When Abigail Lipka was growing up, she and her father would talk about The Glen Theatre.
Maybe they would own it someday.
Today, Lipka is 27, a hospice nurse and the owner of four rental properties.
And now she has acquired an additional property: The Glen Theatre, a 1913 band hall that became a movie theater whose films delighted generations of Glen Rock-area residents.
When she acquired this Glen Rock landmark this year and faced the daunting restoration work, her father, David Tuten, told her, “I need to remember not to dream around you.”/
Home of a prince
Movie houses were – and are – valuable to their towns. The Glen Theatre carries an international chapter to its story.
This was the home base of an internationally known composer, Roland F. Seitz, tagged as the “Parade Music Prince” for his many march compositions.
Seitz, 1867-1946, was born in Shrewsbury Township, led bands and published music. The building he works from stands today, just down the street from Glen Rock Mill Inn. His best-known work, “March Grandioso,” is played by college bands today and can be heard as part of the soundtrack of the movie “Friday Night Lights.”
In 1913 the Glen Rock Musical Association — with Seitz as a member — purchased a property on Manchester Street and erected an auditorium, The Glen Theatre, at a cost of approximately $13,500 and with a seating capacity of 500. (When it closed 10 years ago, its main floor could seat 170.)
The Musical Association installed wooden seats that had a wire frame underneath to hold men’s fedora-style hats.
The Item, a Glen Rock newspaper, described it as a “splendid little opera house.”
Movie theaters everywhere
There was a day when most small towns in York County and the region hosted movie theaters.
Some survive today with different uses, places that attract the community as they’ve done from their beginning.
For example, Mount Wolf Community Church meets in the former theater in that borough. The Weary Arts Group operates from the Dallas Theater in Dallastown. Bonkey’s, an ice cream stand, draws hundreds of people a week in the former New Freedom theater. The Belmont Theatre, a community theater group, operates in the former theater by that name.
In York, a religious group meets in the former Southern Theater and the Hi-Way Theater, without its tall façade, has been used for commercial purposes. Of course, the Appell Center for the Performing Arts covers two operating entertainment venues: the Strand and the Capitol.
One by one over the decades, local theaters have been pulled down. In recent years, for example, The Ramsey in Stewartstown was demolished.
The Hanover or State Theater, unused as a film venue since the mid-1980s, has gained new purpose.
The Hanover Economic Development Corp. is looking for ideas for this historic place and recently broadened the search for redevelopment partners.
In other words, Hanover has not given up on its landmark.
Glen Rock on the rise
The Glen Theatre’s rebirth is coming at the right time in its southern York County home.
The rail trail running through town has increasing use. The borough is part of the York County Trail Towns initiative that seeks to leverage the rail trail to economically benefit towns along its 27-mile length.
The Northern Central Railway, an excursion rail service, rolls on tracks parallel to the rail trail that have carried trains since the late 1830s.
The Glen Rock Mill Inn, a destination eatery, has attracted restoration funding, and the nearby Ruins Park is a growing entertainment destination.
Earlier this year, PeoplesBank donated its longtime 1 Manchester St. building to the borough.
The Glen Rock Historic Preservation Society, which operated a museum on its top floor for years, holds its monthly meetings in first-floor space so familiar to bank users for decades.
Artifacts of the old bank were left in place — a teller’s window, for example — and the bank’s vault. A room is set aside for banking items and another room for a display of Glen Rock Carolers artifacts.
Auditorium hosted town events
The Glen Theatre’s longevity stems, in part, from its longtime owners. For example, Chalmers and Lottie Sechrist operated the theater for 31 years, and Gerald and Ruth Bortner for eight. The Fred Strausbaugh family owned the theater from 1975 until its 2013 closing.
Over the years, movies were shown there, to be sure. But it also served as a venue for Glen Rock High School plays and commencements and other community activities.
It was a community center in the same way dreamed about today by Abigail Lipka.
She wants the top floor of the old movie theater to become a place for live theater and trivia nights. And to show movies. And to serve as a wedding venue.
The basem*nt, with its 14-foot-high ceiling, was a former men’s club. And then apartments. Now, this space with a commercial kitchen will support activities in the auditorium.
To do all this, she needs sweat equity from the public, help in knocking down additions – faux wood paneling and drop ceilings. She wants to hear stories and learn more from those, like her, who saw movies there before it closed in 2013.
In a call for volunteers, she’s offering an enticement for community members who help in cleaning up and knocking down. They can “Explore the Secrets of the Theatre.”
There are parts of The Glen that she hasn’t yet dug into.
But she’s found some things: an authentic 1975 disco ball, for example. The projector is still there, as are film reel holders.
The place is cooled with a hamster-style fan that wafts cool air upward from a stream running under the building. The air is vented through the ceiling.
“Come join me in this adventure,” she says.
When asked her favorite part of The Glen, the new owner says it’s moving through the doors from the lobby into the old auditorium and taking in the scene, an enjoyable part of her youth.
And she says about how she feels when she sees the auditorium: “Holy crap, I own this place.”
Sources: John Hufnagel’s “Celebrating the 100th Anniversary of The Glen Rock Auditorium,” YDR files.
At The Glen
A cleanup/knockdown day is set for the Glen Theatre in preparation for its restoration into a community center. The event is set for 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 5, at The Glen, 37 Manchester St., Glen Rock. Questions: 717-942-1022 or thehistoricglentheatre1913@gmail.com. Details: thehistoricglentheatre.org
Jim McClure is a retired editor of the York Daily Record and has authored or co-authored nine books on York County history. Reach him atjimmcclure21@outlook.com.
