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The Pantages Theatre at 144 S. Main St., Salt Lake City, Salt Lake County, Utah, is significant under Criterion A in the area of Recreation/Entertainment and Criterion C for Architecture. The period of significance for the Pantages Theatre is 1920-1971, which starts at the date of the completion of construction, through the last theater renovation (1967), and up through fifty years before the current year. The theater continued operation through 1992. Under Criterion A, the Salt Lake City Pantages Theatre is significant as one of only a few vaudeville era theaters in Utah to have been adapted for film. Having now exceeded 100 years of being extant, the Pantages has proven to be resilient by retaining its high style interior over several decades while remaking itself multiple times to stay current. One of the renovations included the creating the first twinplex in Utah, and the first twinplex within an existing building. Constructed at the height of vaudeville’s popularity in Utah, but also within an era of theater construction across the state, the Pantages Theatre is one of the few remaining examples of how theaters were some of the most ornate buildings in any town.
The Salt Lake City Pantages Theatre, significant under Criterion C in the area of Architecture, was originally constructed between 1918-1920 by well-known vaudeville empresario Alexander Pantages who constructed and operated one of the largest entertainment circuits in America and Canada. Architect for the theater was Pantages’ preferred designer B. Marcus Priteca, whose works include the famous Hollywood Pantages Theatre as well as dozens of other theaters and Pacific Northwest landmarks. The style of the Salt Lake City Pantages Theatre is Italian Renaissance, branded as “Pantages Greek,” and was hailed as the most decorative theater in the state in the early twentieth century. It included innovative engineering in the use of a Warren steel truss, a Sturtevant HVAC system, and Priteca’s innovation of an acoustical sound accelerator. In order to keep up with theater economics over several decades, the theater’s exterior was altered four times, and the interior once. Prior to 1938, the third story of the theater was removed, the facade resheathed in Art Moderne aesthetic, and a new Moderne marquee installed. In 1968, the center section of the facade and marquee were again replaced, now with a smaller projecting roof of simple design. This was also the first major renovation of the interior, which created an up-and-down twin-plex on the interior and removed original interior finishes in the lower Auditorium in order to accommodate the renovation. Despite the alterations, the Salt Lake City Pantages Theatre retains integrity of setting, location, and design as a theater.
THIS BUILDING WAS RECENTLY PURCHASED BY A PRIVATE OWNER, WHO HAS SUBMITTED A LETTER OF OBJECTION TO THE NOMINATION. THE NOMINATION WILL STILL BE REVIEWED BY THE BOARD OF STATE HISTORY.
