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Fortner remembers the grand old days of Greer theaters

Published on Friday, April 27, 2012

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This is where Don Fortner worked his first job. Fortner performed myriad tasks, as he had to know how to run the concession stand and prepare movies for showing.

Photo by Don Fortner

This is where Don Fortner worked his first job. Fortner performed myriad tasks, as he had to know how to run the concession stand and prepare movies for showing.



Enlarge photo

This photo of the Greer Theatre brings back memories of Don Fortner’s days as a teen working in various jobs.

Photo by Don Fortner

This photo of the Greer Theatre brings back memories of Don Fortner’s days as a teen working in various jobs.

 

Don Fortner wanted to protect the history of Greer’s movie theaters so he wrote a chapter and contributed photos to a just released book, “Single Screen Theaters of South Carolina”. 

Fortner contributed his post to GreerToday.com:

“The authors had no information on the Greer Theater at all. I wrote up what I remembered about the theater in the 50s and 60s. Under the Greer listing there was nothing listed for the theaters ... in Greer except their names. I wish more had contributed information on the Grand, the Rialto and another old theater in our town.

If you are interested in the book, which is a great history, with lots of facts and pictures, you probably can order from the website. It also may show up in bookstores. I plan to buy a few for my grandkids and kids. The age of the single screen, walk-in theater may be gone forever.
I worked in the theatre in 1962 and 1963. The managers I worked for were Mr. Reg Chesson, Mr. Aaron Bell, and Mr. Greene. It has been 44 years since I was last in the theatre. I remember it was part of my job to change the weekly lobby cards, which contained all those wonderful black and white photos of the movie scenes. I think of all the old photo cards that I changed over the years and put in the trash. If I had kept all of those I would probably be wealthy today as there is such a demand now for any of the old artifacts from those movie days.

Read the rest of Don Fortner’s chapter at http://www.scmovietheatres.com/greer.html

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