Posted by Paul Wright on June 08, 2002 at 10:45:53:
My name is Paul Wright and I am currently the Board President for the Armstrong Community Theater, a non-profit community theater program in Armstrong County. we have recently taken a tour of the old Columbia Theater on Market Street in Downtown Kittanning. The old theater is now set up as office space for what used to be the armed forces recruiting center and now houses Helpmates. We toured the building because we are very interested in the fact that there is still an old theater remaining in downtown Kittanning. While we were in the building, we toured the lod balcony section, the projection room, some old dressing rooms and viewed the old stage which is now located under the floor of the existing office space inside. When I walked out onto the balcony, I had chills when I looked out over the building to see the arch way of the old stage and the walls still containing the original coverings. The balcony still had a few original seat and the projection room was still in place. The building was just screaming to be restored back to it's glory days as an active theater and an active part of the community in Kittanning. I am interested to see if anyone out there in cyberland has any information on this building when it was an active theater. If you have any information, pictures, or old stories about this theater, I would love to hear them. Our group is thinking about taking on the project and restoring this amazing building. If you would like to see this theater become a part of downtown Kittanning again, please get in touch with me by responding to this posting. In order to make this happen, we will definately need an enormous amount of community support. Take care.