It’s hard to believe it, but I first photographed the former Plaza Theater way back in April of 2009, when we were first starting to explore the West End and points to the north, such as Hamilton Heights and Wells-Goodfellow by heading up Clara Avenue. Today, it’s the Friendship Missionary Baptist Church, which has occupied the building now for quite a long time.

But it was originally built in 1910 as the Plaza Theater, with a seating capacity, according to various sources, between 500 and 735. The theater was built by the Plaza Amusement Company, whose offices were in the Wainwright Building. Famed brewery architects Weismann and Walsh, also in the Wainwright Building, designed the theater, while the general contractor was Kellerman Contracting Co, 510 Pine Street. It cost $23,000 to erect. At some point, the theater closed and a synagogue, Bais Yaakov Shul, moved in; I have had little luck finding out much about this congregation. It reopened in 1947 as a movie theater again operated by Wehrenberg but closed again in 1956. It may have become a church at that point.

The area around the theater-turned-church ranges from well-maintained two-families, as seen above along Montclair Avenue, to abandoned buildings, as seen below.

But just look at that finial below!

Beautifully kept houses sit right next to abandoned four-families.