The Beaver Theatre and the Silent Film Organists
Near Dundee, Oregon
When the Beaver Theatre opened in nineteen twenty-five, it was built for live stage shows and silent pictures. To fill the silence between the title cards, the theater hired local teenage girls to play the organ, accompanying the drama and comedy on screen in real time. It was a job that required genuine musicianship, quick reflexes, and the ability to improvise when a reel ran long or a scene shifted unexpectedly.
The talkies arrived in nineteen thirty, and the first all-talking film screened here was Broadway. The talkies made the live organ accompaniment unnecessary. The marker here keeps the memory of a spot where local girls once played the score of a whole town's Friday nights.
