Building series: it used to be a theater 1 – Klausenberg Synagogue

It was the Lee Theater for a while, and this is a little confusing because there was a large Lee Avenue Theater elsewhere earlier, which I’ll write about in part 2. It seems the Congress Club was also located there in the early 1920s, but that history is foggy; it perhaps served as offices. In 1922 the organ for music was installed, as the below picture shows.

In 1926, the manager of the theater made it into the Brooklyn Eagle newspaper when he was held on $500 bail for appropriating receipts, which he claimed to have done so he could pay the doctor’s bills for his sick wife”

“THEATER MANAGER HELD.

“Joseph Weber of 310 W. 99th st., manager of the Lee Theater, 131 Lee ave., was held in $500 bail for further examination next Tuesday, when arraigned yesterday in Bridge Plaza Court on a charge of larceny. Weber, it is alleged, appropriated receipts totaling about $4,500. Weber, it is declared, took the money to pay doctor’s bills for his wife, who has been ill.”

Then, in 1946, the theater was again in the news because it lost its license to admit children due to fire hazards. By this time, you can already see that the same theater, located at 131 Lee Avenue, was called Models Theater.

“Fourteen Brooklyn and Queens movie houses are among 19 which lost their children’s admission licenses because of violations of fire laws and other managerial laxity.

“The licenses were suspended for one and two-day periods, License Commissioner Benjamin Fielding announced yesterday. A total of 67 other theaters and movie houses will be warned today, the commissioner said, following a survey of 86 theaters where 147 violations were discolosed.

“Brooklyn movie houses whose children’s licenses were suspended are: Model Theater, 131 Lee Ave.”

In 1947, the theater made several appearances in the Brooklyn Eagle’s classifieds as they were hiring for whopping salaries of $20 a week. One could even be a “candy girl!”

The red boxed portion of the below ad reads: “CANDY GIRL. 1-9:30 daily. weekday off; $20 week. Model Theater Co. 131 Lee Ave.”

Philip Fishman remembered the Model Theater in A Sukkah is Burning:

“The Model movie theater had been a highly popular neighborhood institution during my childhood. The Model was a large, old fashioned theater located around the corner from my home, on Lee Avenue between Hewes and Hooper Street. For fourteen cents I and my friends, and frequently my mother, could see a triple feature. I remember many pleasant summer afternoons laughing at the cinema.”

The theater was even sensitive to the kosher laws of the many Orthodox Jews that lived in the neighborhood:

“Before Thanksgiving, the Model would hold a raffle where they would offer a turkey as the prize. In deference to neighborhood sensibilities it was a kosher turkey. One year my mother won the turkey. She was overjoyed. She told me that this was the first time in her life that she won anything, which, upon reflection, was a rather sad statement.”

Fishman remembers when it shut its doors:

Sometimes in the early fifties, the Model closed its doors as a movie theater and the building was purchased by the Klausenberger Rebbe, Rabbi Yekusiel Yehuda Halberstam, who converted it into a synagogue that is still active today. Needless to say, I was disappointed at this turn of events.

The August 10, 1947, Brooklyn Eagle announced the sale of the theater to an investor:

Lee Ave. Theater Sold to Investor

The Model Theater, located at 131-33 Lee Ave., Brooklyn, has been sold to an investing client of Standard Business Brokers, 8523 Bay Parkway, Brooklyn.

The deal was negotiated by Michael Honig, representing Standard. The principals were Kennis Amusement Corporation and S. Parlotta and F. LaCava. The attorneys representing the principals were Samuel Flasterstein and Harry T. Lindauer, respectively.”