nearly always bad, an unfortunate stereotype of early Hollywood. One time I even remember seeing Uncle Tom’s Cabin, a black and white silent movie. It was the only silent movie I ever saw in a theater.

In 1950, sixteen years into the industry, George built the Stovall and shortly afterwards closed the Ute. (The Rio had been closed earlier.) The Stovall was a grand theater for that day. A single screen theater, everything was new and beautiful. The architectural style of the theater is often spoken of as western but a closer look reveals a mid-twentieth century modern appearance. The box office was just off the right side of the entrance and there was a large and inviting lobby in which you entered. George or another family member was there to take the ticket you had just purchased from the box office. There were two entrances into the theater itself from the lobby and a large concession stand was situated against the wall between the two entrances. You could get just about everything from that concession stand. It was my first experience getting pickle juice or a “pickle Coke.” I would buy a nickel’s worth of pickle juice which was the limit they would sell you. They didn’t want you getting sick during the movie. There was a boy’s restroom off to the left of the lobby and, I assume, a girl’s to the right. That was the first place I ever saw a urinal built into the floor. While the “standing urinal” is one of humankind’s better inventions, to build it right into the floor was a work of genius. The only way to make it better would be to construct an artificial tree in the middle of the restroom with drains all around the bottom in the floor.

The screen was larger than any I had seen before although it was probably not any larger than most in other towns. Two aisles with three sections of seating, there was a larger section in the center and smaller ones on each side. It was a good theater. The facilities were clean and beautiful. They were comfortable. The movie selections continued to be the morality plays, mainly westerns, that didn’t change much. Color movies became commonplace and Hollywood started making some epics. Stars became bigger than life. The MGM musicals of the 50s all made their way to the Stovall.

I attended high school in Sayre, graduating in 1962. I dragged main and I went to the Stovall. I watched many movies, some not worth the time I invested and some leaving an impression on me I will never forget. I took dates to the Stovall, sometimes went alone and sometimes met friends there. There was usually someone there I could sit with. One of the things we did back then that I still find quite amusing was that we would go to the movies when it was convenient, often coming in after the movie was already in progress. We would go in, take our seats and watch from that point forward. We would watch to the conclusion, watch the credits, the advertisements, the previews and the comedy and then begin the feature film. When it got to the point where we came in, we would get up and leave.

George would walk up and down the aisles from time to time. He carried a flashlight in his pocket and used it when he needed to see better or call attention to someone or something. We were expected to behave. We could hold hands, put our arms around our date’s shoulder and maybe sneak a kiss now and then. Sometimes there was a little more than that but it wasn’t openly tolerated. Not by our parents, not by our social structure and not by George. He demanded and he received respect and proper behavior. I never saw him eject anyone from the theater but I always knew he could and assumed he would.

I graduated in 1962 and left town. From time to time I would return to Sayre and go to the movies. With improvement in television, the movies took a beating. They couldn’t compete for a time. George, like the rest of us, got older and the day came he couldn’t run the theater anymore. And then he wasn’t there at all except in a memory, a cherished memory. The theater changed hands and Barbara Lewis completely rebuilt the interior, putting in a smaller screen and reducing the seating capacity. The outside was in a state of disrepair. It closed and someone else tried to reopen it. Finally it closed for the last time. It sits there on Main Street, a block from the courthouse, recognizable to those of us who came to see her and her offerings of entertainment in better days. The owner advertises that she is for sale and more than one of us looks at her longingly, wondering if we could possibly take it over and make a go of it. Probably not.

The Ute and the Rio are gone. The Stovall is also nothing more than a memory. George is gone. His daughter, Micki, is a dear friend of mine. We dated in high school and went to the movies in a neighboring town. Her dad walked the aisles of the Stovall.

2 comments:

  1. What a marvelous (and somewhat unexpected) history lesson! I remember the Stovall very well, indeed, starting from the late '60s. I remember "Mom & Pop" Stovall, as well - in fact, "Mom" babysat me more than a few times, when my great-grandmother was busy. What a splendid place and what splendid people. My mother worked the ticket booth a brief while, in the late '50s, while she was in high school. Maybe you remember some of the Lockes - my great-granddad, Carson, owned and ran Locke's Barbershop, on Main St., east of 4th, just a few doors down from the Owl Drug... Gosh, this has fired so many memories of my childhood in Sayre! Thanks for this reminiscence! Did you know that the Stovall was restored in '14? I haven't seen it yet, myself, and I have no idea if they're back in business, but at least they've rescued the sign and the front from the sad, sorry state it was in...

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  2. Hello! I am the editor of the Stovall Family Association Journal, which is a genealogy newsletter that goes out to Stovalls all across the US. I've been researching the Stovall theater and would love to source your page and article if you wouldn't mind!

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