Rembering The Co-ed
‘You used to be big in pictures.”
‘I am big, it’s the pictures that got small.”
OPlNINfi
HIRTIETH
llfii
— Gloria Swanson to William Holden in the 1950
motion picture, “Sunset Boulevard”
“I Was A Male War Bride”
Motion pictures will get smaller in Boiling
Springs if the town council, as expected, votes in
the next two months to franchise cable television,
bringing first-run movies to local television
screens.
That entertainment change would be the biggest
in Boiling Springs since August 30, 1948 — when
pictures still were big, and the biggest picture was
at the brand-new Co-ed Theater.
“I remember as a little girl part of going to town
on Saturday was going to the Co-ed for a nickle and
a dime.”
The little girl grew up to be the town clerk,
Margretta McKee, and her Saturdays at the Co-ed
are shared in memories of many other residents
who grew up here in the ’50s and ’60s. The Co-ed
was Boiling Springs’ first movie theater — and its
first victim to television.
Practically every town had at least one movie
house in those pre-television days. Shelby had four
now defunct: the Carolina, State, Webb, and the
Washington. Lawndale had the Piedmont Theater.
(“Boy, do I remember the Piedmont!” laughed
Kays Gary. The Observer columnist recalled it as
the site where teenagers were intiated into kissing,
and, it was rumored, more: “It took a lot of
courage to go in there,” Gary confided.)
“We opened in August, 1948,” recalled “Welly”
Hamrick, a Boiling Springs contractor who with
his partner Fred Plonk built the theater on land
Hamrick had inherited. “At first we were going to
call it the Community Theater, but Fred decided
on the name Co-ed.”
The Co-ed wasn’t bashful about promoting her
charms. The full-page ad in the Shelby Star set the
scene for the theater’s opening 2 p.m., Aug. 30,
1948:
“The trumpets sound. . .melodious music peels
forth. . .lights are dimmed. . .curtains roll back. .
.and you get a preview of one of the most up-to-
date theaters in Cleveland County.”
The Co-ed promised its patrons seats “correctly
inclined”; and for 35 cents (children paid nine
cents) you could see the following: news, a car
toon, a short, a serial “G-Men Never Forget,” and
the main attraction, “Feudin’, Fussin’ and A-
Fighin’ ” starring Donald O’Connor.
Business was good, Hamrick recalled.“Our
biggest all-time grossing film from the general
public was ‘I Was A Male War Bride’,” a Cary
Grant comedy.
The Co-ed also has the distinction of having
made more money off Shakespeare than Cary
Grant. The theater arranged with Gardner-Webb
College for a special showing of “Hamlet” at $1.50
a ticket when the usual admission was 40 cents.
“We really cleaned up,” Hamrick smiled.
Hamrick took over the day-to-day operation of
the theater after Plonk sold his interest to Dr.
Wyan Washburn. Duties included trips to
Charlotte’s “Film Row,” a series of offices on
Church Street where hard-boiled representatives
of New York and Hollywood studios dickered with
the Cleveland native over film prices:
“Oh, they’d ask for $25 or 40 per cent of the
gate,” recalled Hamrick. He laughed. “I’d tell ’em
my front office in Boiling Springs wouldn’t stand
for such a thing.”
Watching Hamrick bluff the Charlotte bookers
was a future movie mogul at that time miscast as a
sweeper at the Cliffside movie house. Earl
Owensby, then a boy and later the chief executive
of the EO Corporation, would join Hamrick for the
ride to Charlotte.
It wasn’t the distribution costs, however, that
did in the Co-ed; it was that new invention, black-
and-white television.
“Just about the time we started doing well,”
Hamrick recalled, “televsion came into our area
and business got weak. ’’
Not that the Co-ed didn’t fight back. Hamrick
installed a lens for Cinemascope, trying to fight
the small screen with a wide one.
“We spent $1800 on the cinemascopic equip
ment,” Hamrick said. “And that was when money
was money!
“I may be wrong, but at that time I believe that
amount of money would buy you a new Buick.”
But small, independent theaters were as ob
solescent as fins on a Buick. Hamrick sold out his
interest to Dr. Washburn, and after several
changes in management “Doc rented the building
to two colllege boys who wanted to open a
restaurant.” The business still operates as The
Movie House Restaurant.
None of the previous owners or managers could
remember when the Co-ed showed its last film.
Like an aging dowager, the Co-ed simply was seen
less and less by the public; at last, one day
someone notices she’s absent.
