Recommended Reading

Books

The books listed below can be found in the Newton Free Library or in the Minuteman Library Network. The Newton library books have the call number listed. Other books can be requested through the Inter-Library Loan (ILL) system. If you need help, speak to a reference librarian at your local library.

Many of these books are also available via online booksellers like Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and Alibris.

Berger, Robert. The Last Remaining Seats: Movie Palaces of Tinseltown. Los Angeles, CA: Balcony Press, 1997.
(Minuteman Library Network)

Bowers, Q. David. Nickelodeon Theatres and Their Music. Vestal, NY: Vestal Press, 1986.
(Newton Free Library 792.097 B67N 1986)

Butsch, Richard. The Making of American Audiences: From Stage to Television, 1750-1990. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000.
(Newton Free Library 791.097 BUTSCH 2000)

Dixon, Wheeler W. A Short History of Film. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2008.
(Newton Free Library 791.437 D64S 2008)

Goody, Marvin E. (Editor). Boston Society of Architects: The First Hundred Years 1867-1967. Boston: Boston Society of Architects, 1967.
(Minuteman Library Network)

Hall, Ben M. The Golden Age of the Movie Palace: The Best Remaining Seats. New York: C.N. Potter, 1975.
(Newton Free Library 791.43 H14G 1961)

Hitchcock, Henry Russell. Boston Architecture, 1637-1954; Including Other Communities within Easy Driving Distance. New York, Reinhold Pub. Corp. 1954.
(Newton Free Library Massachusetts Collection 720.974 H63B)

Kay, Jane Holtz. Lost Boston. Expanded, updated edition. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 2006.
(Newton Free Library 974.461 K18L 2006)

King, Donald C. The Theatres of Boston: A Stage and Screen History. Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Co., 2005.
(Minuteman Library Network)

Lewis, Robert M. (Editor). From Traveling Show to Vaudeville: Theatrical Spectacle in America, 1830-1910. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, c2003.
(Newton Free Library 791.097 FROM 2003)

Margolies, John. Ticket to Paradise: American Movie Theaters and How We Had Fun. Boston: Little, Brown, 1991.
(Newton Free Library 725.822 M33T 1991)

Naylor, David. American Picture Palaces: The Architecture of Fantasy. New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1981.
(Minuteman Library Network)

Naylor, David. Great American Movie Theaters. Washington, DC: Preservation Press, c1987.
(Newton Free Library 725.822 N23G 1987)

Pildas, Ave.Movie Palaces. New York: C.N. Potter, 1980.
(Minuteman Library Network)

Putnam, Michael. Silent Screens: The Decline and Transformation of the American Movie Theater. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000
(Newton Free Library 791.43 P98S 2000)

Shand-Tucci, Douglass. Built in Boston: City and Suburb, 1800-2000. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1999.
(Newton Free Library 720.974 T79B 1999)

Shand-Tucci, Douglass. The Boston Rialto: Playhouses, Concert Halls and Movie Palaces. Boston: The Author, 1977.
(Newton Free Library Reference 725.8 T79B 1977)

Shipman, David. The Story of Cinema: A Complete Narrative History, from the Beginnings to the Present. New York: St. Martin Press, 1982.
(Newton Free Library Reference 725.8 T79B 1977)

Singer, Arthur. Boston‘s Downtown Movie Palaces. Charleston, SC: Arcadia Pub., 2011
(Newton Free Library 725.8 S61B 2011)

Valentine, Maggie. The Show Starts on the Sidewalk: An Architectural History of the Movie Theatre, Starring S. Charles Lee. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1994.
(Newton Free Library 725.822 V23S)

Vanderwarker, Peter. Boston Then & Now: 59 Boston Sites Photographed in the Past and Present. New York: Dover Publications, 1982.
(Newton Free Library 974.461 V28B 1982)

Internet Sources

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjamin_Franklin_Keith
Biographical information on one of the nation’s most important builder of “movie palaces.”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Franklin_Albee_II
Biographical information on one of the nation’s most important builder of “movie palaces.”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Movie_palace
An informative on-line article on “movie palaces,” with internet links.

http://xroads.virginia.edu/~cap/palace
A major Web site source on “movie palaces, with lots of pictures and internet links

http://www.davidandnoelle.net/moviehistory.htm
A highly informative and somewhat personal Web site for information on the history of movie theaters in the United States, with lots of exterior and interior pictures of movie theaters around the country.