For “Welly” Hamrick, though, there is still an
occasional memory of when “music peels forth,”
“lights dim,” and “curtains roll back”:
“Every now and then I’ll be driving through
some small town,” he says, “and I’ll see some
theater boarded up, and I’ll get a lump in my
throat. I’ll think of the Co-ed closing, and I’ll know
what they’re going through.”
The
aRDNER WEBB COLLEGE LIBRftRV
(
We See It Your Way
99
THURS. MARCH 18,1982
BOILING SPRINGS, NC
Panther ''Pretty Good
Oh, Boyl
Break-Ins
Hit Two
%4"
I
Break-ins Friday and Saturday nights at a
Boilings Springs residence and business resulted
in losses over $2500 reported to police.
G.T. McSwain’s warehouse on West College was
broken into Friday night, according to police, and
11 air conditioners are reported missing.
The air conditioners, “still in the boxes,” are
worth approximately $2500, according to Boiling
Springs police officer James Clary, who is in
vestigating.
The boxes apparently were taken out of the
warehouse through the back door, Clary said. A
bolt there was broken, the officer said.
The next night a burglary was reported at
Varsity Square apartments about
To prevent break-ins, Boiling Springs
Gardner-Webb police departments jointly
sponsoring “Operation Identification”
Saturday. The departments will have
and
are
this
eight
■
engraving tools available for the public to mark
valuables, making them less likely to be stolen.
Radios, televisions, wheelcovers, and prac
tically any item can be engraved with the owners’
driver’s license number, according to Officer
Clary. Engravers will also be signed out to the
public for use at home. Clary said.
“Operation Identification” will last between 9
a.m. to noon at the Charles I. Dover building on the
Gardner-Webb campus Saturday, March 20.
V
9:45 p.m.
Saturday. The front door of an apartment was In other news:
pried open, according to police, and a radio and an pretty good,” said Mike Panther Wed-
automatic handgun were reported stolen. nesday morning. Panther, 17, underwent six-hour
The resident of the apartment was not home at surgery Monday to repair spinal damage he suf-
the time of the reported break-in. Police estimate early-morning car wreck Saturday
the value of the items taken at $165. near Boiling Springs.
Greetings from her three sons on this home- ferson Hamrick, bom Feb. 26. The four boys and
made sign met Kathryn Hamrick at the door when their parents, Kathryn and Cline Hamrick, run a
she brought home their new brother. Miles Jef- dairy farm on College Farm Road.
At The Cross Roads...
“I saw him at the
cross roads.” “I heard it
at the cross roads.” “It
happened at the cross
roads.” People and
news traditionally have
gathered under the road
signs at Boiling Springs,
and beginning this week
The Foothills View will
bring you news of Boil
ing Springs gathered
under our heading “At
The Cross Roads.” If
you have an event you’d
like to publicize, or a
person you’d “just plain
like to do some bragging
on,” send us the in
formation at PO (Box
982, and look for it “At
The Cross Roads...”
— The Editor
“Where are the new
heros?” asked a Shelby
newspaper editor
several months ago. In
Boiling Springs, we can
answer,^ at the home of
Roscoe Barker.
In a dramatic rescue.
Barker pulled to safety
the occupant of a bur
ning mobile home last
Friday, after noticing
the fire on Dellinger
Road. The victim. Shag
Dedmon, is in
satisfactory condition at
Cleveland Memorial
Hospital with second-
and third-degree burns.
Had Barker not pulled
Dedmon out, he would
have remained where
he fell, inside the bur
ning trailer, a few feet
from a door where
Barker spotted him.
The View
congratulates this brave
man.
The program enabled
the two to study
government in
Washington the week of
Jan.lO-Feb.6.
Congratulations also
are in order for Becky
Proctor and Derek
Greene. Becky, the
daughter of Drs. Dan
and Lonnie Proctor of
Gardner-Webb, and
Derek, the son of Mr.
and Mrs. Randall W.
Greene of Shelby, were
selected as James P.
Porter Presidential
scholars from Crest
Senior High School.
Crest Junior High is
not lacking for honors
either. The nineth grade
band went to state
contest March 5 and
made a “superior”
rating. Superior is the
highest rating possible.
Craven Williams,
president of Gardner-
Webb College, at the
monthly meeting of the
Flinthills Chapter of the
DAR. Mrs. Reba Mc-
Swain was welcomed as
a new member.
“Hope Lives Eternal
in America” was the
topic of the speech
delievered by Dy.
History also lives in
the Cleveland County’s
Historical Museum’s
exhibit on Polkville. The
exhibit will be shown
March 14, from 2-5 p.m.,
and includes such
unusual items as a
vinegar pump, a glass
turkey compote, and a
home “tin” canning
machine.
c’r*''.':.